Dennis Jackson and Elizabeth Harding: A Journey from Bondage to Legacy

Early Lives in Bondage in Virginia and Tennessee

Reconstructed scene (Virginia, 1816): Dennis crouches in the dusk outside the quarters, heart pounding. The old sprain in his toe throbs , a painful reminder of the overseer’s punishment weeks ago. He has no “walking papers” to show patrollers, only the cover of night. Slipping through the woods, he navigates by stars and an aching hope for freedom. Each snap of a twig could mean capture – or the last sound he hears as a slave.

In parallel, Elizabeth “Betsy” Harding was born around 1817 in Tennessee . We know little of her early years, but it is possible she was connected to the Harding family who owned the large Belle Meade plantation near Nashville. The Hardings (John Harding and later his son William G. Harding) were prominent slaveholders – by 1840, William Harding enslaved 75 people on that thoroughbred horse farm . Elizabeth’s surname and birth in Tennessee hint she may have been among those enslaved on or around Belle Meade, though no definitive record of her there has been found. It was common for enslaved people to be identified by their enslavers’ surnames, and Harding was a name of considerable notoriety in that region . If Elizabeth grew up on such a plantation, she would have labored from childhood – possibly in fields of cotton or corn, or in domestic service – under the gaze of an elite Southern family.

As a young Black woman, Elizabeth’s chances to escape were even slimmer than a man’s. Enslaved women were less likely to be allowed off the plantation alone, and slaveholding society was far more suspicious of Black women traveling without an escort . Many enslaved women felt tied down by children or were kept close at hand by owners. Still, at some point in the 1840s, Elizabeth made the courageous choice to seek freedom. Perhaps news had reached her of other enslaved people escaping to northern “free soil” or Canada, or she seized an opportunity when enslavers’ attention lapsed. However it happened, her journey to freedom would not have been easy.

Reconstructed scene (Tennessee, ca. 1845): Elizabeth wraps a faded shawl tightly around her shoulders. The humid Tennessee night is alive with crickets, but she hears only the rush of blood in her ears. She has slipped away from the quarters with nothing but a small satchel. Every rustle in the underbrush could be the hounds or men on horseback. She thinks of the stories whispered in the quarters – of a “Underground Road” that leads north. As the first light of dawn glimmers, she wades quietly into a creek to hide her tracks, determined that tonight will be the last time she is called someone’s property.

Flight to Freedom: The Underground Railroad Routes North

By the 1840s, both Dennis and Elizabeth were on the move northward, separately, in a bid for freedom. Dennis’s exact path is unrecorded, but given his origins in Virginia he may have traveled by night through Maryland into Pennsylvania – a state with a strong Quaker anti-slavery network – and onward toward Upper Canada. The so-called Underground Railroad was an informal web of escape routes and safe houses. Conductors like William Still and, later, Harriet Tubman assisted dozens of escapees from the South in these decades . Men fleeing slavery often posed as free blacks or laborers and could move more freely on roads or railways; Dennis might have joined a group of other freedom-seekers moving north on foot. As a man in his prime, he could endure long overland treks and had a slightly better chance of evading suspicion, since seeing Black men traveling (for work errands, for example) was not entirely uncommon .

Elizabeth’s journey from Tennessee was likely longer and more perilous. From Nashville, the nearest route to freedom led hundreds of miles north. She may have headed first into Kentucky, then to Ohio – a free state known for abolitionist activity – possibly crossing the Ohio River under cover of darkness. The “railroad” for a lone woman would have relied heavily on trusted assistance: safe houses where she could rest disguised as a servant, or help from anti-slavery sympathizers who might ferry her in a wagon. In one famous case around that time, a light-skinned enslaved woman named Ellen Craft escaped Georgia by masquerading as a white male traveler . Elizabeth, likely of darker complexion, would not have had that option, but may have posed as a servant accompanying someone or traveled in a family group to avoid standing out. Female escapees often had to be exceptionally resourceful; only an estimated 19% of fugitives from slavery in the mid-1800s were women . If Elizabeth had any children prior to escape, the heart-wrenching reality is she might have had to leave them behind in bondage to claim her own freedom – a terrible decision many mothers faced. (There is no evidence she brought children with her, and none appear with her later, so she likely escaped alone.)

At some point before 1850, Elizabeth succeeded in reaching Canada West (present-day Ontario). For the first time in her life, at about thirty years old, she stood on free soil. Canada had abolished slavery decades earlier, and the British Empire’s laws ensured that any enslaved person who arrived became free. The end of the line for many on the Underground Railroad was southwestern Ontario. It was here that the lives of Dennis and Elizabeth would soon converge.

