Read Part One HERE
In this post I will focus on a woman named Josephine St Pierre Ruffin. She lived from 1842 - 1924. Josephine was born in Boston, Massachusetts. Her parents were John St Pierre, of French and African descent from Martinique, and her mother was Elizabeth Matilda Menhenick from Cornwall, England. Her father was a successful taylor and founder of a Boston Zion Church.
Josephine attended public school in Charlestown and Salem, and a private school in New York City because of her parents' objections to the segregated schools in Boston. She completed her studies at Bowdoin College, after segregation in Boston schools ended.
Josephine married George Lewis Ruffin when she was sixteen years old. The couple moved to Liverpool but returned to Boston soon afterwards and bought a house in the West End. Working with her husband, Josephine became active in the abolitionist movement. During the American Civil War, they helped recruit black soldiers for the Union Army. They also worked for the Sanitation Commission, which provided aid for the care of the soldiers in the field. After the war ended, Josephine turned her attention to organising for the Kansas Freedmen's Relief Association, collecting money and clothes to send to aid southern blacks resettling in Kansas, known as Exodusters.
Read Part One Hundred And Seventy-Two HERE
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