“Our Domestic Trials with Freedmen and Others”: A White South Carolinian's Diary of African-American “Exhibitions of Freedom,” 1865–80

Abstract

In October 1865, Jacob Schirmer returned to Charleston, South Carolina, after more than three years refuge from the Civil War in the village of Edge-field, South Carolina. Schirmer had brought his slaves with him to Edgefield, but they did not return to Charleston with him, choosing instead to “realize their Freedom” (diary entry for October 28, 1865). Schirmer, a German American, kept a regular diary from 1826 until his death in 1880. Following the Civil War, though, he also commenced a separate journal — “Our Domestic Trials with Freedmen and Others” — in which he recorded his dealings with domestic workers in the free labor system. He hired three domestic servants: a female cook and washer, a male butler, and a male gardener. For the next twenty-five years, Schirmer struggled with the transition from slavery to freedom. “Our Domestic Trials” documents not only Schirmer's reaction to the revolutionary social changes of the era but also offers a telling picture of the ways in which African Americans responded to their newfound freedom and their determination to maintain that freedom.Jacob Schirmer was born in 1803 into a well-known German-American family in Charleston. Schirmer's grandfather was Jacob Sass, a reputable Charleston cabinetmaker. Schirmer operated a successful coopering (barrel making) business, and he owned eight buildings in Charleston. He served as president of the Corporation of St. John's Lutheran Church and as treasurer of the German Friendly Society. It does not appear that Schirmer was active in politics, nor was he a member of the German rifle clubs in Charleston (probably because they were formed by German immigrants in the 1850s).