Pati Delany
(c. 1768–1864)
BIRTH
c. 1768
PLACE
Unknown
NAME
Pati Peace
DEATH
1864
PLACE
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
FAMILY
CHILDREN
Martin Delany
(1812-1885)
HOMES
RELIGIOUS VIEWS
CHRISTIAN
DENOMINATION NOT DOCUMENTED
MEMBERSHIPS
AWARDS
Pati Delany was the freeborn mother of abolitionist Martin R. Delany. A seamstress, she moved her children from Virginia to Pennsylvania after being prosecuted for teaching them to read. Samuel Delany, their father, was enslaved at the time.
EARLY LIFE
A nineteenth-century biography of her son Martin Delany names her parents as Shango Peace and Graci. The account presents their African origins and names as family tradition; independent records have not been located.
Pati Peace Delany was a free Black seamstress in Virginia. She taught her children to read despite state restrictions, and in the early 1820s faced legal trouble over their education. She moved the family from Charles Town to Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, in 1822 so the children could continue school. An early biography also recounts that she defended the family's free status in court.
CAREER
DEATH
Pati Delany died in Pittsburgh in 1864 at the home of her son Samuel, according to an 1868 biography of her son Martin R. Delany. It gives her age as ninety-six but does not establish an exact death date or cause.
POPULAR BIOGRAPHIES
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