This post is another preview of my forthcoming two-volume, 1,800+ page, tenth book, titled, An Early Industry of Household Wares: The Red Earthenware of Salem Village, Danvers, Peabody, Beverly and Salem, Massachusetts: http://www.earlyamericanceramics.com/2026/01/update-on-new-book-book-sent-to.html.
While researching the new book, I realized that the Buffum family was not related to the area’s red earthenware production; however, they were fundamental in establishing the local Quaker movement and, ultimately, driving the group's fierce anti-slavery stance. Here is that story.
"...The Buffum family was one of the prominent Quaker families with deep roots in Danvers and Salem, Massachusetts. In the 1600s, they faced harsh punishment from the local Puritan government for their religious beliefs. To survive, they teamed up with another local Quaker family, the Southwicks (Chapter 6), and the two families eventually intermarried and built the area's first official Quaker Meeting House, in the autumn of 1688.
By the 1800s, descendants like James Needham Buffum (1807-1887) had moved to nearby Lynn, Massachusetts. James became a successful politician and a fierce abolitionist. His Quaker beliefs taught him that all people are equal, which is why he owned a teapot and sugar bowl featuring a famous British anti-slavery design, now in the collection of Historic New England.
James did not just talk about his beliefs; he acted on them. He became close friends with the famous author and former slave Frederick Douglass (1818-1895). In 1841, when a violent mob tried to drag Douglass out of a segregated train car in Lynn, James stepped in and helped Douglass fight them off. Later, in 1845, James paid to travel to Scotland with Douglass to protest against church groups accepting money from slaveholders.
Douglass’ association with the Quaker potters of Bristol County and Boston’s African Meeting House is further discussed in Volume II of this book. Additionally, while it shares a common name, Boston's African Meeting House was not a spin-off of Quaker meeting houses. Instead, it was founded as an African Baptist church and drew its name from New England's broader Puritan and civic traditions.
Nonetheless, the shared purpose of these meeting houses brought the two groups together in 1832. That year, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879) founded the New England Anti-Slavery Society inside the African Meeting House. Because Quaker families like the Buffums heavily funded Garrison's work, the two networks easily connected. Soon, the exact same speakers who traveled the Quaker circuit, including Frederick Douglass, were regularly preaching from the African Meeting House. This partnership united two different religious traditions into a single, powerful front against slavery."
Note: For more information about Boston's African Meeting House and Frederick Douglass - see a feature story I wrote that was published on pages 16-17 in the February 27, 2026 issue of Antiques And The Arts Weekly, titled, Nineteenth Century Red Earthenware Recovered At Boston's African Meeting House: http://www.earlyamericanceramics.com/2026/02/black-history-month-feature-story.html.
For more information about the Southwick family - see a feature story I wrote that was published on page 10 in the December 12, 2025 issue of Antiques And The Arts Weekly, titled, The Southwick Family Of Potters Of Salem & South Danvers, Mass.: http://www.earlyamericanceramics.com/2025/12/new-published-feature-story-in-antiques.html.
Please Stay Tuned...Much More to Come...
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