Biographical Database of Black Woman Suffragists
Biography of Rozie Harris, 1845(?) - unknown
By Chelsea Lundquist-Wentz, independent historian
Rozie Harris was one of the 15 black female citizens to sign an 1877 petition to Congress in favor of women's right to vote. The petition reflects the engaged citizenry of her community, Hillsdale, whose black residents regularly engaged in charitable efforts, fundraising, community building and benevolent and literary societies.
Many of Rozie Harris' fellow female petitioners came to live in Hillsdale, a Freedman's Bureau-planned community, after early interactions with the Bureau directly after the Civil War. There are records of a Rose Harris receiving aid in a Freedman's Bureau hospital as a teenager in 1866, though they cannot be definitively confirmed as the petition signer.
Sources
AMOS, ALCIONE M., and PATRICIA BROWN SAVAGE. "Frances Eliza Hall: Postbellum Teacher in Washington, D.C." Washington History, vol. 29, no. 1, 2017, pp. 42-54., www.jstor.org/stable/90007373.
District of Columbia, Freedmen's Bureau Field Office Records, 1863-1872," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-L937-6SXL?cc=2333782&wc=9J3J-C66%3A1069294702%2C1069294804 : 3 August 2016), Local superintendent for Washington and Georgetown (records relating to employment of freedmen) > Roll 19, Register of patients in female ward of Lincoln Hospital, Jul 1, 1866-Mar > image 4 of 9; citing NARA microfilm publication M1902 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).
Frederick Douglass Jr. and Other Residents of the District of Columbia. "Petition for Woman Suffrage." Petitions and Memorials, 1813-1968. Records of the U.S. House of Representatives, 1789 - 2011, Record Group 233, National Archives Building, Washington, DC. https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/douglass-petition-woman-suffrage
Hillsdale, District of Columbia. Page 3 of The bee. (Washington, D.C.), 10 Nov. 1883. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.
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