Thomas Russell Jr.

Quick Facts

Significance:

Boston Vigilance Committee member, judge

Place of Birth:

Plymouth, Massachusetts

Date of Birth:

September 26, 1825

Place of Death:

Boston, Massachusetts

Date of Death:

February 9, 1887

Place of Burial:

Plymouth, Massachusetts

Cemetery Name:

Burial Hill

A vocal opponent of the Fugitive Slave Law, lawyer and judge Thomas Russell Jr. served as a member of the 1850 Boston Vigilance Committee.

Born on September 26, 1825, Thomas Russell Jr. grew up in Plymouth, Massachusetts, before attending Harvard College and Law School. He moved to Boston, where he began practicing as a lawyer.¹

While just beginning a career in law, Russell joined the antislavery cause and spoke out frequently against the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. He gave speeches in and around Boston, alongside abolitionists such as Lewis Hayden, William Ingersoll Bowditch, and George Thompson.² In an impassioned speech at the Faneuil Hall Anti-Slavery Bazaar, Russell said:

So do the freemen of Massachusetts reply to the haughty demands of the Southern slave-hunters.—They shall not have a slave of them! No, if a slave would save that Union which some of them love better than their souls, they shall not! We’ll keep them all! And some of you are ready to complete the quotation, and to say,--We’ll keep them by these hands!³

Russell joined the 1850 Boston Vigilance Committee, an organization dedicated to providing assistance to freedom seekers coming to and through Boston on the Underground Railroad in the face of the new Fugitive Slave Law. When appointed as a judge to Boston’s Police Court in 1852, newspapers recognized Russell as “a prominent member” of the organization. In 1859, the Vigilance Committee reimbursed Russell for aiding freedom seeker John Williams.⁴

In 1858, a captain of a ship from North Carolina discovered a freedom seeker named Phillip Smith as a stowaway while the ship anchored in Boston Harbor. Upon hearing this, Judge Russell issued a writ of habeas corpus. Russell, Deputy Sheriff Francis Irish, “about a dozen” of Russell’s friends, and “a posse of harbor policemen,” went on a yacht to the ship to rescue Smith. The captain of the vessel threatened to shoot anyone attempting to come on board. Russell replied that it would be a hanging offense to shoot a man. The standoff cooled, as Russell and the others learned that Smith had jumped overboard. Smith had swam to nearby Lovells Island, and frostbitten, he managed to hail a passing ship and make his way to abolitionists in Boston.⁵

Additionally, Russell sought to use his legal expertise to help the abolitionist cause. He and his wife Mary traveled to Virginia in 1859 to meet with and provide aid for the defense of John Brown.⁶

During the US Civil War, Russell advocated for the raising of Black regiments. Russell spoke at the African Meeting House on the subject and celebrated with others after the passage of the Emancipation Proclamation, which helped open the doors of the military to Black soldiers.⁷

A social reformer, Russell also supported the suffrage movement; he attended local suffrage meetings and aided in the passage of a suffrage law allowing women in Massachusetts to vote in school committee elections.⁸

In his career, Russell served not only as a judge on the Boston Police Court, but also later as a justice of the Massachusetts Superior Court, a customs collector, chairman of the Railroad Commissioners, and minister to Venezuela.⁹

Russell died on February 9, 1887, in Boston. His remains are interred in his hometown of Plymouth, Massachusetts.¹⁰

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Footnotes

1. Thomas Russell Jr. is mapped at his 1850 location per the Vigilance Committiee's Broadside, at 35 Court Street. Zion’s Herald, February 16, 1887, 4; “Judge Thomas Russell,” The New York Times, February 10, 1887, 4.
2. “Lynn has Spoken,” The Anti-Slavery Bugle, March 15, 1851, 2; “Liberator Soiree at the Cochituate Hall,” The Liberator, February 7, 1851, 2; “The Faneuil Hall Bazaar—Speech of George Thompson,” The Liberator, January 3, 1851, 2; “General Summary,” The Springfield Daily Republican, April 23, 1851, 2; “Middlesex Co. A.S. Society,” The Liberator, April 18, 1851, 4; The Liberator, December 6, 1850, 3.
3. “Remarks of Thomas Russell, Esq.,” The Liberator, January 17, 1851, 3.
4. “Summary of News,” The Springfield Daily Republican, February 28, 1852, 2; The Springfield Daily Republican, April 22, 1852, 2; Francis Jackson, Account Book of Francis Jackson, Treasurer the Vigilance Committee of Boston, Dr. Irving H. Bartlett collection, 1830-1880, W. B. Nickerson Cape Cod History Archives, https://archive.org/details/drirvinghbartlet19bart/page/n3/mode/2up, 62.
5. “A Runaway Slave in Boston,” The Recorder, January 3, 1859, 2; “A Runaway Slave in Boston,” The Springfield Daily Republican, December 29, 1858, 2; “Escape of a Fugitive Slave from a Vessel in Boston Harbor,” The Liberator, December 31, 1858, 2.
6. “The Morning’s News,” Fall River Daily Evening News, November 1, 1859, 2; “Charlestown, Nov. 3d.,” The Standard-Times, November 4, 1859, 2; “What is the Chivalry of the South?” The Liberator, November 25, 1859, 2.
7. “The Negro Regiment—Meeting of the Colored Citizens,” The Liberator, February 20, 1863, 3; “Proposition to Raise Fifty Thousand Colored Soldiers,” The Liberator, August 7, 1863, 3;
8. “Hon. Thomas Russell,” The Woman’s Journal, February 12, 1887, 4.
9. “Hon. Thomas Russell,” The Woman’s Journal, February 12, 1887, 4; Zion’s Herald, February 16, 1887, 4; “Judge Thomas Russell,” The New York Times, February 10, 1887, 4.
10. “Judge Thomas Russell,” Find a Grave, Judge Thomas Russell (1825-1887) - Find a Grave Memorial.