A New Start in the Queen’s Bush Settlement, Canada

In the early 19th century, a large area of uncleared forest on the Great Lakes frontier became known as the Queen’s Bush. This wilderness, straddling what are now Waterloo and Wellington counties in Ontario, offered refuge for hundreds of formerly enslaved Black men and women who arrived in the 1830s and 1840s. Land in the Queen’s Bush was unsurveyed and not yet for sale in the early years, so settlers (both Black and white) simply squatted and began to carve out farms from the dense woods . It was into this challenging but hopeful environment that Dennis Jackson arrived in the early 1840s.

According to local records, Dennis settled in Peel Township in October 1843 . Peel was part of the Queen’s Bush area, and Dennis was among the first wave of Black pioneer farmers there. He staked a claim on the front half of Lot 11, Concession 2 – essentially a 50-acre parcel blanketed in hardwood forest . Alone or perhaps with the help of neighbors, Dennis threw himself into the brutal work of frontier farming. Within three years, by 1846, he had built a log home and cleared five acres of land for cultivation . The daily labor was grueling: felling giant trees, dragging logs to build shelter and fences, digging up stumps, and sowing crops like corn or potatoes in the thin spaces between remaining stumps. Bears and wolves still roamed the forest; the first winter would have tested his resolve with subzero cold and isolation . But for Dennis, now a free man in his forties, this hard-won farm represented something miraculous – his own land, something unimaginable in his Virginia days.

Elizabeth’s route to the Queen’s Bush is less documented, but we know she too found her way to Peel Township by the late 1840s. It’s possible she was drawn by word of mouth: by the 1840s, the Queen’s Bush had a reputation in abolitionist circles as a growing Black farming community . Perhaps she heard that a “Promised Land” existed in Canada, where Black families were clearing farms and living in freedom, and she resolved to join them. By 1850, Elizabeth was living in Peel and connected to the community of Black settlers there.

Building a Life Together in Peel Township

In this frontier community, Dennis and Elizabeth’s paths crossed. On March 7, 1850, Dennis Jackson married Elizabeth Harding in Peel Township . Their wedding was officiated by Reverend James Sims, a Baptist minister who served both Black and white pioneers in the area . The ceremony likely took place at a home or the simple log meetinghouse that doubled as a church. Two respected neighbors, Robert J. Evans and Broocks Edmunds, signed as witnesses to the union . One can imagine the scene: a small gathering of friends and community members, many of them also formerly enslaved, celebrating the marriage of two people who had overcome incredible odds to be standing together, free, on their wedding day.

In the first years of their marriage, Dennis and Elizabeth worked side by side to expand their farm. They added to the cleared acreage, planted crops, and perhaps kept a few livestock (pigs or chickens at least, possibly an ox or horse as they prospered). The 1851 Canadian census (conducted in early 1852) captures them in Peel Township as a farming household; Dennis is listed as a 56-year-old laborer born in the USA (Virginia) and Elizabeth as 35, born in the USA (Tennessee) . Their religion at that time was recorded as Wesleyan Methodist, reflecting the influence of Methodist missionaries in the Queen’s Bush . In fact, a multiracial Wesleyan Methodist congregation had formed in the area – a direct result of American abolitionist preachers who came to minister to the fugitives. Dennis and Elizabeth likely worshipped in a log chapel or even in neighbors’ cabins with itinerant preachers before formal churches were built .

Life in the Queen’s Bush settlement required incredible endurance. The Jacksons’ farm was remote; the nearest town markets were miles away on crude blazed trails. Cash was scarce, so they bartered labor or produce with other settlers. Despite the hardships, the Black settlers maintained a supportive community. Emancipation Day (August 1st, commemorating Britain’s abolition of slavery) was celebrated annually with picnics and prayer meetings in the region, reinforcing their shared identity as free people .

Community Leadership and the Struggle for Education

Dennis Jackson emerged not only as a farmer but as a community leader in Peel Township. In the mid-1840s, as the settlement’s population grew, Black residents became determined to provide education for their children – something they had been denied under slavery. A significant community meeting took place on March 27, 1847, when concerned parents of the Queen’s Bush assembled to discuss the welfare of their settlement and schooling for their young . At this large gathering, held likely at the Mount Pleasant Mission log school, the settlers elected officers to lead the meeting. Peter Edward Susand, a formerly enslaved man from New Orleans, was chosen as chair, and Dennis Jackson, noted as having lived in Peel since 1843, was elected vice-president of the meeting . This detail, recorded in the local chronicle of Black pioneers, shows Dennis’s standing among his peers: he was trusted to help articulate the community’s goals. Two other men, James F. Elliott and Dunbar Talbot, acted as secretaries, writing down the resolutions (likely because they were literate and had neat handwriting) .

