*Faustin Soulouque was born on this date in 1782. He was a Black Haitian politician and military commander. Faustin-Élie Soulouque was born in Petit-Goâve, a small town in the French colony of Saint-Domingue, to a slave mother, Marie-Catherine Soulouque. She was a creole of ethnic Mandinka descent. Soulouque was freed because of a 1793 emancipation decree that […]
learn more*The birth of Jean-Baptiste Riché is celebrated on this date in 1780. He was a Black Haitian, a career officer, and a politician. Riché was born free, the son of a prominent free black man of the same name in the North Province of Saint-Domingue (the French colony that later became Haiti). His father was […]
learn more*John W. Joseph was born on this date in 1933. He was a Black politician and community activist. John Wilfred Joseph was the son of Reverend Adam Joseph and Mrs. Julia Lee Jones Joseph. During racial segregation, he was born and raised on his father’s farm in Plaisance, Louisiana. The state’s dual education system relegated […]
learn more*Homer Phillips was born on this date in 1880. He was a Black lawyer and public policy advocate. Homer Gilliam Phillips was born in Sedalia, Missouri. He was the son of a Methodist minister, but he was orphaned in infancy and raised by an aunt. Phillips’s interest in law led him to Washington, D.C., where […]
learn more*On this date in 1868, Cuba’s Ten Years’ War began. Also known as the Great War (Guerra Grande) and the War of ’68, it was part of Cuba’s fight for independence from Spain. Cuban-born planters and other wealthy natives led the uprising. Sugar mill owner Carlos Manuel de Céspedes and his followers proclaimed independence and […]
learn more*The birth of William R. Morris, Sr. is celebrated on this date in 1859. He was a Black professor and lawyer. William Richard Morris was born into slavery in Flemingsburg, KY. He was the son of Hezekiah (a slave), Elizabeth Hopkins Morris (free), and the brother of Edward H. Morris. Hezekiah bought his freedom and […]
learn more*José Martí was born on this date in 1853. He was an Afro Cuban nationalist, poet, philosopher, essayist, journalist, translator, professor, and publisher. Born in Havana, Spanish Empire, José Julián Martí Pérez began his political activism at an early age. In 1865, he enrolled in the Escuela de Instruction Primaria Superior Municipal de Varones, headed by Rafael […]
learn more*Inez C. Fields was born on this date in 1895. She was a Black lawyer and activist. Inez Catherine Fields was from Hampton, Virginia, the daughter of George Washington Fields, an attorney, and Sarah “Sallie” Haws Baker Fields. Her uncle James Apostle Fields, a Newport News attorney, served one term in the House of Delegates. Fields […]
learn more*Marian Fleming Poe was born on this date in 1890. She was a Black lawyer and women’s advocate. Lavinia Marian Fleming was born in Warwick County, Virginia, to Archer R. Fleming, a blacksmith and formerly enslaved person, and Florence M. Carter. She grew up in Newport News, Virginia. In 1910 she married Abram James Poe […]
learn more*George Washington Fields was born on this date in 1854. He was a Black Lawyer. Fields was the son of Washington Fields and Martha Ann Berkley, two enslaved people in Virginia. He grew up on a plantation in Hanover Courthouse, Virginia. During an American Civil War skirmish in July 1863, Fields and his family escaped the plantation […]
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