Details: Nathaniel Hill Middleton
***Nathaniel Hill Middleton***
(b. April 7, 1856; d. March 31, 1900)
South Carolina. Mulatto/Black.
Occupation: instructor, physician.
Father's occupation: minister, tailor, teacher, carpenter.
Nathaniel Hill was born in 1856 in South Carolina to Abram and Sarah Bing Middleton. Sarah was a free person of color. Abram was born into slavery in Charleston, although he led a life of relative privilege. He was a literate skilled laborer who worked as a carpenter. After the Civil War, he moved the family to Midway, South Carolina and worked as a school superintendent. He was a delegate to the 1868 South Carolina Constitutional Convention and a founding member of the Trustees of Claflin University. Abram's brother Benjamin represented Barnwell County in the South Carolina House of Representatives, 1872-74.
Nathaniel registered as a student on April 1, 1874. He entered as a freshman in the college student following the modern track. The university closed before he completed his studies.
In 1880, he was working as an instructor in Orangeburg, South Carolina. Nathaniel continued also continued his studies at Claflin University. He graduated in 1882, making him one of the first two students to receive an A.B. degree from Claflin.
After receiving his degree from Claflin, Nathaniel moved to Tennessee and attended Meharry Medical College, enrolling in Fall 1882. There he studied alongside fellow former U of SC students James E. Asbury, J. J. Durham, and Zebulon W. McMorris. Nathaniel graduated and received his M.D. in 1884.
After completing his education, Nathaniel moved to southeastern Texas. He first moved to Oakland (a small town in Colorado County) and started a medical practice with Governer R. Townsend. Governer had graduated with Nathaniel from Meharry and had moving to Texas from Lumberton, North Carolina.
Nathaniel's partnership with Townsend seems to have only lasted a year as Townsend then left Oakland and moved to Victoria, Texas, a town about 80 miles away. Nathaniel himself left Oakland for Columbus, the county seat, around 1887. He remained there for about 10 years before returning to Oakland.
In Oakland, Nathaniel was joined by his former UofSC classmate Robert L. Smith. Nathaniel and Robert seem to have remained in touch after they moved to Texas. Around the time he returned to Oakland (In 1893), Nathaniel purchased roughly one-third of an acre of land adjacent to a tract owned by Robert.
Sadly, Nathaniel was found dead in the Navidad river on April 1, 1900. A local newspaper reported that he had fallen in the river and drowned, possibly after suffering an epileptic fit.
Sources
1). 1870; Census Place: Midway, Barnwell, South Carolina; Roll: M593_1484; Page: 292A.
2). 1880; Census Place: Orangeburg, Orangeburg, South Carolina; Roll: 1237; Page: 266A.
3). Middleton, Earl M with Barnes, Joy W. Knowing Who I Am: A Black Entrepreneur's Struggle and Success in the American South. University of South Carolina Press. 2008
4). Beckford, Rhoades Beckford. Biographical Dictionary of American Physicians of African Ancestry, 1800-1920. Africana Homestead Legacy Publishing, Cherry Hill, New Jersey. 2011.
5). Meharry Medical College, “1882, 1883, 1884, 1885, 1886, 1887, 1888, 1889, 1890 Meharry Medical College Catalogue,” Meharry Medical College Archives.
Posted 4/10/20