Background
Charles Calistus Burleigh was born on November 3, 1810 in Plainfield, Connecticut, he was a son of Rinaldo and Lydia (Bradford) Burleigh, and a member of a family of reformers.
(Excerpt from The Genealogy of the Burley or Burleigh Fami...)
Excerpt from The Genealogy of the Burley or Burleigh Family of America Justice to myself and others has induced me to present this work in its unfinished state; The compilation has occupied a period of Six years of labor, carried on through discouraging words from some, and with little, or long-delayed, aid from others. Surnames originated about rsoo a.d., and middle names were not universally used much previous to 1780. Men were named from their father, or from some peculiarity of person. If a man named John had a son Peter, he would be called Peter Johnson, his son would bear the name of Peterson. If he was deformed in any way, the name indicating his deformity would be used as a middle name, as Peter Hunchback Johnson. Our name is an ancient one, having originated in England. It may have been derived from Burler, a dresser of cloth, Burly, boisterous, or compounded from Bur, Burgh, elevated, and ley, meaning um tilled grouhd; Viz. High and untilled ground. Burgh also means a fortification, a castle, and ley, leigh, means a field, viz a castle on the field, or defence of the lowly. The variations in spelling the name have been Burleigh, Borleigh, Burghly, Burghley, Birgeley, Burley, Berley, Birley, Burlie, Burle, Burlly, Bourle, Burly, Budley, Burdley, Berdley, Birdley, Birdly, Bodley, Borley, Barley, Burles, Beareley, Brally, Bralley, Bowley, Burhely, and perhaps Burleson and Burlison. Burleigh is the more mod em, and I would suggest that it be continued, though Burley is the most common orthography in England to-day. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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(Excerpt from Thoughts on the Death Penalty The design of...)
Excerpt from Thoughts on the Death Penalty The design of punishment is to prevent the commission of crimes and to repair the injury that hath been done thereby to Society or the individual. And it hath been found by experience that these objects are better obtained by moderate but certain penalties, than by severe and excessive punishment: and it ts the duty of every government to endeavor to reform rather than exterminate offenders. And the punishment of dentin ought never to be inflicted where it is not absolutely necessary to the public safety - Laws qf' Pennsylvania. Stat. Qf21794. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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(Excerpt from Reception of George Thompson in Great Britai...)
Excerpt from Reception of George Thompson in Great Britain: Compiled From Various British Publications And whither did he fly? Why, verily - he returned directly to that land which his ca lumniators declare that he was forced to leave, that he might escape an ignominious punish ment. And how was he received there 1 Were the officers of justice standing ready to seize him, the instant he should again set foot on British soil? Was the convict ship waiting to receive him on board, and then hoist sail for New Holland? The answer may be gathered from the following pages, which describe the manner of his reception in his native country, and contain accounts of various meetings which he has attended, and reports, more or less full, of the speeches he has delivered, since his arrival there. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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abolitionist journalist lecturer
Charles Calistus Burleigh was born on November 3, 1810 in Plainfield, Connecticut, he was a son of Rinaldo and Lydia (Bradford) Burleigh, and a member of a family of reformers.
He received his schooling at Plainfield Academy, and while continuing to help with the work of his father's farm, began the study of law.
In January 1835 Burleigh was admitted to the bar, but again the Rev. S. J. May and the call of reform intervened, and Burleigh turned his back on a professional career to become agent and lecturer for the Middlesex Anti-Slavery Society. In the same year he was in the company of William Lloyd Garrison when the latter was mobbed in Boston, wrote the account of the mob published in the Liberator (October 24, 1835), and helped conduct that journal during Garrison's absence from the city.
In 1838 he was a witness of another mob when Pennsylvania Hall in Philadelphia was burned. At this time and for some years he was editor of the Pennsylvania Freeman, after 1844 the regular organ of the Eastern Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society. As a member of the business committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society he introduced at the meeting in 1840 a resolution stating that the constitution of the society should not be interpreted as requiring members either to exercise or refuse to exercise their political votes; this resolution led to the repudiation by the society of both Harrison and Van Buren as candidates for the presidency.
In 1859 Burleigh succeeded Sydney H. Gay as corresponding secretary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, and in that capacity prepared its twenty-seventh annual report, published under the title, The Anti-Slavery History of the John Brown Year (1861).
He also prepared the introduction to Reception of George Thompson in Great Britain (1836); and an appendix to Discussion on American Slavery between George Thompson, Esq. , and Rev. Robert J. Breckinridge (1836); and was the author of Slavery and the North; and an address, extracts from which appeared in No Slave-Hunting in the Old Bay State.
