Where my Salem folks at? (I know, I couldn't resist. I've something of a personal attachment to that particular town). But in all seriousness, say hello to Salem's own Charles Lenox Remond, abolitionist and elder brother of Sarah Parker Remond, whom you learned about back in Lesson #54. Born in either 1810 or 1812 (records are unclear), Charles holds the distinction of being one of the first Black men to publicly lecture audiences on the subject of abolition --this was significant at the time, as the only orators willing to hold forth publicly on that subject were contemporaries like William Lloyd Garrison and Lucretia Mott. While not formally educated, like his younger sister, Charles was taught to read and write by his entrepreneurial parents: his father a free person of color from the Caribbean, and his mother a prominent Bostonian whose parents had fought in the American Revolution. Charles followed his father into the barber trade and established himself in the Salem community, making acquaintances and connections as a normal part of his daily job.
At some point in the early 1830's, Charles joined the abolitionist movement and began penning essays for Garrison's The Liberator. His talent for lecturing and orating also came to the fore and he joined the American Anti-Slavery Society. Eventually he was in demand to speak at public meetings all across New England in also New York and Pennsylvania; his easy wit tempering his militancy. He also aggressively lobbied on behalf of Free Blacks in the northern states; in particular advocating to end segregation on trains. In 1840 Remond went on a lecture tour of Europe, and while in England attended the world's first Anti-Slavery Convention in London, as the United States' sole Black delegate. The prestige that came with this speaking tour also helped to throw greater light onto his other cause: womens' liberation. In 1855 at that year's national Colored Convention in Philadelphia, Remond not only fervently spoke up for Black liberation but also for womens' rights, pushing for Mary Ann Shadd (Cary) to be named as a delegate... and pointedly walking out (along with Garrison) when she was passed over (see Lesson #38 for more about her). At that convention he also famously proposed that Blacks were obligated to walk away from any church "that discriminated against them in seating or at the communion table;" a resolution which was ultimately adopted.
During the Civil War, Remond worked as a recruiter of Black soldiers in Massachusetts for the Union Army; his public speaking fame having been somewhat eclipsed by the likes of Frederick Douglass and Wendell Phillips. After the war he worked as a Boston street light inspector and a clerk in the Boston Customs House. Failing health prevented him from travelling as much as he had previously, but he still managed to be a fierce advocate for womens' rights and for the improvement of the lives of U.S.'s newly-liberated population. Significantly he was able to attend the very first Equal Rights Convention in 1867. He retired to his beloved Salem and died there in late December of 1873.
