14th, and 15th amendments to the constitution raised peter's interest in politics. in 1876 peter was selected to be a presidential elector in the heavily-contested case. he was one of eight louisiana electors whose votes gave the election to president hayes and put him in the white house. and put him in the white house. in 1880 peter wrote to recommend his cousin william syphax. so there's a lot of ties not just here, but as you move away and people want to come back and understand what's going on with the family to help others. i would be happy to answer questions afterwards. [ applause ] >> thank you, steve. we'll have angela next. >> hi.

i want to first acknowledge that this was a photograph taken at the white house in front of the portrait of george washington. and thanks to beth taylor, who is the author of the paul jennings book, we were invited to the white house. the family, the deaccidents of paul jennings to have a private tour and take this photograph in front of the portrait. for those who have not read the book yet, paul jennings is credited with saving the original portrait during the war. i think it was 1809. we went there in 2009. the anniversary of him helping to save this portrait of george washington in the white house before it burned. so i want to acknowledge all of my cousins, many of whom i have met recently.

some who actually lived here in washington, where i have lived all my life and had never met. and some from other cities such as california and pennsylvania, et cetera. basically, i'm just going to mention a little bit about growing up here and being exposed to my family and paul jennings. i did not really grow up knowing about paul jennings. i knew that i had relatives or a relative that had worked in the white house probably for a president that was about the extent of it. but what i did have was a wealth of information about that side of my family. i grew up knowing paul jennings grandson. his grandson was my great uncle hugh. >> and paul jennings, uncle

hugh's parents were franklin and mary jennings. they lived at 2121 k street northwest. beth showed you a picture actually of franklin standing in front of their home. that home was there until about the late -- and i visited that home many times because my great great grandmother mary lived to be almost 100. she was 99. she kept the house wonderful with all kinds of artifacts including that portrait of paul jennings that you saw that hung in her house with many antiques, with swords from the spanish-american war, et cetera. so i did grow up actually seeing that and knowing about some of my history. and ironically, this area has been involved with my family for

a long time because my mother actually taught at stevens elementary school, which was at 21st and l, and my brother and sister attended stevens in the elementary years. i wound up at 24th and k for at mac late conception high school.at mac late conception h school.emac late conception hig school.cmac late conception hig school.mac late conception high school.mac late conception high school.amac late conception hig school.cumac late conception hih school.lamac late conception high school.tmac late conceptio high school.emac late conceptio high school.\mac late conception high school.mac late conception high school.ac late conception high school.c late conception high school. late conception high school.late conception high school.ate conception high school.te conception high school.e conception high school. conception high school. and i would get to walk past my great great grandparent's house, you know, a couple times a week. so i continued to be in this area and foggy bottom was, you know, home for me. also during the '80s, i worked down the street here at the va hospital and ate lunch many days in lafayette square not knowing that paul jennings had actually worked across the street, you know. had actually walked the same area that i was sitting out there eating in. and then even more ironic, i don't work down here anymore,

when borders was getting ready to close on l street, you know, i was in borders. i said, i didn't realize it was so old down here in the basement. well, according to beth's research, this was paul jenning's home. this had been part of his home, part of his foundation. so it's amazing how, you know, i'm still crossing paths with my ancestor. he's always been in my life, even though i didn't really know him. he's been there at some point or another. and even more ironic is my brother, who is now deceased, did his career at the department of interior for 30 years where paul worked at the department of interior. so those are just, you know, a couple tidbits to just kind of let you know how history has not

left families sometimes. that even though we're not here at the same time, some of it continues. and even now part of the family mary franklin are actually buried in the old mount zion cemetery, as somebody mentioned earlier this hair presentation over in georgetown. they are buried in the black section, which is not kept up, but it does have the headstones that you can see the family names on. so thank you. and i want to thank beth especially for being interested and curious about paul jennings and who he was and everything to actually document all this history. i can't tell you how thankful i am personally for having that. i mean i couldn't have done it. i don't have those kind of

