Person

Rensalaer Barker

Quick Facts
Significance:
Member of the 1850 Boston Vigilance Committee
Place of Birth:
Eastport, Maine
Date of Birth:
June 4, 1812
Place of Death:
Stoneham, Massachusetts
Date of Death:
November 10, 1872
Place of Burial:
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cemetery Name:
Mt. Auburn Cemetery

Housewright Rensalaer Barker1 participated as a member of the 1850 Boston Vigilance Committee.2

Born on June 4, 1812, Rensalaer Barker grew up in Eastport, Maine to parents Timothy and Susan Barker.3 By 1816, his family had moved to Boston.4

Barker's whereabouts for the next several years are unknown. An 1827 newspaper lists a Rensalaer Barker as a survivor of the shipwreck of the schooner Friendship. This schooner, bound from Calais, Maine to Boston, capsized in Frenchman Bay Maine on October 23, 1827.5 He may have spent time in Plymouth County in the 1830s as well. On September 15, 1838, he married Harriet Symmes in Plymouth.6 Over the following 15 years they had five children: William (1841), Benjamin (1843), Timothy (1845), Herbert (1850), and Susan (1852).7

The 1837 Boston City Directory lists a "Ransler Barker" working as a sashmaker at 9 Haverhill Street.8 The 1850 Boston City Directory documents Rensalaer Barker's occupation as a housewright and residing at 11 Wesley Street in East Boston. Barker and his partner Curtis Barnes kept their shop at 14 Charlestown Street.9

Rensalaer Barker joined the Boston Vigilance Committee in 1850. Bostonians founded this iteration of the Vigilance Committee in response to the passage of the new Fugitive Slave Law that empowered enslavers and their agents to capture and return freedom seekers to bondage. While the Vigilance Committee broadside and Austin Bearse's Reminisces of the Fugitive Slave Law Days in Bostonlist him as a member of the Committee, Barker's contributions to the organization remain unknown.10

Barker worked as a carpenter until the end of his life. November 10, 1872. Barker is interred in Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge Massachusetts.11

While we know some information about Barker's life, much of it remains undiscovered, especially his contributions to the Underground Railroad and his motivations for joining the cause.

If you are a researcher or descendent of Rensalaer Barker, or can provide any further details of his life and work, please reach out to us at boaf_mail@nps.gov.