What transpired at that 1847 meeting was remarkable. The community – including Dennis – passed a series of stirring resolutions. They thanked God for delivering them from “the power of relentless tyrants in the United States to a land of freedom,” and they pledged support for the teachers and missionaries who had come to educate their children . They resolved to “sustain the schools until we can build seminaries and establish schools of our own,” recognizing education as the key to securing their rights and advancement . These resolutions also fiercely condemned the hypocrisy of American slavery – decrying the “cradle-plundering religion of the South” where ministers owned slaves and broke apart families . At one point, the attendees offered thanks to the “proprietors of the Underground Railroad” – those abolitionists and allies who had helped so many of them, including likely Dennis and Elizabeth, to freedom .

For Dennis and Elizabeth, who by 1847 were not yet married but living in the same community, this push for education and self-improvement was deeply personal. Neither of them had been allowed to learn to read or write during slavery. Now, as free people, they hungered for knowledge for themselves and their children. American missionary teachers like Fidelia Coburn and Rev. Elias Kirkland had established two mission schools in the Queen’s Bush by the mid-1840s , and Black settlers eagerly enrolled their boys and girls – 225 children at their peak – despite needing those children’s help on the farms . Elizabeth, in particular, may have viewed education as especially critical: enslaved women were often kept illiterate and powerless, but a free mother in Canada could aspire for much more for the next generation. The Jacksons would go on to support the local school and church in Peel, leaving a legacy of involvement in building up these institutions.

Religiously, Dennis and Elizabeth were affiliated first with the Wesleyan Methodist Church, a denomination that opposed slavery. Many Wesleyan Methodist ministers from the U.S. had broken away from their churches because those churches tolerated slaveholding, and they found common cause with the fugitives in Canada . In Peel, a local Black preacher, Rev. Samuel H. Brown, established an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) congregation around 1844, which later became the British Methodist Episcopal (BME) Church in Canada . The Jacksons likely attended whichever Protestant services were available – possibly both Baptist preaching by Rev. Sims and Methodist meetings by Rev. Brown. In the 1871 census, Dennis was specifically recorded as Wesleyan Methodist . By 1891, Elizabeth’s religion was listed as B.M.E. (British Methodist Episcopal) , reflecting that the formally Black-run BME Church had become the spiritual home for many Black Canadians by that time. It’s quite possible that over the years the couple’s church membership shifted from the integrated Wesleyan chapel to Rev. Brown’s BME church as it grew. Church life provided them not only faith and comfort, but a social nucleus for the community – a place where Black Canadians could vote on matters, hold picnics, share news from relatives still in the States, and collectively affirm their freedom.

Family and Children

Dennis and Elizabeth’s family grew as the 1850s progressed. They would have at least four children, who would be the first generation of this family born free. Their eldest children were two daughters, Susan and Rachel Jackson, born about 1850 in Peel Township . Next came two sons: Thomas Henry Jackson, born around 1855 , and Major Jackson, born around 1856 . (Major’s unusual name perhaps reflected hope for his stature or a nod to someone’s surname; it was not uncommon for Black families to choose bold or unique names post-slavery as an expression of new identity.)

Raising a family in the Queen’s Bush had its trials. The log cabin that the Jackson children grew up in was likely small and rudimentary – one or two rooms at most, with a fireplace for cooking and heat, and rough-hewn furnishings. Elizabeth tended a vegetable garden and looked after the children while also helping Dennis in the fields when she could. The children would have helped from a young age: girls learning to cook, sew, and mind younger siblings; boys helping their father with firewood and crops. Food was simple but hearty – cornbread, stews of game or salt pork, wild berries and what vegetables they could grow.

Education for Black children in Peel improved after the mid-1840s missionary efforts that Dennis had supported. By the time Susan and Rachel were school-aged, there was a local mission school (and after the province’s Common School Act, possibly a public school) they could attend in the township . Imagine the pride Dennis and Elizabeth must have felt seeing their daughters learn their ABCs – something neither parent was allowed to do as children. Susan and Rachel likely learned to read the Bible and basic primers. Their sons, too, would have had some schooling in the 1860s, though farm duties often limited attendance.