resources. it's just phenomenal to be able to hear about what one of your ancestors did so many years ago. and thank you for the white house historical association for having this presentation, including paul jennings as part of it. [ applause ] >> thank you all for sharing those stories. and as i was listening to you all, one of the things that i found really interesting and also exciting is that, you know, probably the four families that you represent are ones that you think of kind of prominent black families that you, you know, that represent families that we know much about. but yet, through all of the work you are doing, there's still so much more to know and so much more to research, which is

interesting and exciting. with that, i want to open it up to the audience to see if anyone has any questions for our panelists. and there's someone who has a microphone and they will come to you. >> i'm directed towards mr. hammond. have you searched through the slave manifest records in new orleans or attempted to do that looking for your syphax ancestor? >> thank you for the question. i'm actually beginning to do that right now. looking at the national archives and don and i are planning a trip right now to new orleans. so as we gather our list, we're going to go down there and see what we can find. i was told a lot of the manifests would potentially have names there. so we are hopeful. >> just as a suggestion, it's something that i have actually initiated. my folks come from norfolk, virginia. what i discovered was, and this is something that's been reemphasized throughout many of the presentations, is that a lot of the traders had private sales. and so where you would normally

look in the deed records for evidence of these transactions, they are not there. one thing about new orleans is that they have these inward slave manifests. so you may not find them leaving, but you may find them arriving there. i've been to the notarial archives in louisiana. they are phenomenal. the staff is top notch. they will go out of their way to help you. so i will suggest that you spend about a week or so going through those records. it's just volume after volume after volume. i just wanted to mention that simply because some of the records at the national archives, there's only one side to it. and there's a wealth in new orleans. there's just a whole different culture understanding the french government. one other thing i wanted to say to all of the descendants, i came here because i was hoping to hear something more about your lineage.

i have been fascinated by your families since i was a kid. i've read about your families. for quite a long time and have been fascinated by the individual accomplishments and the continuity of those accomplishments, the effect, the influence that your ancestors had on our society. one question i wanted to ask each of you, or if you could answer this, when you found out at that juncture what your ancestor did, what kind of influence did it have on your life? >> steve? >> i guess the real big impact for me is when we found nancy syphax at the cater house. this occurred here in d.c. happened to be at an event and they saw her name on the placard

in the building that said nancy syphax lived here. and we were just floored because we have been looking to place nancy as opposed to her brother in arlington. it was exhilaration and it also opened about a thousand more questions. >> does anyone else want to answer a question about what it meant when you first found out about how famous and historical your ancestors were? >> i did. i looked up and said, not that again. because i was a little child. it wasn't until i became a more mature person that i appreciated the significance. but i can remember my great aunt, who is the little infant in the picture there, sitting me and trying to describe the scene and the frosted doors and the

elegance she had, little horse and carriage can. but she didn't spend so much time on that. she spent her time talking about honor and dignity and the way you carried yourself as being most important. on florida avenue, she lived over one house on 8th and s. i went out with her just a little 6-year-old. 7-year-old. we were going to the corner. and some person who looked like he might not have had a meal in a long time walked by and said hello. and she hid with her umbrella. she said you take your hat off when a lady walks by. never forget that. i always take off my hat. >> i was in 7th grade and my brother brought home a book called "great negros in american history." he said your great grandfather is in there. i looked at the book and saw his

picture in there. it was the first exposure i had to austin depriest. and that summer we went to church camp up in northern michigan. and we were playing volleyball and the ball went into the neighbor's yard. and there were three elderly black men sitting in the front yard on folding chairs. the ball bounced past one guy and i went and picked it up. and he said, boy, what's your name? and i said my name is phillip de priest. and he said, i used to work with your great grandfather back in the '20s and '30s. and of course, i was like, 11 years old, and i didn't appreciate the connection. and i went back to the volleyball game. that was it.

it wasn't until much later in my and my brother's appreciation for the depriests grew as we went to high school and then on to college. i reestablished a relationship with my grandfather in chicago, oscar jr. and that's when the story started to come out. he had remarried back in the '40s. my step grandmother franky was a tremendous source of information. especially considering jesse de priest. we had a lot of trouble finding out information about her. she was very, very quiet and reserved woman who didn't have a whole lot to say. she carried herself with great

poise and dignity and class and was always very concerned about being courteous to other people, no matter who they were. so that's the beginning of finding out more and more. being a political science and history major, i kind of took on a passion of finding out as much as i could about the both of them as years went by. >> do you want to talk about the impact? >> mainly i would say it's really been real interesting for me to find out about the things that he did and overcame all the obstacles of getting out of slavery.

