A Brick In The Wall Has Fallen Part 5 Eli Brumfield

Eli Brumfield

This is Part 5 of a series identifying the individuals in the above photograph. Eli Brumfield is identified in the above picture as the black man standing on the right side in the picture. In the 1900 Pike County, Mississippi Federal census, the enumerator recorded that none of Eli Brumfield's children could read or write. In 1900, 44.5 % of Black and other non-whites were literate or unable to read or write in any language.*    His children however did attend school. The Pike County, Mississippi school census was divided into colored and white. I was able to identify Eli's children.  In the 1885 Pike County school census, Kizzie Brumfield 6 years old is listed with her father Eli Brumfield. Their names are at the bottom of the page.

Mississippi Enumeration of Educable Children, 1850-1892; 1908-1957," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:939F-PV9F-WD?cc=1856425&wc=M6NC-7P8%3A167436801%2C167437202 : 18 September 2015), Pike > 1885 > image 6 of 178; Government Records, Jackson.

Kizzie (Kizza) 11  and Lotty 6 years old are listed with Ely (Eli) Brumfield in the 1890 Pike County school census. 

Allen County Library Fort Wayne, Indiana  Pike County, Mississippi Records and Correspondence Black families1890 author Serena Abbess Haymon collation 

Lottie 10, Charles 8 and Maude 5  years old are listed with Eli Brumfield in the 1896 Pike County school census.

  

Allen County Library Fort Wayne, Indiana  Pike County, Mississippi Records and Correspondence Black families1896 author Serena Abbess Haymon collation 

Dudley 14 years old is listed with Eli Brumfield in the 1908 Pike County school census. 

The Allen County Library Fort Wayne, Indiana  Pike County, Mississippi Records and Correspondence Black families1908 author Serena Abbess Haymon collation 

The number of days that the children actually attended school a year is unknown. As the children became older, they were probably helping on the farm with their parents.  The quality of education in the segregated school at that time has been well documented in United States history. 

*SOURCE: U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970; and Current Population Reports, Series P-23, Ancestry and Language in the United States: November 1979. (This table was prepared in September 1992.)

------ The Tree Gardener