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Public Unveiling of Agrippa Hull’s Certificate of Discharge

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The Stockbridge Library Museum & Archives is pleased to announce the acquisition of the discharge certificate of Agrippa Hull. This document, dated July 24, 1783, is signed by George Washington as well as Joseph Trumbull and Lt. Jacob Town of the 2nd Massachusetts Regiment. Hull was a free African American soldier from Stockbridge, who served for six years in the Continental Army, two as orderly to General John Paterson of the Massachusetts Line, and the remainder of his service in the same capacity to General Tadeusz Kościuszko. Hull served in several battles from Saratoga, NY to Eutaw Springs in South Carolina.

Certificates of discharge were submitted as part of an application for a military pension and usually remained part of the pension records. To find one outside of these records is unusual, and to find one for a free African American soldier is rarer still, since relatively few free African Americans served in the Continental Army. In addition, his discharge certificate figures prominently in the history of Agrippa Hull. Upon applying for his pension in 1818 he was loath to part with the certificate because it contained Washington’s signature. Ten years later Charles Sedgwick, a local lawyer who was also Massachusetts Speaker of the House of Representatives, wrote letters of support asking for Hull’s pension without the signed documents, because ‘he had rather forego the pension than lose the discharge.’ Sedgwick’s petition was successful and Agrippa Hull retained his certificate.

This document is an additional component of Agrippa Hull’s story, fleshing out the narrative presented by his portrait, his chair, and his daguerreotype; all of which are held in the collection of the SLMA.

The document has undergone conservation and stabilization since its arrival at the Stockbridge Library and will be unveiled to the public on Saturday, November 2, 12:30-2pm. Museum & Archives staff will be on hand to answer questions about the document and provide context for the Agrippa Hull story.

Despite the conservation treatments, the document remains fragile and the original will only be on view through the end of the year. After that we will display a facsimile, with the original available to researchers and as part of special exhibitions.