but then also realizing that from him, he really did leave a legacy in our family. he left property in our family that still kind of goes on till today all the way down to the next generation. that is very significant, you know, for african-american families. for any family to last this long. >> are there any other questions? >> in doing your research, what we found looking up our family, property records was the best start we had definitely with slavery. then after slaves became free, the census records got a little shaky when it came to people of color.

did you find that in your research? to finding out your family if your family was in the slavery? was a slave? >> you have to become a student of census records and you have to take everything with a grain of salt. you cross reference and cross reference and cross reference. it's remarkable what you'd read the first time, when you go back and read it the second or third tenth time you always find something new. you go back and look at whatever records you think you'll know, you'll find something that you missed the first time around. or you'll find some linkage to a piece of information that you can use elsewhere. just last week, i found this story about robert old and being the confederacy and so forth.

and the emancipation document that he had filed, had to be served by the justice of the peace. it was from the same town that robert old was from. their fathers would have known each other back in the 1818 and 1820. i've had that in my files for years. just never know. >> this is for mr. de priest. as a congressman, do we know what committee work congressman de priest was influential on or involved in? >> i'm sorry? >> what committee work oscar depriest did as a congress member. >> as far as legislation is concerned, his record is somewhat limited. he was working against a constant head wind whenever he

did introduce that kind of legislation. he was successful in getting an amendment to build and establish the civilian conservation corps in 1933, which made any kind of -- you couldn't discriminate for race or religion when people were looking to get a job with the conservation board, which opened up thousands and thousands of jobs for african-americans. so he was very successful in that regard. he did introduce an anti-lynching bill into the house, twice, that was defeated. it really kind of blows your mind when you think about the kind of environment that he had to function in when an anti-lynching bill -- it didn't even make lynching a crime. it held accountable the

or county who were holding a poor soul in their -- in their jail. if a mob came and dragged out, you know, this poor soul and lynched them. the authorities that that sheriff or that county sheriff would be held accountable for what happened. so basically what -- what that said that it's okay to lynch black people in america, and you won't be held accountable or go to jail for it. there's -- it's really a black mark on congress' history when you think about that. >> i think that's a good -- i'm sure you all have many questions and we can continue the

conversation, but i think that that's a good point for us to end, and i think it's poignant, and it pulls out from everything that we've heard today is to think about these descendants that they represent and what they want phyllis therouxout the -- throughout their lives and it's an its operati it's an inspiration for us when we're challenged to bring justice and equity as their descendants did and as they continue to do so thank you very much. in may of 2011, historian richard norton smith led a ten-day bus tour from asheville, north carolina to austin, texas. the group stopped at several presidential and historic sites along the route. one of the stops was the andrew johnson homestead in greenville, tennessee, a site owned and operated by the national parks service. johnson served as vice president under president lincoln, and

succeeded him when lincoln was assassinated. here's park guide daniel luther portraying president johnson and telling the story of how andrew johnson met abraham lincoln. >> in 1847 i went into the 30th congress for my third term representing the people of the first district, and while i was there i met an extremely tall raw-boned young man representing the prairie state of illinois, and his name was abraham lincoln. and we fell into conversation, and i introduced myself and told him that i was from northeast tennessee, and he replied that he had relatives in northeast tennessee and perhaps i knew some of them. he identified his great uncle isaac as having owned a faum up on the wautauga on which his father thomas lincoln had worked as a hired hand in the 1790s and identified another great uncle, a gentleman by the name of moredichai, who lived in the

