Solving the fascinating puzzle of Solomon Mosbey
A one-line reference to a riot. And the curiosity of a man fascinated by historical detail.
It was the combination of the two that led to a story about a little-known rebellion in Niagaraon-the-Lake.
Author Michael Pawlowski’s novel, Niagara, Black Waters Flow Deep (JCharlton Publishing Ltd., $30) tells the story of Solomon Moseby, a black slave in Kentucky. He escaped to freedom in Upper Canada on a stolen horse, but was seized by bounty hunters and imprisoned. A riot in Niagara on Sept. 12, 1837, rescued him from extradition back to slavery in America.
And yet, there is little reference to it in history books.
That’s exactly what drew Pawlowski, a 68-year-old retired insurance manager and paralegal living in Hamilton, to immerse himself in the pages of tattered and torn reference books on both sides of the border in search of morsels of information to feed
his inquisitive mind.
His curiosity was piqued some 30 years ago while in Niagara doing other historical research. He happened upon a one-line reference about a riot in Niagara. There was no date. No names. And no other facts. So, as he often does with abstract facts without context, he stored it away in his mind. “That ended that,” he says. Or so he thought. During a vacation to Maine in 1988, he found himself in a bookstore. A woman handed him a old book about Upper Canada. It smelled foul. The cover was missing and so were the first few pages. He started reading and stumbled on a second reference to the Niagara riot.
“That was basically the end of it,” he says.
More than a decade later, in 1992, he was in New Hampshire at a barn sale where he found another book about Upper Canada. He perused the section on Niagara and read a line about a Niagara riot in 1837.
Armed with a date, he scoured the Hamilton library for more information. He read about a rebellion that involved a slave, and an angry plantation owner who wanted to exact revenge by having him returned south. The man was Solomon Moseby.
He was intrigued. “There was nothing written in our history books.
“I started thinking, who else was involved?”
His attention to detail had been honed by years of working in the insurance industry, then representing injured clients as a paralegal. “You try to always find the answer,” he says. “My job as a paralegal was to have the answer before the question was asked.”
Then he let his mind wander. He identified several historical characters of the time. Sir Francis Bond Head was the Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada. Andrew Heron a newspaper publisher. Alexander McLeod, sheriff of Niagara Town. And many others.
“I couldn’t figure out what happened to this Moseby character,” he says. And that bothered him. “It urges me to do a lot more,” he says.
A key piece to his historical puzzle came to him, where else but in a bookstore. This time in Atlantic City.
“I go in there to look at the old books,” he says. “The merchant says here, and pulls off the shelf behind her a book and says, ‘Are you interested in this for five dollars?’
“It was another one on Upper Canada.”
He read about Solomon Moseby, a slave in Kentucky. He had stolen a horse, made it to Upper Canada and an extradition order was issued in Kentucky. He was caught by bounty hunters, and imprisoned. There was a riot in September 1837 that involved both black and white residents demanding his release. Mosbey escaped and two people died.
Pawlowski suggests their efforts were fuelled by a deep sense of compassion and justice.
More thought, research and some best guesses later, Pawlowski travelled to Kentucky for more research. Then he returned, following what he surmised was the route taken by Moseby on horse to his freedom.
Pawlowski suggests that this riot was an important turning point in history and just one predictor of events to come. However, he knows people might disagree.
He speculates on the reasons that it has mostly been forgotten in history books, except for small references. It was an embarrassment to the colonial governments that had supported his banishment. And the black population was simply too scared of repercussions for speaking up. Those who led the revolt were tried for treason, he says. So, the story was never told. Never recorded.
Pawlowski, however, is passionate about sharing the story.
“It comes from the heart,” he says, “that I have done perhaps one ounce of recognition for those who are forgotten.”