The Marshall Family, Part I: The Long Road to Coronado
Civil War hero Edmund Marshall and wife Martha, both former slaves from Kentucky, followed E.S. Babcock to Coronado in 1887. They are the first documented African American residents of Coronado.
A note: I certainly wish I could share these remarkable lives in a shorter format. I have considered reducing the length of these stories by simply covering their lives once they arrived in Coronado, but feel that would be an injustice to what they endured to get here, and it would also be a failure on my part to share with you the fuller history needed to understand their lives.
In Part II on the Marshall family you learn how Edmund Marshall became the first African American employee of the Hotel Del, working first as a laborer and later in the hotel ice factory. You will also learn that the Marshall family were the first African Americans to own property in Coronado, as well as the first to have children attend Coronado schools. Edmund and his sons Richmond and William were also cofounders of the iconic and historically important Fidelity Lodge #10 in 1903, an African American institution which still operates in San Diego today.
Early life of Edmund Marshall, Coronado Pioneer
Edmund Marshall was born enslaved on a tobacco farm five miles south of the city of Henderson, Kentucky, along the Madisonville road, sometime between 1838 and 1840. His parents are unknown. He was described in some records as mulatto or “copper,” indicating perhaps that his father or grandfather was white. He and the others on this farm were part of the deceased William Marshall’s “family trust,” established in 1835. The trust ruled that the property and “negroes” of the deceased would be managed by an executor, John G Holloway, who would be tasked with the annual selling off of slaves or property to maintain the wife and children of William Marshall.
Oversight and management of the Marshall tobacco farm would certainly have been conducted by employees or overseers, who themselves would have been paid by the trust through the periodic selling off of slaves, creating a perilous “hunger games” situation for all the men, women and children enslaved on the Marshall farm for the next 15 years. On every New Year’s Day in Henderson, the annual slave auction was held in order to sell slaves ‘down the river” to the cotton and sugar plantations in the deeper south. Most would never to see their families again.
The farm would eventually be managed by a son of the deceased, William J. Marshall, who settled on the farm in 1851 at age 24. He would marry several years later, and have 6 children over the next two decades. In 1860, according to the US Slave Schedules of that year, there were twenty four men women and children owned by William J. Marshall, with 20 year old Edmund Marshall likely among them.
When the Civil War erupted in April of 1861, Kentucky made a practical decision to stay within the Union, even though they were fully committed to the institution of slavery. Kentucky was geographically, economically and politically interwoven into the fabric of both the North and South, with railroads going north and south and the majestic Ohio River marking the border between free and slave state. Both U.S. President Lincoln and Confederate leader Jefferson Davis were born in Kentucky. While slaves accounted for twenty-percent of the population of Kentucky, it was nearly forty percent in Henderson County due to the highly profitable dark leaf tobacco industry located there. As I have written before, Henderson County, Kentucky, was at one point considered the richest county per capita in the country as a result of the slave-labor dark leaf tobacco trade.
The election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 came as a shock to the all states economically dependent on slavery. Only 1,341 Kentuckians voted for Lincoln, representing less than 1% of the vote. Anxiety about the future of slavery ignited debate immediately after Lincoln’s election with talk of secession. During these debates in the Kentucky capital, Henderson native and former US Senator Archibald Dixon, himself a large slave owner, was one of the most influential voices that convinced the current state leaders to remain in the Union. Despite the attempts by local leaders to calm the white citizens about their need to stay in the Union, paranoia about slave revolts and mass escapes were rife.
Just days before the start of the war, on April 1st, an event took place in Henderson that shook its citizens to the core - it was the murder of a Dr. Norwood by the fugitive slave Jim Brown.
Brown had reportedly killed Norwood in a botched rescue mission to free his enslaved wife from the nearby Cannon farm. Knowing that Brown was armed, dangerous and on the loose, the town leaders received approval from the Governor to put a bounty on the head of the fugitive Brown. Large numbers of armed vigilante groups scoured the countryside looking for Brown. He was caught days later in the barn of William J. Marshall and was shot dead on the spot. This was the very farm where Edmund Marshall lived. Hours later, hundreds of the white citizens of Henderson came to view the body of the slain fugitive on the Marshall farm.