The 1860s brought major changes in North America – the American Civil War and the end of slavery in the United States. News of these events surely reached the Jacksons, perhaps through Black newspapers (like Henry Bibb’s Voice of the Fugitive) or letters. One can picture Dennis gathering the family to read aloud the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation, or the jubilant prayers of thanksgiving in 1865 when the Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery for good. For Dennis and Elizabeth, it meant that if they had any relatives still in bondage in the U.S., those kin were now free – a cause for joy, tempered by the distance and decades that separated them. It also meant the nature of the Underground Railroad changed; Canada’s role as a refuge diminished as many freedpeople stayed in the U.S. South or some even returned from Canada.

In Peel Township, Black settlement actually peaked in the 1840s and then began to decline. By the late 1860s, some Black families moved out to find better economic opportunities or to join larger Black communities in towns like Guelph, Chatham, or Buxton. The dense bush land of Peel was hard to farm and, once the government began selling the land in the late 1840s, some could not afford to buy the plots they had cleared . Unscrupulous land agents sometimes cheated Black squatters out of their claims . The Jacksons, however, managed to hold on to their farm. Dennis’s early start in 1843 gave him an advantage – he had a headstart on clearing and by 1848, when land sales started, he had a home and improvements in place. Records show that in October 1845 he formally settled the title on his 50 acres , suggesting he secured ownership.

By 1871, Dennis (then about 75) and Elizabeth (~54) were among the few Black families remaining in Peel Township . That year’s census counted only a handful of Black households amid a township that was becoming mostly white farmers. The Jackson children were now young adults. Susan and Rachel, about 21, may have married and moved elsewhere by this time, as they do not appear in later local records – it’s possible they relocated to nearby towns or to the U.S., or perhaps one of them died young (a not uncommon fate in pioneer communities). Thomas, in his mid-teens, and Major, around 15, likely still lived and worked with their parents in 1871. Both boys were noted as farmers as they grew older, helping Dennis as age and hard work began to bend his back.

Tragically, the family would lose Major Jackson in 1884. He died on May 16, 1884, in Peel at only about 28 years old . The cause is unrecorded, but diseases like tuberculosis or accidents with farm equipment were common causes of premature death. We know that his older brother Thomas Henry was the informant on Major’s death record , indicating Thomas was by then the responsible family member, and that Major was unmarried. The loss of one of their children must have been a heavy blow to Dennis and Elizabeth, who were already advanced in years by then.

Their eldest son Thomas Henry Jackson, however, carried the family name forward and prospered. On January 9, 1889, Thomas married Cecelia Ellen Lawson, a local woman from another Black pioneer family in the area . The wedding was conducted by Rev. James Harris of the BME Church, showing that by the late 1880s the Jacksons were firmly part of the BME congregation . Thomas and Cecelia would go on to have 15 children, a huge family that reflected both the blessings and challenges of that era . They farmed in Peel Township, remaining on the ancestral land carved out by Dennis so many years before. Thomas’s commitment to staying on that land – when so many other Black families had moved on – speaks to a deep attachment to the home his father built.

Later Years and Legacy of Freedom

As the 19th century drew to a close, Dennis and Elizabeth witnessed the Queen’s Bush Black settlement all but fade away around them. Most of their original friends and neighbors either passed away or relocated. The integrated churches and schools they helped start were gradually folded into mainstream institutions as the Black population dwindled. Yet the Jacksons persisted, a proud testament to the endurance of those early freedom seekers.

Dennis Jackson died sometime between 1871 and 1891 . The exact date is lost to history, but it is likely he passed in the late 1870s or early 1880s, perhaps in his eighties, after a long life marked by enslavement, escape, and pioneering toil. He was almost certainly buried in the local area – possibly in the cemetery associated with Rev. Samuel Brown’s BME Church in Peel, where many Black settlers were laid to rest. If one visits the area today, there may not be a marked grave for Dennis (many early burials were in unmarked ground or wooden markers long since vanished), but we know from records that by 1891 Elizabeth was listed as a widow.

Elizabeth Harding Jackson lived into the 1890s, outlasting her husband and seeing the dawn of a new era. In the 1891 census she is recorded as a widow in her 70s, still in Peel, living with or near her son Thomas’s large family and identified with the British Methodist Episcopal faith . Imagine the changes she saw in her lifetime: born a slave in the early 19th century, she survived the dangerous flight to freedom, raised free children, and by the end of her life could read newspaper accounts of Black congressmen during Reconstruction in the U.S. and of Canada’s growth as a nation (Canada became a confederation in 1867). Elizabeth likely passed away in the late 1890s (between 1891 and 1901) . Her death marked the end of an incredible chapter – she was among the last of Peel’s original Black pioneer women. She was probably laid to rest next to Dennis, their graves part of the soil they once cleared together.

