AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY, PRINCETON, NJ - 1850-1899

The Princeton Press, Sat., Jan. 16, 1886:

[From the N. Y. Observer.]
MY FATHER'S COLLEGE LIFE.
    In the year 1801, my father entered Nassau Hall, as it was then called, at Princeton, N. J. Though but sixteen years old, he became a member of the Sophomore class, and took high rank with such men as Theodore Frelinghuysen and J. R. Ingersoll, who entertained me in London in 1853, when he was United States Minister to England. My father's given name was Nathaniel Scudder, which he received from Dr. Scudder, of New Jersey, who was a very dear friend in college of my grandfather, who graduated at Princeton in the year 1751. In the graveyard in the woods, near the old Tennent Church, in Freehold, N. J., is a tombstone with an inscription in memory of Dr. Nathaniel Scudder, who was killed in the battle of Monmouth. That was the man whose name my father bore. But as he was never pleased with the name he would not impose it on any of his five sons ; in my case preferring to go into the Old Testament, among the prophets, for one name, and to the fathers of the early church for another.
    One of the servants waiting upon the college students was a colored boy named Peter Scudder, who had been a slave in the Scudder family of Princeton. Having the name himself that my father had, and belonging to the family with whom my father was thus connected, the boy attracted the young and pious student's attention. My father had been "born again" the year before he went to college. He found that Peter could not read, and had received very little religious instruction. Encouraging him to come to his room when his work for the day was done, my father gave the lad daily lessons, till he became able to read intelligently, and in the meantime the teachings of his young tutor were made effectual in his conversion. I have often heard my father relate, with tears, the remarkable experience of this colored boy, the clear evidence he gave of genuine conversion, and of his romantic devotion to his young friend.
    Thirty years after this event, I entered the Seminary at Princeton to study theology. Long before this had I forgotten all about Peter Scudder, and I had no thought of his being still among the living at Princeton. The first day of my residence in the seminary, a colored man came in to make up my bed. I asked him his name, and he said, "PETER SCUDDER."
    "How long have you been in the seminary?"
    "A great many years, and I used to wait on the students in the college before I came here to the seminary."
    "Do you remember Nathaniel Scudder Prime?"
    "Indeed, I do ; he taught me to read ; I got religion from him ; he told me how to come to the Lord Jesus Christ ; I shall never forget Massa Prime."
    "I am his son."
    He was awe-struck. He did not at first seem to get hold of it rightly ; it confused him ; but when the idea fairly took possession of his mind, he gave way to extravagant demonstrations of joy, gratitude, and wonder. He wept, and he laughed.
 




    "And is he yet alive?" he inquired, and he loved to hear me speak of all his young friend's life work, and his remembrance of Peter Scudder. Peter was now the father of a family in the village, and I visited them afterwards, to their great enjoyment. Peter was more than my servant, he was my brother in the Lord.
    The president of the college, when my father was a student, was Dr. Samuel Stanhope Smith. Many anecdotes of him were the entertainment of my boyhood. One is worth writing. The president was greatly annoyed by the frequent trespass of the hog of one of his neighbors, that would get into his garden. The animal belonged to a poor widow who tried hard to keep him at home, but he often broke out of her's into the grounds of the president. He sent her fair warning again and again that he should have to kill that hog if he was found in his garden again. But warnings were in vain. One day, and sad to say, it was the Lord's day, Sam, the doctor's servant, brought word to the president that "dat dare hog was in de garden." The better the day the better the deed, and the Doctor told Sam to come out with the big knife and they would make an end of the business. It was in the heat of the summer, and to kill a hog at such a time was to waste the pork, for it could not be kept long enough to be honestly consumed. But the time for reason or pity was past. Sam caught the pig, which set up such a squealing as to alarm the widow in her cottage. She flew to the garden, and taking in the situation at a glance, implored the Doctor to spare the victim now at his mercy.
    "In with the knife, Sam," cried the overheated divine, and the fatal lunge was made. The life blood fattened the soil of the garden.
    The Doctor, feeling better now it was over, began to chide the widow and at the same time to console her on the loss of her hog.
    "O, la, it ain't my hog, Doctor, its [sic] yourn," and sure enough, in their haste and excitement, neither the Doctor nor Sam had noticed that they were killing their own pig in the middle of summer.
.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .
                       IRENAEUS.

The Princeton Press, Sat., Jan. 16, 1886:

    We publish a very interesting reminiscence of old Princeton, in the "Irenaeus" letter on the second page. These letters were written by Dr. Prime, and left by him to be published after his death. The whole series of these letters as published in the Observer are extremely interesting.

[NOTE: The author is Samuel Irenaeus Prime, 1812-1885. This book, Irenaeus Letters, was published in New York by The New York Observer in 1881.]

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