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Ordeal of John Cassamer

From the pages of the Ohio State Journal dated June 4, 1864 (The State of Connecticut ended slavery in 1848)

" A white slave named John Cassamer has been brought to Connecticut by a mechanic of that State who was lately employed as master of construction at Fort Pike, near New Orleans. Cassamer is an old man, and was the illegitimate offspring of the daughter of a wealthy French planter named Blanc; in Southern Louisiana. The family disowned him, turned him over to the negro cabins on the plantation and had him taught a trade, and after many years of suffering he now finds freedom and full employment in a factory at Collinsville, Ct."