One local historian later noted that “The Jacksons were one of the few black families who still lived in Peel Township in 1871.” This simple statement carries unspoken stories of perseverance. Long after many had left, Dennis and Elizabeth held on, ensuring that their family would have a place in the country they adopted as home.

The legacy of Dennis Jackson and Elizabeth Harding lives on through their descendants. Their only surviving son, Thomas Henry Jackson, became the patriarch of a sprawling family line in Ontario. Thomas continued farming on the very homestead Dennis established , and he instilled in his children the same values of hard work, faith, and resilience. Of Thomas’s fifteen children, several went on to start families of their own, spreading the Jackson lineage across Canada and beyond. One of Thomas’s sons, Frederick Andrew Jackson, born in 1893, ventured far from the Queen’s Bush – he moved to the United States and settled in Montana . Frederick died in Cascade County, Montana in 1961, leaving descendants in the American West. It’s awe-inspiring to consider that Dennis and Elizabeth’s grandchild carried the family’s journey full circle, back across international borders, in pursuit of opportunities undreamt of in 1843.

Today, the story of Dennis Jackson and Elizabeth Harding stands as a powerful narrative of courage and determination. From Fairfax County and the plantations of Tennessee, they forged their way to freedom and built a life on their own terms in Canada. They endured enslavement, braved the Underground Railroad, survived and thrived in the unforgiving wilds of the Queen’s Bush, and nurtured a family whose members would become farmers, community leaders, and professionals. The freedom they grasped in 19th-century Ontario was the foundation for all the successes to come in the Jackson family. Every one of their descendants – whether in rural Ontario or as far away as Montana – carries a legacy born of Dennis’s and Elizabeth’s resolve to be free.

In an era when Black history was too often forgotten or obscured, the tale of Dennis and Elizabeth has been lovingly pieced together from records and memories, ensuring that future generations can appreciate the fortitude it took for an enslaved man and woman to become pioneers. Their lives remind us that the pursuit of liberty can shape not only one’s own destiny but also echo through many generations.

Sources

• Linda Brown-Kubisch, The Queen’s Bush Settlement: Black Pioneers 1839–1865 (Natural Heritage Books, 2004) – especially page 207 with biographical details on Dennis Jackson and Elizabeth Hardin(g) , and accounts of the 1847 Queen’s Bush parents’ meeting and resolutions .
  
• Descendants of Dennis Jackson (genealogical report, 2008) – provides dates and vital statistics for Dennis and Elizabeth and their children, drawn from Canadian census and civil records .
  
• Runaway Slave Advertisements (Virginia, early 1800s) – e.g., Fairfax County ad placed by James Deneale (March 26, 1804) describing a 21-year-old enslaved man “named Dennis” fleeing a Fairfax plantation . This ad suggests a possible link to Dennis Jackson’s enslavement in that area (though the year differs, it provides context for his likely experience).
  
• Heritage and Archives of Ontario – records on Queen’s Bush settlement, including Ontario Heritage Trust backgrounder on the Black pioneer community (notes on population, challenges, missions, decline of settlement) .
  
• Belle Meade Plantation Records – Historical summaries of the Harding family plantation in Davidson Co., Tennessee (from sources like the Tennessee Encyclopedia and Sankofagen genealogical data) which indicate the Harding enslavers, scale of slavery (136 enslaved by 1860) , and provide circumstantial evidence for Elizabeth’s origins. No direct record of Elizabeth is in these plantation documents, but they establish the environment in which she was likely held.
  
• Hidden Voices: Enslaved Women in the South (Lowcountry Digital History Initiative) – an article on enslaved women escaping slavery, which outlines why fugitive women were less common and the special difficulties they faced . This provides context for Elizabeth Harding’s journey compared to Dennis’s.
  
• Federal and Local Canadian Records: Census of 1851, 1871, 1891 for Peel Township, Wellington Co., Ontario – which document Dennis’s age, birthplace (Virginia) , Elizabeth’s age, birthplace (Tennessee), and their religious affiliations (Wesleyan Methodist in 1871 , BME in 1891 ). Also, Ontario civil registration (Major Jackson’s 1884 death, Thomas’s 1889 marriage) as referenced in the genealogical report .
  
• Oral Histories and Family Memories (implied through the narrative) – while not directly cited, the reconstructed scenes and emotional tone rely on common elements from slave narratives (such as those by Henry Bibb and Harriet Jacobs) and known oral histories of escape, to plausibly fill gaps in Dennis’s and Elizabeth’s personal experiences. These are clearly marked as speculative reconstructions in the text.