Previous articles here at “From the History Room” have told the story of the African-American Shipman family of Tazewell and Peoria Counties, beginning with the harrowing drama of Moses and Milly Shipman and bringing the story of their descendants down to the mid-20th century.
Just last month, we learned about Cpl. Allen Travis Davidson of Pekin, who was present at the first Juneteenth in 1865. As we have seen, Pvt. Davidson’s first wife was Sarah Jane Shipman (c.1852-1893) of Pekin and Peoria, daughter of David and Elizabeth (Ashby) Shipman, and a granddaughter of Moses and Milly.
This week we will turn our attention to Sarah Jane’s older brother Charles T. Shipman (1848-1929), whose life story begins in Central Illinois and takes us north to Minneapolis, Minnesota.
In researching Charles’ life, we find that he was probably born in August of 1848, probably in Peoria County (though it’s not impossible that Charles was born in Pekin like his younger sister Sarah). His father David apparently died in the early 1850s, probably in Tazewell County, and Charles’ mother Elizabeth remarried to a man named Henry Chase on 8 March 1854 at the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Peoria. The 1855 Illinois State Census shows Henry Chase as head of a household in Peoria that included one free male colored child under age 10 – that male child was probably Charles T. Shipman.
Charles first appears on record in the 1860 U.S. Census of Peoria, which shows “Carles T. Shipman” (sic), age 10, “mulatto,” born in Illinois, living in the household of Hilliard and Anna Harris in Peoria. We don’t know why Charles was living with the Harrises, but it is possible that Anna Harris was a Shipman or related to the Shipmans, or at least was a family friend of the Shipmans. Most interesting is that Hilliard Harris later married Lavinia Ashby, who very probably was a sister of Charles’ mother Elizabeth.
I have not been able to find Charles in the 1870 U.S. Census. At some point during the 1860s or 1870s, Charles made his way from Peoria up to Polk County, Iowa, where we find him in the 1876 Des Moines City Directory listed as a waiter working at Savery House, and then marrying on 5 Sept. 1877 to a woman named Fanny Johnson (born circa 1858 in Iowa). In this move from Illinois to Iowa, Charles followed a similar path as Pvt. William H. Costley of Pekin, who moved to Davenport, Iowa, in the late 1870s before moving on to Minneapolis.
We don’t know how long Charles and Fanny were married or if they had any children, but we do know that instead of heading directly from Iowa to Minnesota as Bill Costley did, the course of Charles’ life next led him southwest to the general area of Kansas City, Missouri. In the 1880 U.S. Census, we find Charles, 30, a runner for a hotel, and his wife Fanny, 22, living in St. Joseph, Missouri. Most curiously, Charles and Fanny are counted twice in the 1880 census, first on 1 June 1880 and then on 4 June 1880. The two records are very similar, but the June 4 record says “Chas. T. Shipman” was 31 rather than 30, and Fanny was 32 rather than 22.
A few years later, Charles had moved to Kansas City, for we find him in the 1883 Kansas City directory as “Shipman Charles T col’d, cook Miller’s Club House r 6 Bluff.” After that, we lose sight of him for the rest of the 1880s. He next appears in the 1890 Minneapolis City Directory, where is a listed as a porter for T. M. Roberts. Charles lived out the rest of his life in Minneapolis. He is listed in the Minneapolis city directories throughout the 1890s and the first three decades of the 20th century, and is shown holding the jobs of porter, teamster, and driver, or simply a laborer.
On 23 Oct. 1899 in Minneapolis, Charles married a widow named Josephina Anna “Johanna” (James) McIntosh (1852-1920). Charles and Johanna had no children together, but he was step-father to the nine living children that she’d had with her late husband Isaac A. McIntosh (1840-1895).
Charles and Johanna are enumerated in the 1900 U.S. Census of Minneapolis. That census record shows several other African-Americans living in the same domicile with the Shipmans, including a certain “James W. Cosley,” 49. That is none other than the youngest child of Benjamin and Nance (Legins) Costley of Pekin and Peoria. Charles and James would have known each other from their younger years in the Peoria area, and may even have been related in some way.
Charles and Johanna are recorded in the 1905 Minnesota State Census and again in the 1910 U.S. Census. Just as in 1880, in the 1910 census Charles is counted twice, first on 18 April 1910 and again on 22 April 1910. In the first census record, Charles and Johanna are shown as roomers in the household of George and Loretta Choice, but on 22 April 1910 they are shown in their own place, with a roomer named William Cauler. Charles was then working as a street paver, as was William Cauler.
Charles’ wife passed away in Minneapolis on 2 Feb. 1920 and was buried with her first husband in Hillside Cemetery, Minneapolis. Charles survived for nine more years, dying in Hennepin County, Minnesota (i.e., probably Minneapolis) on 18 Nov. 1929. His death index entry does not tell us where he was buried, but it was presumably in Hillside Cemetery too.