Overlooked No More: Elizabeth A. Gloucester, 'Richest' Black Woman and Ally of John Brown.

She ran boardinghouses whose lodgers included members of New York's elite, raised money for an orphan asylum and was active in the abolitionists' cause.

By Steve Bell

New York Times

Sept. 23, 2019

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/obituaries/elizabeth-gloucester-overlooked.html?searchResultPosition=1

Elizabeth and Reverend James Gloucester were leaders of Brooklyn's black community. She made a fortune in real estate and was active in fundraising for New York City's Colored Orphan Asylum. During the Civil War, she led efforts to raise funds for freedmen and Union soldiers. James was the founding pastor of Brooklyn's Siloam Presbyterian Church. He also was the principal of the African School in Carsville and a supporter of Lewis Tappan's American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. The Gloucesters were friends and colleagues of both Frederick Douglass and John Brown, men who would not have quietly accepted discrimination. When it came time for Elizabeth and James to purchase a burial spot, they chose lot 9817 in 1856. When she died in 1883, she was one of the richest women in America–and was widely believed to be the country's richest woman of color. They bought their 300 square foot lot in 1856 for $110–about $3000 in today's dollars. That was a substantial investment, one which many New Yorkers and Brooklynites, white and black, could not afford.

James married Elizabeth Gloucester in 1838 and moved to Brooklyn in the late 1840s. The couple were close friends and colleagues with Frederick Douglass and John Brown, and offered financial support for Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry. After Elizabeth died in 1883, James became a physician and moved to Long Island.

Elizabeth Gloucester was born in Virginia and moved to Philadelphia at age 6. She married Presbyterian minister James Gloucester and the couple moved to Brooklyn. She led fundraising efforts for freedmen and Union soldiers through the Ladies National Union Fair and the American Freedmen's Friend Society.

In addition to the obituary above, another longer NYTimes opinion piece appeared on Feb., 16, 2024 entitled: "The Lost Story of New York's Most Powerful Black Woman

On May 20, 2024, the author of this article, Brent Staples , is scheduled to give a lecture with the same title at the New-York Historical Society.

Name Elizabeth A Gloucester

Date of interment August 11, 1883

Lot number (of current burial site) 9817

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Birthplace -

Marital status Married

Age at death 66 years

Late residence 144 Remsen St, Brooklyn

Place of death Brooklyn

Cause of death Organic Heart

Date of death August 8, 1883

Diagram available (see digital image) false

Lot owner? false

Undertaker / Funeral Director J M Hopper

Burial Registry Volume 29

Burial Registry Page 103

Interment Number 220099