town of greenville, to which i replied greenville is my hometown, and your great uncle moredichai in fact performed a wedding ceremony for me and my wife eliza in 1827 as well as in order die and i served on the town council together in 1829, and i reassured mr. lincoln that he was in good hands in terms of politics, that his great uncle had gained a great many more votes than i had, but like many young men who came into congress at the time, we went in there with goals, and each of us had a cherished goal that we wanted to achieve in that congress. mine was the introduction of a homestead bill. for mr. lincoln it was the introduction of legislation which would have provided for compensated emancipation of slaves in the district of columbia. and like other young men who go into congress we found out it is not so easy to get your cherished goals be a published. so we left that session of

congress without those bills passed. i would serve two more terms. mr. lincoln, that would be his only term in the house of representatives. at the beginning of the fourth term i bought the house that you have just seen, but it is irony. those of us who lived through our late unhappy struggle often felt that we were caught up in the hands of fate, and as fate would have it, each of us, abraham lincoln and myself, were 15 years in the future able to help the other achieve that earlier cherished goal. for my part, abraham lincoln signed the homestead bill into law in 1862. in 1864, i helped mr. lincoln gain at least one state into the column of abolition, emancipation, and that is the state of tennessee that you're visiting today. you heard some of these words earlier, so i'm going to give you just a short excerpt. in october of 1864, word got out

that i as military governor was about to issue a proclamation of emancipation for the slaves in tennessee, and this created a large gathering at the state capital, and i stepped out to address them, and used some of the following words. colored people of nashville, you have always heard of the president's proclamation by which he proclaims that a large portion of the slaves in the states still in rebellion have been declared henceforth and forever free. for reasons which seemed wise to the president, this proclamation did not apply to you or to your native state. conseque consequently, many of you were left in bondage. the fetters still galled your limbs. gradually this inequity has been passing away, but the time has come for the last vestiges of it to be removed. therefore, i, without reference to the president or any other

person have a proclamation to make and standing here on the steps of the capitol, with the past history of the state to witness, its present condition to guide, its future to encourage me, i, andrew johnson, do hereby proclaim freedom, if you will, broad and unconditional to every man in tennessee. those were words. some four months later we backed them up with action. the convention i called to recreate a loyal state government to the union, also enacted an amendment to the tennessee state constitution ending forever slavery in this state which became part of our constitution with a popular vote of the people on february 22nd, 1865. shortly after that, i went back to washington to take the seat as vice president. the second highest office in the gift of a free people.

five weeks later the war was over, and one of its final casualties, our murdered president, and with his death the burden he had borne for four years fell upon my shoulders. sorrowful times, discouraging times, and yet as i spoke to the gathering of the cabinet that came to my rooms at the kirkwood hotel the morning of april 15, i told them that i had hope. i had hope that our government, having emerged from its present trials would settle on policies more consonant with the great principles of free government than it had heretofor, and i believed this nation would come together and would move forward, and i had good strong reason for my hope. i had faith in the union. i had faith, abiding faith, in the constitution, and above all

else i had faith in the people. thank you for your kind attention. >> one quick question. >> sir. >> there's a bit of a controversial 100 years later over you and the part you played and the decision and the trial of the lincoln conspirators. >> yes, sir. >> and in particular the decision, the unprecedented decision on the part of the federal government to execute a woman, mary sirat. could you tell us how that came about? >> yes, sir. i will tell you, and i'm aware of the controversy, and i'm aware there are a number of of different sides to it, that in my view mrs. sirat was guilty. i believe she was the person who kept the nest that hatched the egg. however, the controversy arises over this. having been convicted by military tribunal and having been sentenced to death by that

same tribunal, five of the nine judges on the tribunal recommended clemency for mrs. sirat. in other words, that her death sentence be commuted to life in prison. i was unaware of that commutation recommendation. i was freshly into my office. i was allowing myself to be guided by the cabinet and the other officers who had been present, and when judge advocate joseph holt brought me the papers, including the death warrants, i signed them. some two years later, 1867, now, it is interesting, this is when the secession of the -- i'm sorry, the impeachment crisis was emerging. the newspapers began printing the awareness that a recommendation of clemency had been made, and that i had ignored it, and i sent to the war department requesting to see those documents, and when i did see them, it appeared to me that the clemency recommendation, which was right there, had been torn out and