Just weeks after the slaying of Brown, Henderson authorities put in place harsher measures aimed to restrict the movement and gathering of slaves in Henderson. They placed a ban on all church gatherings, unless conducted by a white pastor, and created an armed vigilante force known as the “Henderson Guards.” A description of the changes in the slave laws in 1861 is found in Edmund Starling’s book, The History of Henderson County:
“The teaching of negro Sunday Schools was prohibited, and the meeting of that race in the city for public worship when conducted, controlled, or assisted by a slave, or free negro, was declared to be a nuisance. It was made the duty of the Marshal to disperse all such meetings, and to arrest the person or persons by whom the same was conducted, and if the preacher, speaker or exhorter be a slave he was to be punished with any number of lashes not less than ten, nor more than twenty, and if a free negro to be fined not less than twenty, nor more than fifty dollars.
Mr. Beverly reported on the twenty-sixth of April that he had purchased the powder directed in the order of the previous meeting, and thereupon a motion was made to furnish the “Henderson Guards,"with such quantities as they may need for "protection purposes."
The Mayor was then instructed to notify the colored preacher, Green, not to preach here any more.”
The “Henderson Guard” slave patrols remained a constant fixture throughout the war in Henderson, creating an atmosphere of fear and terror for the enslaved population of Henderson, including Edmund and those living on the Marshall Farm. However, things took a dramatic turn in 1864, when colored members of the Union Army from other States periodically moved through the area and spread word that the Union Army would finally be allowing colored troops from Kentucky to join the Union.
Lincoln had made a “devil’s bargain” with the “border states” like Kentucky that if they remained in the Union, the Emancipation Proclamation would not apply to slaves in their state, and that they could continue the practice of slavery during the war. That bargain was now falling apart and Kentucky could do little about it. As the final push against the Confederacy turned to Kentucky, which had lost political influence as the Confederacy began to crumble, nearly 24,000 enslaved men rushed to join the United States Colored Troops.
For 24 year old Edmund Marshall, everything was about to change.
On the morning of August 24th, 1864, 24 year old Edmund Marshall walked away from the Marshall Farm en route to his first day of freedom. He walked ten hours to Owensboro and enlisted with Company D of the 118th Regiment of the United States Colored Troops.
On September 15th, three weeks later, the remaining 24 men, women and children enslaved on the Marshall Farm would arrive safely at the Union garrison in Owensboro, most certainly assisted on that journey by Edmund.
Among the 25 former slaves of William J Marshall, every male aged 16 and older enlisted in the 118th Regiment to join the fight for freedom. They included: Edmund Marshall (24), Bill Marshall (35), Fred Marshall (16), Levi Marshall (19), Manuel Marshall (34), Thornton Marshall (16), Tom Marshall (16), William Marshall (18) and William E Marshall (25). Peter Marshall (35) was denied enlistment as physically unfit. Fred Marshall (16), would die from chronic diarrhea in a Union hospital in February 1865. William Marshall, 18, would be gravely disabled in action in March of 1865. The remaining seven Marshall men served honorably with the 118th until they mustered out at White’s Ranch, Texas in February of 1866.
Slave master William J Marshall left his farm for the town soon after:
The 118th Regiment of the USCT in the Civil War
After several weeks of filling the ranks in Owensboro, the 118th Regiment traveled to Baltimore, Maryland, and in October of 1864 were officially mustered in. The regiment departed the following month for Virginia where they would join the siege operations against Confederate forces in Petersburg and Richmond as part of the XXV Corps. The XXV Corps was the single largest African American unit of the Union Army during the American Civil War. It was also the only all-Black Army Corps in United States military history, with three divisions totaling around 16,000 men.
According to regimental records, beginning on January 28th of 1865 Edmund was hospitalized for a prolonged period at Point of Rocks Union hospital in Virginia. This was the same hospital where 16 year old Fred Marshall, possibly Edmund’s brother, died on February 3rd. Edmund would not return to duty until late March.
Of the 180,000 Colored troops who served in the Civil War, disease claimed the lives of 30,000 men, while another 10,000 perished in combat. This casualty rate of over 20% remains the highest casualty rate of any organized unit in United States Military history.
