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John Mercer Langston

1829-1897

Name: John Mercer Langston

Birthplace: Louisa Co. VA

Status: Born a slave. Freed in 1834

Occupation/Training: Educator, Diplomat, politician

Residence: Oberlin Ohio, Chillicothe Ohio, Washington DC, Haiti, Dominican Republic

Abolitionist Involvement: After obtaining his B.A. in 1849 and his M.A. in 1852, John Mercer Langston studied law under Judge Philmon Bliss in Elyria Ohio. He was admitted to the bar in 1854. As a lawyer he defended one Edmonia Lewis resulting in her acquittal. She had been accused of poisoning her white roommate at Oberlin. Miss Lewis later won national acclaim for her sculpture.

John Mercer Langston became president of the National Equal Rights Leagues a forerunner of the Niagara movement and the NAACP.

He became active as did his brothers in the Anti-slavery society in Ohio, and was frequently a companion of Frederick Douglass and was visited several times by John Brown. He was also active in the Conventions of the Colored Citizens of Ohio as well as the anti-slavery societies. Declining an offer by John Brown to accompany him to Harper’s Ferry, John Mercer Langston remained in Ohio. He helped to recruit soldiers for the 54th and 55th Massachusetts Colored Infantry, and for the 5th Ohio regiment. After the war, he worked as Inspector general of the Freedmen’s Bureau.

In 1869 he took at job at Howard University in Washington DC and a year later became the dean of the School of Law. From 1877 to 1885 he was resident minister and consul-general in Haiti and charge d’affaires in the Dominican Republic. He took a position as president of Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute in Petersburg Virginia, and retired to his home in 1890. He died in 1897.

Family: Brothers--Son of Capt. Ralph Quarles, Plantation Owner. Lucy
Langston--mother. Wife Caroline M. Wall; Brothers---Giedon Quarles Langston Charles Langston. Sister--Maria Langston. Nephew--Langston Hughes. Half siblings--William, Harriet and Mary Langston.

Place of Death: Washington DC

Publications: From Virginia Plantation to the National Capitol; Howard University: The First Hundred Years1867-1967 by Rayford Logan; Feedom and Citizenship: Selected Lectures Of Hon. John Mercer Langston 1883.

Link: http://www.preservenet.cornell.edu/aahpf/jml_over.htm

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