icon for Home page
icon for Kid's Home page
icon for Digital Collection
icon for Activities
icon for Turns Exhibit
icon for In the Classroom
icon for Chronologies
icon for My Collection

Things To Do
Dress Up | 1st Person | African American Map | Now Read This | Magic Lens | In the Round | Tool Videos | Architecture | e-Postcards | Chronologies | Turns Activities

Send an E-Postcard of:
Coat of Major Samuel Willard Saxton (1829-1933)

front
(c) Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, Deerfield MA. All rights reserved.
Contact us for information about using this image.

The United States government decided to follow a mostly hands-off policy toward the approximately three million freed slaves in the years immediately following the Civil War. The Freedmen's Bureau, created in 1865, was a limited exception to this policy. The Bureau, under Union General Oliver O. Howard, covered "all subjects relating to refugees and freedmen." Although it provided much-needed food and educational opportunities to former slaves, the Freedman's Bureau was a relatively weak, understaffed organization. It could do little to protect freedmen's rights during Southern Reconstruction (1865-1877). Major Samuel Willard Saxton (1829-1933) of Deerfield, Massachusetts, was one the soldiers General Howard retained to serve in the Freedmen's Bureau after the war. Saxton was named for Deerfield's anti-slavery minister Samuel Willard. He wore this uniform coat and these epaulettes in the 1880s.

 

top of page

Share this image with a friend.
Simply enter their e-mail address below and we'll send them this image in an e-mail greeting, along with a link to see the image on our site.

To E-Mail Address *
From E-Mail Address *
From Name
Message

* = Required


button for Side by Side Viewingbutton for Glossarybutton for Printing Helpbutton for How to Read Old Documents

 

Home | Online Collection | Things To Do | Turns Exhibit | Classroom | Chronologies | My Collection
About This Site | Site Index | Site Search | Feedback