x
Breaking News
More () »

Hidden Tennessee History: TN man wanted to free the slaves. He also had owned them

From his Washington County, Tenn., hometown, Elihu Embree financed and published the first newspaper in the world dedicated to ending slavery. The year was 1820.

John North, Robin Wilhoit

Play Video

Close Video

Published: 12:11 PM EST February 10, 2022
Updated: 6:27 PM EST February 10, 2022

Northerners get much of the credit for pushing to abolish slavery in the United States.

But it was an East Tennessean, four decades before the Civil War, who took the extraordinary step of publishing the first newspaper in the world dedicated to ending the slave trade.

"It is something paradoxical that a man should refuse to buy a stolen sheep, or to eat a piece of one that is stolen, and should not have the same scruples respecting a stolen man," Jonesborough's Elihu Embree declared in his self-financed "The Emancipator" newspaper in 1820.

Credit: WBIR
Downtown Jonesborough site of The Emancipator

It's also paradoxical, to quote the publishing pioneer, that he should be the one to seek an end to slavery because Embree, 38, held owned slaves himself in Washington County, Tennessee. In fact, it was his wish in death that one of his slaves and her five children finally get their freedom.

Embree's life is the story of a man of some means determined in his day to right a wrong. But he was also a man who wrestled with his own internal and material conflicts.

"I think it just speaks to how deeply complicated the history and issue of slavery was," said historian Anne Mason, executive director of the Heritage Alliance of Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia, who has studied Embree's life.

Two hundred years later, many have forgotten his deeds. Indeed, no one can say for certain just where Embree's remains now rest.

History is rarely simple or etched in black and white.

Credit: Washington County, Tenn. archives
The building where The Emancipator was published in Jonesborough. It's now gone and the site is occupied by a house.

Before You Leave, Check This Out