Cato Freeman, a formerly enslaved person, was a North Parish Musician, Landowner, Husband and Father, Church and Community Leader.

On May 26, 1768, Salem and Ramah, enslaved people owned by the Rev. Phillips of South Church in Andover, had their first child, Cato. In 1771, when Rev. Phillips died, Cato was bequeathed as property to his son Samuel, who lived in the North Parish. During his years as an enslaved person, he learned to read and write and to play the violin. In the decades following the American Revolution, rulings by the Massachusetts Supreme Court, changes in the Massachusetts economy, and changes in social norms brought the gradual end of slavery in Massachusetts. Like many enslaved people in similar situations, Cato remained with the Phillips family until he turned 21.

In 1789, he left to establish his own household, taking the surname “Freeman”. In a letter to the family when he left, Cato expressed appreciation and wrote of one day going to heaven, which he described as a "haven of rest where (there) is no distinctions." He married Lydia Bistrow on December 24, 1789 at North Parish with minister Dr. Symmes performing the ceremony. Cato and Lydia Freeman became parishioners at the North Parish of North Andover. According to Massachusetts Vital Records, the couple had at least nine children: Mahala, Rosena (Sena), James Honestus, Dorcas, Zadock Lew, Deborah, Nathaniel Sherlock Milton, Jacob Kimball Holder, and Peter. The right to form their own families and have autonomy as a family was the most important thing for those who had been enslaved. As free people, couples could no longer be separated nor children sold away. To Cato, having marriage, a family, and establishing a place to live and a way to make a living may have been his paramount achievement.

In 1798, Cato began playing viol with the North Parish choir, serving as the parish musician even as he and his family were relegated to the balcony in the meeting house. He was issued a grazing permit for the Town Common by the Board of Selectmen in 1802, making him the first African American to be given that permission. In 1820, Cato leased land for a farm from Henry Osgood prior to buying land on Pleasant Street near Mill Pond from Simon Flanders in 1848, and moving his family there. Cato and his sons James and Zadock worked in the community as laborers, and son Peter was a cordwainer (shoemaker).

When Freeman died on August 9, 1853 at the age of 85, he didn't leave behind much in material possessions -- some tools, a gun, about $63 in cash and a plot of land. Lydia Freeman died exactly a year later. They and their son Jacob, who had died in 1841, are all buried in what was then called the "Negro Quarter" of the Second Burying Ground in North Andover where you can still visit their graves.

Sources:

Forsyth-Vail, Gail, African-Americans and the North Parish and Church of North Andover, Massachusetts, 1760-1860 (unpublished paper, April 2000.)

Martin, Anthony, Homeplace Is also workplace: Another Look at Lucy Foster in Andover, Massachusetts. Published online 18 January 2018, Society of Historical Archaeology 2018.

Read about this banner’s artist, Willfred Acosta