tudy of her laws leaves the impression that the Negroes there
were practically denied the right of instruction.

CONNECTICUT

never legislated against educating Colored persons, but the prejudice
was so strong that it amounted to the same thing. The intolerant
spirit of the whites drove the Colored people of Hartford to request a
separate school in 1830. Prejudice was so great against the presence
of a Colored school in a community of white people, that a school,
established by a very worthy white lady, was mobbed and then
legislated out of existence.

"In the summer of 1832, Miss Prudence Crandall, an excellent,
well-educated Quaker young lady, who had gained considerable
reputation as a teacher in the neighboring town of Plainfield,
purchased, at the solicitation of a number of families in the
village of Canterbury, Connecticut, a commodious house in that
village, for the purpose of establishing a boarding and day
school for young ladies, in order that they might receive
instruction in higher branches than were taught in the public
district school. Her school was well conducted, but was
interrupted early in 1833 in this wise: Not far from the village
a worthy colored man was living, by the name of Harris, the owner
of a good farm, and in comfortable circumstances. His daughter
Sarah, a bright girl, seventeen years of age, had passed with
credit through the public school of the district in which she
lived, and was anxious to acquire a better education, to qualify
herself to become a teacher of the colored people. She applied to
Miss Crandall for admission to her school. Miss Crandall
hesitated, for prudential reasons, to admit a colored person
among her pupils; but Sarah was a young lady of pleasing
appearance and manners, well known to many of Miss Crandall's
present pupils, having been their classmate in the district
school, and was, moreover, a virtuous, pious girl, and a member
of the church in Canterbury. No objection could be made to her
admission, except on acount of her complexion, and Miss Crandall
decided to receive her as a pupil. No objection was made by the
other pupils, but in a few days the parents of some of them
called on Miss Crandall and remonstrated; and although Miss
Crandall pressed upon their consideration the eager desire of
Sarah for knowledge an