Artifact could have roots in Barnwell County

Among the artifacts at the new Smithsonian National Museum of African-American History and Culture is a piece that could hold roots in Barnwell County.

“Ashley’s Sack” is a slavery-era artifact that is unique and has intrigued historians since it was found at a Tennessee flea market in 2007. It might appear to be just an ordinary feed or seed sack, but the embroidered words tell a story of love and loss during a painful time in America’s history.

The words embroidered on the sack in 1921 by Ruth Middleton reveal that her grandmother, a slave named Ashley, was sold at age 9 in South Carolina and was torn away from her mother, Rose. Before the two were separated, Rose placed a tattered dress, three handfuls of pecans and a braid of her hair in the sack for her daughter to take with her. She told Ashley, “It be filled with my LOVE always,” according to the colorful embroidered words.

Rose and Ashley would never see one another again.

There are a lot of unanswered questions about what happened to Ashley after she was sold, but the sack was a treasured reminder of her mother’s love as it was passed down through the generations of her family.

“Ashley’s Sack is very moving and hits people in a very special way,” said Mark Auslander, who teaches in the department of anthropology and museum studies at Central Washington University in Ellensburg, Wash.

Auslander believes he can shed some light on Ashley after spending more than a year researching the lineage of the three women whose names are on the sack.

“The 150-year history of the sack demonstrates how, in the face of structural forces that systematically alienated property from enslaved and liberated people of color, a single material object was inherited, preserved, and creatively transformed across time and space,” wrote Auslander in a blog for Southern Spaces.

IT IS A “VERY PAINSTAKING” process to research people from Ashley’s era because of a lack of records from slavery.

However, Auslander located a “Rose” and “Ashley” listed among the slaves owned by wealthy Charleston merchant and farmer Robert Martin Sr. Inventory records indicate that his lavish household on Charlotte Street in Charleston had seven slaves, including one named Rose who was valued at $700. About 100 miles away, Martin’s Milberry Place plantation in the old Barnwell District (present day Allendale County) contained about 105 slaves in 1853, including a family group with one named Ashley who was valued at $300, Auslander said.

Having looked through hundreds of records, Auslander believes the Rose and Ashley owned by Martin are likely the mother and daughter mentioned on the sack. He said Ashley was a “very rare” name for a black female slave in those times as it was commonly associated with white males.

Research also revealed that Milberry Serena Martin, Robert Martin’s widow, sold slaves from Milberry Place after her husband’s death in December 1852 as a means to raise money to provide for her children’s inheritance. However, no direct evidence has been uncovered to corroborate the story of Ashley being sold and separated from her mother.

“All we can say is that the 1921 embroidered account – of a 9-year-old Ashley being sold away from her mother Rose – is consistent with the extant documentary record of Robert Martin’s estate,” Auslander said.

HE THEN DELVED into identifying the Ruth Middleton who embroidered the sack, which she said belonged to her grandmother Ashley. After looking at all of the Ruth Middletons listed on the 1920 census, “none of them made sense,” said Auslander.

However, he found a Ruth Jones who was born in Columbia in 1903 listed in the 1910 census. Her parents, Rosa Clifton and Austin Jones, worked as servants at the University of South Carolina. Auslander said Rosa’s name could be a tribute to Ashley’s mother Rose since they are similar.

Ruth Jones married Arthur Middleton in 1918 in Philadelphia, where she worked as a domestic servant. She gave birth to a daughter, Dorothy Helen Middleton, in 1919.

While Ruth Middleton’s family cannot be directly linked as coming from Milberry Place Plantation, there is “strong circumstantial evidence” linking her mother and maternal grandparents to that region of South Carolina.

In addition to family roots in South Carolina, Middleton resided outside of the state, was literate and lived with wealthy families where she likely could have learned the skills needed to create the needlework on the sack.

“All those little pieces fit together,” Auslander said. “The evidence looks pretty good.”

Auslander also tracked the Clifton name of Ruth Middleton’s mother Rosa.

“The 1870 census, the first to record the names of all recently-emancipated African-Americans, records about 60 African-Americans named Clifton in the state of South Carolina,” said Auslander.

This includes a black Clifton family in Columbia as well as some families between Columbia and the Savannah River in Barnwell County townships, such as Barnwell and Blackville, and nearby Orangeburg communities.

“Nearly all of these Clifton families reside within a 50-mile radius of Robert Martin’s Milberry Place Plantation where Ashley was clearly enslaved in 1852,” Auslander said. “It looks like everything is leading to the same part of the state.”

AUSLANDER AND his wife, Ellen Schattschneider, explored the property where Milberry Plantation used to be and searched the Barnwell County Courthouse for any possible leads during a trip to South Carolina lasst month. They plan to return in the summer.

SmithSonian muSeum The embroidered sack tells of a girl named Ashley who was sold into slavery and separated from her mother.

They received a few leads on possible Clifton relatives, but they encourage anyone with information to contact them. They specifically want to meet with anyone with the last name of Clifton or Martin – the name of the former plantation owner. Anyone with information can contact Auslander at Mark. Auslander@cwu.edu.

“It seems pretty likely there are descendants of Ashley living in the Barnwell area,” said Auslander.

Schattschneider said one issue that could be hindering their search is alternate spellings of names possibly being recorded. This could happen for a variety of reasons, but it can hamper a search for information.

Ashley’s Sack was loaned to the new Smithsonian African-American history museum last year. It opened in September 2016.

Regardless of whether he can connect the dots about the sack’s past, it is still a unique piece since so much of African-American history was oral history rather than written down, Auslander said. It’s also one of the few pieces in the museum’s collection of 37,000 pieces that was owned by slaves.

“It is a national treasure,” he said.