Wickham House: Amy Green

Amy Green was a member of the First African Baptist Church, as well as a wife, a mother and a grandmother. She was also an enslaved woman living in Richmond, Virginia, during the early to mid-1800s.  

Our knowledge of many of the details of Amy’s story is unusual for enslaved people during this period, and most of what we know about her does not come from personal accounts in her own words, like a diary or letters to her family.  Her story is pieced together from church and hospital records, financial records and letters written by members of the Wickham family who enslaved her.  

Census records indicate that Amy was born around 1790.  The next piece of her story comes from the records of First African Baptist Church where she was a member. Church records show that when Amy was baptized on October 3, 1830, she was married to Billy Green, a man also enslaved by the Wickhams. Amy’s death appears in the church meeting minutes from August 7, 1859, placing the date of her death between July 3 and August 7, 1859.   

After the death of Amy’s enslaver John Wickham, in 1839, Amy and the rest of those he enslaved remained in bondage to the Wickham family. 

In the Wickham household, Amy served as nurse to Gabriella Wickham Leigh’s infant daughter Ella (John Wickham’s daughter and granddaughter) in 1851 or 1852. Gabriella died shortly after childbirth in March 1851, and the infant Ella, passed away in December 1852. 

In September 1852, one of the Wickham daughters, Bettina, wrote to her brother Littleton, “Please tell Uncle Billy that Amy is looking quite smart again. She is able to go about her washing. She has had no return whatever of her mental attack.” Bettina also indicated her intent to write a letter for Amy to her husband Billy. 

Amy was institutionalized twice at Eastern State Hospital, known then as a “lunatic asylum,” in Williamsburg, first from 1853-1854 and again from 1856-1859. The reasons for her institutionalization are unclear, but she was described as having a “mental attack” and exhibiting signs of derangement.  

On September 8, 1853, Amy entered Eastern State Hospital. Patient records indicate that Amy disputed having any mental illness.   

Amy’s daughter Nancy made a statement to the hospital’s superintendent describing her mother as temperate, a Baptist Church member and having domestic dispositions. She explained that prior to this “mental attack” Amy worked nursing the infant Ella and that other enslaved workers “seemed jealous of her being entrusted with the duty of nursing the infant of her young mistress.”  

She said that Amy’s “disease” began in August, when she tried to climb out a window to “wander off.” This statement by Amy’s daughter to the hospital Superintendent is significant because it comes from an enslaved person’s own words.  

Amy’s first institutionalization in 1853 happened during a time of great change in the Wickham House. Elizabeth Wickham, the family matriarch and overseer of the enslaved people in the house, and her daughter Elizabeth (“Bettina”) Wickham, who still resided in the Wickham home, both died that year. For enslaved people, the death of their enslaver was a time of uncertainty and fear. Sales of estates commonly resulted in the sale of enslaved people away from their families, communities and sometimes to other states. 

Records from Eastern State Hospital indicate that while institutionalized, Amy was given laudanum and laxatives, which were described as having no effect on her. In October, Amy was described as appearing sane, but unconscious of her “derangement, and indeed she denies its existence.” The following month she was said to “continue to improve.” Later entries described her as continuing “nearly rational and also to fatten,” and “very fat.”  

Amy was discharged from the hospital on March 2, 1854, when she was declared “recovered.” 

Not long after her discharge, the executors of John Wickham’s estate sold Amy, her daughter Nancy and Nancy’s child to a Richmond hotelier named John Ballard for $400. Ballard had purchased the Wickham House from the family in 1854 and was also aware that Amy had been institutionalized. However, after Ballard purchased the trio, he complained to one of the executors, William F. Wickham, that Nancy also exhibited signs of being “deranged.” Wickham agreed to refund Ballard for his purchase. 

By May 17, 1856, Amy was again institutionalized at Eastern State, paid for again by the Wickham estate. This time the patient notes were minimal, recording that at first Amy was melancholy and had little to say. Later she was described as “working industriously” and still later as having recovered from chills.  

Amy seems to have remained at Eastern State until late April 1859 (based on a final payment of $73.25 to Eastern State in 1859). Sometime between 1858 and1859, Eastern State officials informed William Fanning Wickham that Amy would need to leave the hospital. Not because she recovered, but because the hospital was full. An act of the Virginia General Assembly decreed that enslaved patients could not take a space needed by a free white or “coloured” person.  

In an undated excerpt of Wickham’s response to this notification, he said
“… I really do not know what disposition to make of the poor creature. … She was so much better when distant from her former residence in Richmond that I am unwilling to bring her back. Could no one be found in Williamsburg or the neighborhood who would take charge of her & treat her kindly?…” 

The last record for Amy is when her death at Eastern State is reported on August 7, 1859, in the First African Baptist Church meeting minutes. Nothing in Eastern State’s records, Wickham’s financial records or his letters indicates what happened to Amy after she was made to leave Eastern State – or if she stayed at the hospital until her death as the church records suggest.  

While Amy’s story contains information about her institutionalization, there are missing details about her as an individual. We are missing important information – such as her birthday, exact death date, and final resting place – but also smaller details that would allow us to paint a picture of Amy as a person with her own unique personality. 

Unlike the stories of the Wickhams who enslaved Amy and her family, Amy Green’s story lacks her own voice. Research into her story is ongoing as the Valentine works to uncover more information about the individuals enslaved by the Wickhams.  

Consider This…

• Based on what we know about Amy, how much control over her own life do you think she had? 
• Why don’t we know more about Amy Green’s story and how it ended? 
• How has mental health treatment changed since the 1800s? 
• What do you wish we knew about Amy Green’s story?
  

Sources

• Elizabeth Selden Maclurg Wickham, letter to Littleton Waller Tazwell Wickham (Virginia Museum of History and Culture Mss1W6326cFA2, Richmond, date unknown). 
• “Eastern State Hospital Series I. Admission and Statistical Registers – Patients, Register of (1852-1853), Volume 028” (Library of Virginia, Virginia, 1853), entry 341. 
• “First African Baptist Church Minutes 1841-1859,” (microfilm at Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA). 
• William Fanning Wickham, “Day Book” (Virginia Museum of History and Culture Mss1W6326cFA2, undated). 
• John Wickham, “Last Will and Testament” (Virginia Museum of History and Culture Mss1 W63236 c FA2, Richmond, 1839) 
• “Eastern State Hospital Series I. Admission and Statistical Registers – Patients, Register of (Patient Census) 1812- 1868, Volume 003” (Virginia, Library of Virginia)
  Master Patient Index Card (Virginia Department of Behavioral Health and Development Services, Williamsburg, 1852). 
• Census Office, 1850 United States Census (Washington, DC, 1850).