On April 3rd, 1865, a recovered Edmund and his 118th Infantry Regiment, part of General Draper’s 1st Brigade, were given the order to march on Richmond. They did so on the “double-quick” and as result, the 118th were one of the first regiments to reach the center of Richmond and begin to take control of the city. This fact was corroborated by journalist Thomas Morris Chester, who was traveling with the XXV Corps:
There may be others who may claim the distinction of being the first to enter the city, but as I was ahead of every part of the force but the Calvary, which of necessity must lead the advance, I know whereof I affirm when I announce that General Draper’s brigade was the first organization to enter the city limits. According to custom, it should constitute the provost guard of Richmond.
General Draper’s brigade is composed of the 22nd, 36th, 38th and 118th U.S. Colored troops, the 36th being the first to enter Richmond.
-Thomas Morris Chester, from Black Civil War Correspondent
Edmund and the troops of the 118th were present the following day in Richmond when a triumphant Abraham Lincoln entered the city. Lincoln would be tragically assassinated just ten days later in Washington D.C.
Edmund and the 118th remained as part of the occupying force of Richmond until the 22nd of May, when news broke that the Colored Troops of the XXV Corps were heading for Brownsville, Texas. By June 4th all but a few Regiments had set sail for Texas. The XXV Corps were part of the overall 40,000 Union Army force sent to serve as a military deterrent against Napoleon III’s French imperialist occupation of Mexico.
Edmund, with six others from the Marshall Farm, traveled by sea from Virginia to Brazos Santiago in South Texas, a journey that would take 25 days. Once in Texas, he and his fellow troops found the conditions stark and inhospitable, with few options to supplement their diet and supply lines hampered by the lack of a rail link. Over the next several months, Edmund and the colored troops of the XXV Corps built an 11 mile railroad line that connected to a line in the interior of Texas. Despite this effort many troops of the 118th fell sick and died as a result of the poor diet and cramped living conditions. In his regimental documents, it shows that Edmund was admitted to the hospital three separate times while in Texas.
“No set of men in any country ever suffered more severely than we in Texas. Death has made fearful gaps in every regiment." - 25th Corps Chaplain
In January of 1866, Edmund and the men of the 118th Regiment were based in Clarksville, near the mouth of the Rio Grande, directly across the river from the Imperial Mexican trading post and garrison town of Bagdad.
The men of the 118th Regiment were sympathetic to the Mexican Republican forces of Juarez, and also knew that Bagdad had been an important Confederate supply post during the war. In the predawn hours of January 4th, members of the 118th combined with a group of American mercenaries and Mexican Republican troops, launched a successful covert attack and occupation of Bagdad. Several members of the 118th died in the raid. This remarkable raid helped contribute to Napoleon’s doubts about his imperialist adventure in Mexico. He would announce a French withdrawal from Mexico three weeks later on January 31, 1866, which was completed in November of the following year.
The 118th Regiment mustered-out of Texas in February 1866.
Back to Henderson, 1866-1886
Edmund had left Henderson in 1864 as a slave, and returned in 1886 as a free man and a war hero to his local African American community. However, much of Kentucky was in a state of confusion and chaos in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War. Many white Kentuckians lamented the outcome of the war and the end of the lucrative institution of slavery. The white citizens of Kentucky were generally resentful of African American’s new found freedom and citizenship, and feared vengeance or retribution for their historically brutal treatment of them. The return to Henderson of former slaves who were now confident, free, battle-hardened veterans of the Union Army (which included seven from the Marshall Farm), would have certainly added to that fear. At the same time, Henderson’s wealth was heavily dependent on African American labor, so there were legitimate efforts by some to improve the social services to African American residents for fear of labor migration. It was during this time that the Freedman’s Bureau, the Federal agency tasked with serving refugees and newly free African Americans across the South, began its difficult work in the early years of Reconstruction. Many African Americans like Edmund Marshall made the adjustment to this new reality as wage earners in Henderson, made possible by the high profits of the tobacco industry.
Despite these efforts, a new violent reality began to emerge for African Americans across the south, arriving in Henderson in 1868. It was the emergence of the Ku Klux Klan, and its use of political violence against African Americans to disrupt the policies and programs of Reconstruction.
