Author: Earl Ijames, Curator of African American History
“When did slavery end in the United States?” is a tough question to answer. Most people point to one of three dates: Emancipation Day on January 1, 1863; the ratification of the 13th Amendment on December 6, 1865; or Juneteenth on June 19, 1865. On January 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation provided a pathway to freedom for enslaved African Americans in Union-occupied areas of Confederate states like Beaufort, Elizabeth City, Plymouth, and New Bern in North Carolina. It did not affect enslaved people in Confederate-occupied areas, nor those in Union states, such as Delaware and Kentucky.
Photo courtesy of Bennett Place State Historic Site.
Celebrations of Emancipation Day began the next year. The first commemorations in Plymouth and New Bern were held in church spaces. By the following year, New Bern’s day of observance included a parade through the main streets of the city with a band and an escort by the North Carolina Heavy Artillery. The procession halted at the army’s parade field, where an orator read the Emancipation Proclamation and Black leaders offered speeches. By 1878, Emancipation Day celebrations were acknowledged statewide, often in conjunction with Watch Night celebrations.
On December 31, 1862—the night before Emancipation Day—many enslaved people in Union-occupied areas stayed up overnight in anticipation of emancipation. This was known as Watch Night. In many areas with large Black populations, people still celebrate Watch Night, mostly at church services.
But Emancipation Day isn’t the only date considered to be the end of slavery in the United States.
Some historians point to December 6, 1865, the day the 13th Amendment was ratified. The amendment abolished slavery nationwide, except as “punishment for a crime.” It codified the Emancipation Proclamation while also expanding it to cover the four “slave states” in the Union. The Senate passed the amendment in April 1864, but President Abraham Lincoln had to actively campaign for the House of Representatives to pass it in January 1865. To become part of the Constitution, three-fourths of states had to ratify it.
North Carolina and other former Confederate states had to approve the 13th Amendment, as well as the 14th and 15th, to be readmitted to the Union after the Civil War. The state finally ratified the 13th Amendment on December 18, 1865, about a week after it became part of the US Constitution.
Recently, Juneteenth has seen a surge in awareness, even becoming a federal holiday. But what are we celebrating on June 19th?
On June 19, 1865, Union general Gordon Grainger and regiments of United States Colored Troops (USCT) arrived at Galveston, Texas with news of the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed enslaved people in Confederate states. This was a full two months after the official end of the Civil War and three years after the issue of the proclamation in 1863. Of course, the news took more than that one day to spread across Texas, a state more than four times the square mileage of North Carolina.
Some of the USCT with Grainger were from North Carolina. As a condition for voting in favor of the 13th Amendment, delegates to North Carolina’s Constitutional Convention demanded the troops be removed from the area. Some of the reassigned troops, mainly from northeast North Carolina, were part of the group in Galveston.
While Juneteenth is now celebrated nationally, it was little known outside of Texas for decades. But small celebrations weren’t uncommon in North Carolina.
Greensboro began having larger city-sanctioned events in 1996, followed by Winston-Salem in 1998. The state of North Carolina began recognizing Juneteenth in 2007, though it is not an official state holiday. It became a federal holiday in 2021.
Today, very few people celebrate Ratification Day, and Emancipation Day in the South has been superseded by Juneteenth in some areas. However, they all celebrate the end of slavery and the beginning of freedom for all!