African Americans played a vital role both before and after slavery as skilled captains and boatmen on the Hudson River. Built circa 1870 to carry lumber, Little Martha was captained by African American Clint Williams and his two brothers.
They were described by sloop historians Moses Collyer and William Verplank in The Sloops of the Hudson (1908) as “capital boatmen.”
The sloop was owned by William Bull Millard of the Millard Lumber Co.
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