A Freedman’s Bureau report by Brevet Major James McCreery said on April 22, 1868, “a crowd of about 30 persons collected in Henderson with the avowed purpose of mobbing the jail and lynching two negroes that are confined there. Had it not been for the troops (of the Freedman’s Bureau), the rioters would have succeeded. It is believed that a branch of the Ku Klux Klan has been organized here.”
— Frank Boyett, The Henderson Gleaner, January 25, 2019
The mayor of Henderson at the time, Edmund Starling, attempted to deal with this dangerous development head on. He was granted additional resources to double the size of his police force and began interrogating local citizens to learn about who were members of the Klan. His efforts reduced the masked presence of the Klan in the town and surrounding farms, but the tension and danger certainly remained.
Marriage to Martha “Matt” Dallam
In 1869, amidst this chaotic resettling of the “new normal” in Henderson, Edmund Marshall married Martha “Matt” Dallam. Matt, like Edmund, was born enslaved, and was the inherited property of the Dallam children, L.C. and Virginia. Both L.C. and Virginia would eventually marry into wealth. L.C. married into the extremely wealthy Soaper family, while Virginia married John Atkinson, the son of millionaire tycoon George Atkinson.
Edmund and Martha’s first child, William, was born in 1869 (son Richmond was born in 1872 and daughter Florence in 1880).
Between 1870 and 1877, Matt, Edmund, and their sons Richmond and William lived in the mansion of Virginia Atkinson’s millionaire father in law, George Atkinson, a man who had pioneered tobacco growing in Henderson, building his wealth on the lives and backs of hundreds of slaves between 1820 and 1865. Edmund worked there as a laborer, while Matt was the cook for the elderly tycoon. George Atkinson died in 1877, after which the Marshalls moved into a small home behind John and Virginia Atkinson’s home on Green Street.
As a result of political pressure both in the North and the South, combined with the violent tactics of the Klan, Reconstruction collapsed in 1877. Thus began the long period of Jim Crow segregation and the affirmation of white supremacy as the future reality for African Americans in the South, while the North embraced many of the customs and norms of Jim Crow, treating African Americans as inferior and second-class citizens.
According to the Census of 1880, the Marshall family lived on Green Street behind the Atkinson home. Edmund again is listed as a laborer, likely for the Atkinson family, while Matt is listed as a homemaker. Their son William was listed as attending school, likely at the colored school in town. Their son Richmond is missing from the census data, and only appears later with sister Florence in the census data from Coronado.
In 1886, a man will arrive in Henderson that will change everything for the Marshall family, and present them with an opportunity to leave Kentucky behind, and start a new life.
Elisha S. Babcock, visionary founder of Coronado, arrives in Henderson in 1886
In early 1886, Elisha S. Babcock formerly of Evansville, Indiana, and current resident of San Diego, California, had just completed the purchase of Coronado island and was in need of additional funds to build the Hotel Del Coronado, the crown jewel of his vision for Coronado. He made an important fundraising trip to Henderson, located just across the Ohio River from Evansville, with hopes to raise funds from the wealthy bankers and newly minted millionaire tobacco heirs of Henderson, which included Thomas Soaper, LC Dallam, and John Atkinson, all men known to Edmund and Matt Marshall.
It was during this visit that Edmund and Matt Marshall would have learned about E.S. Babcock’s big plans out west in Coronado, likely from African American Solomon Johnson, Babcock’s coachman at the time. He would have been present during this visit, and may have played a big part in giving Matt and Edmund the confidence to trust Babcock and consider heading west to California. Soon after Babcock’s visit, Edmund and Matt would commit to the move west with teenage sons William and Richmond and young daughter Florence in tow.
The Marshall family arrived in Coronado sometime in 1887 amid the biggest building boom and growth phase of any year in San Diego history. They would have crossed to Coronado on the ferry and found the Hotel del Coronado under construction with the town plan beginning to take shape. They would have likely arrived with fellow African Americans from Henderson, Gus Thompson and George Banks.
Their new life had just begun.
Kevin Ashley, Coronado, June 2022