Burleigh's zeal in the anti-slavery cause led him indirectly into another crusade. Twice jailed in West Chester, Pennsylvania, for selling anti-slavery literature on Sunday, he plunged into Anti-Sabbatarianism, joining with others in a call for a convention, held in New York in March 1848, at which he was prominent among the speakers.
He also dabbled from time to time in other reforms: opposed capital punishment in a pamphlet, Thoughts on the Death Penalty (1845) and on the platform in Philadelphia; and supported woman suffrage, notably by his speeches in the conventions at Cleveland and New York in 1853 and at the first annual meeting of the American Equal Rights Association at New York in May 1867.
During his later years he made his home at Northampton, Massachussets, where he died in 1878 from injuries received in a railroad accident at Florence, Massachussets.
Burleigh was one of the most active, vital and exciting speakers of the antebellum abolition movement. As an agent for several abolitionist groups, he earned widespread admiration for his public addresses. He turned his back on a professional career to become agent and lecturer for the Middlesex Anti-Slavery. In 1863, he came from Plainfield, CT as the first speaker of the Free Congregational Society of Florence. The society was more philosophical than religious and was devoted to the principles of free thought & free speech. The many of the original 35 founders had been members of the cooperative Northampton Association of Education & Industry. Mr. Burleigh spoke on subjects such as abolition, woman's suffrage, welfare, social reform, other denominational philosophies, etc. In 1845 he published a pamphlet, Thoughts on the Death Penalty, condemning capital punishment.
(Excerpt from The Genealogy of the Burley or Burleigh Fami...)
(Excerpt from Reception of George Thompson in Great Britai...)
(Excerpt from Thoughts on the Death Penalty The design of...)
Early in 1833 an attack on the Connecticut "Black Law" which he had published in the Genius of Temperance attracted the attention of the Rev. Samuel J. May, through whose instrumentality he became editor of Arthur Tappan's new paper the Unionist, published at Brooklyn, Connecticut, in defense of Prudence Crandall and her negro school. Burleigh--later assisted by his brother, William Henry, --edited the Unionist for some two years during which he won a reputation for fearless and forceful writing.
He was a member of the Middlesex Anti-Slavery Society and of the American Anti-Slavery Society .
Eccentric in dress and with a flowing beard he vowed not to remove until the end of slavery.
Quotes from others about the person
His name appeared frequently in the Liberator thereafter, and his long thin figure, "flowing beard and ringlets and eccentric costume" became familiar on lecture platforms throughout the northeastern states.
He later followed his brother William Henry into the field of temperance reform. Burleigh's personal appearance, his eccentricity of dress and manner, were against him, in the opinion of Samuel J. May, who nevertheless reckoned Burleigh among his ablest associates, characterizing him as "a single-minded, pure-hearted, conscientious, self-sacrificing man, " who often "delighted and astonished his hearers by the brilliancy of his rhetoric and the surpassing beauty of his imagery".
The son of William Lloyd Garrison said that as a close debater Burleigh "was easily first of all the abolition orators".
William Wells Brown, ex-slave and public orator, described Burleigh in glowing terms:
“In the month of May, 1834, while one evening strolling up Broadway, New York, I saw a crowd making its way into the Minerva Rooms, and, having no pressing engagement, I followed, and was soon in a splendid hall, where some twelve or fifteen hundred persons were seated, and listening to rather a strange-looking man. The speaker was tall and slim, with long arms, long legs, and a profusion of auburn or reddish hair hanging in ringlets down his shoulders; while a huge beard of the same colour fell upon his breast. His person was not at all improved by his dress. The legs of his trousers were shorter than those worn by smaller men: the sleeves of his coat were small and short, the shirt collar turned down in Byronic style, beard and hair hid his countenance, so that no redeeming feature could be found there; yet there was one redeeming quality about the man—that was the stream of fervid eloquence which escaped from his lips. I inquired his name, and was informed that it was Charles C. Burleigh. Nature has been profuse in showering her gifts upon Mr. Burleigh, but all has been bestowed upon his head and heart. There is a kind of eloquence which weaves its thread around the hearer, and gradually draws him into its web, fascinating him with its gaze, entangling him as the spider does the fly, until he is fast: such is the eloquence of C. C. Burleigh. As a debater he is unquestionably the first on the Anti-slavery platform. If he did not speak so fast, he would equal Wendell Phillips; if he did not reason his subject out of existence, he would surpass him. However, one would have to travel over many miles, and look in the faces of many men, before he would find one who has made more personal sacrifices, or done more to bring about the Emancipation of the American Slaves, than Mr. Charles C. Burleigh. ”
On October 24, 1842, he had married Gertrude Kimber of Chester County, Pennsylvania, who bore him three children.
1807–1877
1844–1911
1807–1877
1816–1869
He was a supportive friend of Abby Kelley.
1851–1944
1848–1882
1846–1910
1809–1848
1817–1884
