The Vice President's Black Wife

Award-winning historian Amrita Chakrabarti Myers has recovered the riveting, troubling, and complicated story of Julia Ann Chinn (ca. 1796–1833), the enslaved mixed-race wife of Richard Mentor Johnson, owner of Blue Spring Farm, veteran of the War of 1812, and US vice president under Martin Van Buren. Johnson never freed Chinn, but during his frequent absences from his estate, he delegated to her the management of his property, including Choctaw Academy, a boarding school for Indigenous men and boys. This meant that Chinn had substantial control over economic, social, financial, and personal affairs within the couple’s world, including overseeing Blue Spring’s enslaved labor force. Chinn’s relationship with Johnson was unlikely a consensual one since she was never manumitted.