[EARLY PHOTOGRAPHY]. "Negro Woman Pender," stereoview with manuscript identification.

Stereoview featuring an elderly African American woman wearing a striped dress and head scarf. Pittsfield, MA: Buell & Seaver, 1867. Mount recto features photographers' imprint, copyright, and caption: "No. 2. Negro Woman Pender."

Verso bears applied paper label dated at Westfield, 7 November 1761, being a bill of sale for a "Negro Girl called Pendar," purchased by Col. William Williams.
In full: Rec'd of Colo. Wm. Williams of Pittsfield Fifty pounds in full for a Negro Girl called Pendar, which I vouch to him & his against the claims & demands of all persons whatsoever, in behalf of my Husband Wm. Day as Witness my Hand."

Colonel William Williams IV (1710-1785) was an early settler of Pontoosuc Plantation in Pittsfield, and a Harvard graduate. He constructed Fort Anson in 1754 and commanded a regiment that participated in the attack on Fort Ticonderoga in July of 1758. He was an important local leader, acting as judge of the court of common please and of probate, and was a representative of Pittsfield at the general court and at the framing of the state constitution.

According to the African American Heritage Trail project, there were 45 Black residents of Pittsfield as of 1790, and one of the first Black residents of the town was an enslaved woman named Pendar, who gained her freedom and made a life for herself in Pittsfield until she was in her nineties.

Featured here is a fascinating combination of two pieces of history, nearly a century apart, likely concerning the same woman - both as an enslaved young girl and a free elderly woman.

This lot is located in Cincinnati.