Footnotes

  1. There are several different spellings of Barker's first name in Boston City Directories, but the evidence indicates that they were the same individual. Ransler Barker (1837-1839), Ransalaer Barker (1840-1849), and Rensselaer Barker are listed as sashmakers in Boston City Directories. Housewrights Ransalaer Barker (1850) and Wm. Ransalaer Barker (1851) were listed partners in the firm Barker and Barnes. Wm. Ransalaer Barker and Rensaleer Barker (1855) are listed as carpenters partnered with Curtis Barnes and living in Medford. In 1856, Rannsalaer Barker lived in Medford. From 1861 to 1872, carpenters R. Barker, Renssalaer Barker, and Rennselaer Barker lived in East Boston. There are no multiple listings in any directory. Charles Stimpson Jr. published directories that mention Barker. Charles Stimpson Jr., Stimpson's Boston Directory (Boston: Stimpson): 1837 on pg. 77; 1838 on pg. 72; 1839 on pg. 75; 1840 on pg. 73; 1841 on pg. 74; 1842 on pg. 76; 1843 on pg. 76; 1844 on pg. 79; 1845 on pg. 71; 1846 on pg. 74; Between 1846 and 1856 George Adams published directories by different names including: Adams's Boston Directory, Directory of the City of Boston, Boston Directory for the Year [with Year]. Rensalaer Barker and variations of his name appear in: 1846 on pg. 74; 1847 on pg. 49; 1848 on pg. 66; 1849 on pg. 67; 1850 on pg. 83; 1851 on pg. 19; 1854 on pg. 30; 1856 on pg. 27. George Adams published the The Boston Directory for the Year Commencing [specific date] with "Sampson" from 1861 to 1867. Rensalaer Barker and variations of his name appear in: 1861 on pg. 36; 1862 on pg. 31; 1863 on pg. 29; 1864 on pg. 29; 1865 on pg. 39; 1867 on pg. 52. Sampson and Davenport published The Boston Directory for the Year Commencing [specific date] and Rensalaer Barker and variations of his name appear in: 1868 on pg. 70; 1869 on pg. 69; 1870 on pg. 73; 1871 on pg. 75; 1872 on pg. 76. All Boston City Directories can be found at the Boston Athenaeum.
  2. Austin Bearse, Reminiscences of Fugitive Slave Law Days in Boston (Boston: Warren Richardson, 1880), 3, https://archive.org/details/reminiscencesfu00beargoog/page/n12/mode/2up, (Accessed 16 Sept 2021).
  3. Massachusetts, U.S., Death Records, 1841-1915 for Ransaleer Barker. On Ancestry.com, (Accessed 16 Sept 2021).
  4. E. Cotton, The Boston Directory (Boston: Cotton, 1816), 59, Boston Athenaeum, (Accessed 16 Sept 2021); Town and City Clerks of Massachusetts. Massachusetts Vital and Town Records. Provo, UT: Holbrook Research Institute (Jay and Delene Holbrook). In Ancestry.com: Massachusetts, U.S., Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. (Accessed 3 Oct 2021).
  5. "Ship News" Courier (Charleston SC), November 17, 1827, GenealogyBank, (Accessed 16 Sept 2021). It would be difficult to determine if Barker stayed with relatives—Maine state censuses at the time listed the ages of household members but didn’t name them.
  6. American Antiquarian Society, Index to Marriages in Massachusetts Centinel and Columbian Centinel, 1784-1840, Vol. 1 A-D. Boston, MA, USA: G.K. Hall, 1961. On Ancestry.com, Massachusetts, U.S., Marriage Index, 1784-1840 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 1998. (Accessed 16 Sept 2021).
  7. 1855 Massachusetts State Census, Ancestry.com, Massachusetts, U.S., State Census, 1855 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014. (Accessed 2 Oct 2021).
  8. Stimpson, 1837 Boston Directory, 77. (Accessed 16 Sept 2021). Barker lived at several other locations over the next 34 years: Williams Street (1840), Dupee Place (1841-1842), Cooper Street (1843)—all of these near Causeway Street in Boston. Wesley Street in East Boston (1844-1850), Medford MA (unknown street addresses from 1851-1857 (and probably 1858-1860 as well), then to East Boston: Princeton Street (1861), Eutaw Street (1862-1863), Brooks Street (1864-1869), and Lexington Street (1870-1872). Stimpson, 1840 Boston Directory, 73; ---, 1841 Boston Directory, 74; ---, 1843 Boston Directory, 76; ---, 1844 Boston Directory, 79; Adams, Boston Directory for 1850-1851, 83; ---, Boston Directory for 1851, 19; ---, Boston Directory for 1861, 36; ---, Boston Directory for 1862, 31; ---, Boston Directory for 1864, 29; ---, Boston Directory for 1870, 73; N.A., Boston Directory for 1872, 76.
  9. Stimpson, 1837 Boston Directory, 77.; Adams, Boston Directory for 1850-1851, 83; Deaths Registered in Newton for the Year eighteen hundred and eighty -five, Ancestry.com;  "Members of the Committee of Vigilance," broadside printed by John Wilson, 1850, Massachusetts Historical Society. 
  10. Bearse, 3.
  11. Ransaleer Barker Death Record; Van Renselaer Barker Memorial. On Van Renselaer Barker (1812-https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/96917107/van_renselaer-barke. (Accessed 16 Sept 2021). This was indeed the same Renselaer Barker—the birth date, death date, and names of his parents match up with other sources.

Boston African American National Historic Site

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Last updated: January 16, 2023