1838 Jesuit slave sale

Dates: June 19, 1838 (first agreement); November 1838 (delivery)
Location
Origin: Cecil, Charles, Prince George's, and St. Mary's Counties, Maryland, U.S.
Destination: Ascension and Iberville Parishes, Louisiana
Participants
Thomas Mulledy
William McSherry
Henry Johnson
Jesse Batey

On June 19, 1838, the Maryland Province of the Society of Jesus agreed to sell 272 slaves to two Louisiana planters, Henry Johnson and Jesse Batey, for $115,000 (equivalent to approximately $3.25 million in 2023). This sale was the culmination of a contentious and long-running debate among the Maryland Jesuits over whether to keep, sell, or free their slaves, and whether to focus on their rural estates or on their growing urban missions, including their schools.

In 1836, the Jesuit superior general, Jan Roothaan, authorized the Maryland provincial superior to carry out the sale on three conditions: the slaves must be permitted to practice their Catholic faith, their families must not be separated, and the proceeds of the sale must be used only to support Jesuits in training. It soon became clear that Roothaan's conditions had not been fully met. The Jesuits ultimately received payment many years late and never received the full $115,000. Only 206 of the 272 slaves were actually delivered because the Jesuits permitted the elderly and those with spouses living nearby and not owned by Jesuits to remain in Maryland.

The sale prompted immediate outcry from fellow Jesuits. Some wrote emotional letters to Roothaan denouncing its immorality. Eventually, Roothaan removed Thomas Mulledy as provincial superior for disobeying orders and promoting scandal, exiling him to Nice for several years. Despite coverage of the Maryland Jesuits' slave ownership and the 1838 sale in academic literature, news of these facts came as a surprise to the public in 2015, prompting a study of Georgetown University's and Jesuits' historical relationship with slavery. Georgetown and the College of the Holy Cross renamed buildings, Georgetown granted legacy admissions preference to the slaves' descendants, and the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States pledged to raise $100 million for them.

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Legacy

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Return to public awareness


Mulledy Hall, now Isaac Hawkins Hall, at Georgetown in 1898

The 1838 slave sale returned to the public's awareness in the mid-2010s. In 2013, Georgetown began planning to renovate the adjacent Ryan, Mulledy, and Gervase Halls, which together served as the university's Jesuit residence until the opening of a new residence, Wolfington Hall, in 2003. After the Jesuits vacated the buildings, Ryan and Mulledy Halls lay vacant, while Gervase Hall was put to other use. In 2014, renovation began on Ryan and Mulledy Halls to convert them into a student residence.

With work complete, in August 2015, university president John DeGioia sent an open letter to the university announcing the opening of the new student residence, which also related Mulledy's role in the 1838 slave sale after stepping down as president of the university. Despite the decades of scholarship on the subject, this revelation came as a surprise to many Georgetown University members, and some criticized the retention of Mulledy's name on the building. Between 2014 and 2015, several articles in the school newspaper, The Hoya, also brought the university's relationship with slavery and the slave sale to public attention.

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