Enslaved woman in John Rogers’ “The Fugitive’s Story”

The three men in the sculpture were stalwarts of the abolitionist movement of the 19^th century. Sculptor John Rogers had captured them for eternity in a grouping titled “The Fugitive’s Story.”

Poet John Greenleaf Whittier, clergyman Henry Ward Beecher of Brooklyn, brother of Harriett Beecher Stowe of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” fame; and William Lloyd Garrison, editor of the Liberator, a well-known anti-slavery newspaper.

Standing before these three giants was an enslaved African woman with her child nestled protectively against her bosom, telling them about her escape from slavery. As the men are real figures, the woman is more a representative of a people. She wears a scarf on her head, slightly tattered clothing and holds all her earthly belongings in a small bundle at her feet. Rogers painted her sympathetically rather than pathetically, which was the norm at the time.

The men are named on the front of the base of the sculpture, the woman is not. On its website, the National Portrait Gallery in Washington lists her and her child as “Unidentified Woman” and “Unidentified Child.”

Although the grouping was fictionalized, I wondered who this nameless woman was. Did Rogers pull her from his memory, a composite of enslaved women he had seen? Or was she a real person with a real story of her own and not the common one explicit in the statue. We may never know.

I saw the statue, which stood at 22″ tall, at an auction preview recently. It was a plaster and clay reproduction of a bronze statue created by Rogers. This replica was not in very good shape: it was chipped and dusty, and appeared to have been repainted a darker color to cover up peeling paint. It sold for $325.

Rogers didn’t start out to be a sculptor; in fact, he trained to be a master mechanic. He began working in clay as a hobby. After a financial downturn in the country in the 1850s and the end of his job with a railroad company, he decided to become an artist. He went to Europe to learn his craft but didn’t especially like the Neoclassical style that was prevalent there.

He became popular during the mid- to late 19^th century for mass-producing his bronzes in plaster and painting them the color of putty. He was known as the “people’s sculptor” because his pieces were inexpensive and affordable for many middle-class families. Selling for $15 each, they could be found in show windows, parlors, schools and raffled at fairs.

The subjects of his sculptures were taken from novels, poems, prints, and everyday life. They were called “Rogers Groups” and ranged from eight inches to 46” tall. Abraham Lincoln was said to have owned one of his works, as well as Civil War Gen. Armstrong Custer.

Rogers’ images included common people, family groups and Civil War soldiers. Over a period of 30 years starting around 1860, he made about 85 different sculptures, with up to 100,000 plaster castings created from his groupings. Some of the works were recast in editions as high as 20,000. Rogers was said to have made more than $1 million on them. He published a catalog to sell his works, and engaged newspapers to write stories about them.

His first work was “The Checker Players,” which he exhibited at a charity bazaar in Chicago, where he was working at the time in the city surveyor’s office. Rogers became well-noticed with “The Slave Auction,” which he produced in 1859 and exhibited in New York in 1860.

“I have got a magnificent Negro on the stand. He fairly makes a chill run over me when I look at him. . . . The auctioneer I have rather idealized . . . two little quirks of hair give the impression of horns. The woman will be more clearly white and she and the children will come in gracefully. I am entirely satisfied to stake my reputation on it.”

The pieces did not initially sell well; to bump up sales, he hired a black man to peddle them on the streets. “The Slave Auction tells such a strong story that none of the stores will receive it to sell for fear of offending their Southern customers,” he said.

Soon, several abolitionists wrote about them, bought them and encouraged friends to purchase them. Rogers later created a companion piece with a happy non-black family titled “The Farmer’s Wife.” He tried selling them as a pair to a New York jeweler who rejected the slave auction piece, saying he preferred “the more pleasing subject.”

“The Fugitive’s Story” was sculpted in bronze in 1869. Rogers inscribed the men’s names on its base to ensure that the subject matter was very clear. Garrison is seated at the desk, Whittier at left and Beecher in the center. When black abolitionist Sojourner Truth saw the work, she was said to have cried because it reminded her of her escape with her infant daughter Sophia.

In creating the sculpture, Rogers interviewed each of the men, got measurements and photos, and took life masks of Beecher and Garrison. Unlike “The Slave Auction,” this sculpture was universally received, and Rogers was lauded for the work. He considered it one of his most important works.

Rogers created several other works featuring blacks: “The Campfire: Making Friends with the Cook,” “The Wounded Scout, a Friend in the Swamp,” “Taking the Oath and Drawing Rations,” and “Uncle Ned’s School.”

He was also commissioned to create a statue of Civil War Gen. John F. Reynolds that stands in front of Philadelphia City Hall, and he completed a statue of Abraham Lincoln that was shown at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893.