From Witness Stones Shed Light On New Haven’s History Of Enslavement Downtown
Lucy was most likely born in West Central Africa in 1764 and later kidnapped and trafficked to the island of St. Thomas, where she was sold into chattel slavery. General R. Tritton, a merchant who sailed ships in and out of New Haven, enslaved Lucy. The enslaving Tritton family was based in Nova Scotia, Canada and owned property in New Haven, where General Tritton’s children attended school for several months a year.
Lucy’s daughter, Lois, was born in Nova Scotia in 1799, and despite laws that prohibited the import of enslaved people into the United States, the Tritton family persisted in enslaving her. In 1825, Lucy and Lois were sold to the abolitionist and Trinity Church member Anthony P. Sanford on the New Haven Green, who emancipated the two of them.
Lois, affectionately known as “Auntie Louis,” was a laundress, a member of Trinity Church, and a mother to her child Henry. She lived to the year 1894, dying at age 95, the second-oldest person in New Haven at the time.