Local Black History: Meet Melissa Smith Hesson

As part of Black History Month, Words in Place is publishing profiles of forgotten figures from local Black History, beginning with Melissa Smith Hesson.

Melissa Smith, the organist of Guelph’s British Methodist Episcopal (BME) church, had ambitions. Journalism, public speaking, performance—she tried them all. The fact that she did not succeed as she might have says more about her era and the limited options for nineteenth-century Black Canadian women than it does about her ability. However, Smith’s desire for more, as well as her commitment to the church, was obviously part of a long family tradition.

Smith’s grandfather, Kentucky-born Henry Smith (1802-c1854), first arrived in Peel in 1844, though he had probably been in Canada for well over a decade. The 1851 Census lists Henry, his wife Margaret, and their seven Canadian-born children in Peel. Henry was by all accounts religious; in 1846 he was admitted on trial as a minister by the AME Church. By 1852, he was mentioned as “Bro. H. Smith” in the Voice of the Fugitive, where the following report was made:

we our committee to whom was referred the duty of examining brother Henry Smith for holy orders, have attended to the same; and beg leave respectfully to submit the following as the result of our labors; we believe brother Smith to be a very pious and upright man, but literally disqualified to be admitted a Deacon in the Church of God. We therefore recommend him to improve his mind by reading &c., one year longer. Cheerfully submitted by Wm. H. Jones, Edmund Crosby, and S.H. Brown

Reading between the lines it appears Smith suffered the fate of many raised in slavery: an insufficient education which impeded his ability to fulfill the duties of a Deacon, including those which relied on textual knowledge. Whether Smith reapplied is unknown; his busy household and the responsibility of supporting a family while also engaging in the back-breaking labour necessary to settling parts of the Queen’s Bush no doubt impeded his ability to study.

Smith’s children, however, do appear to have been educated. It is possible that at least two of his sons (Charles and John) served in the United States Civil War; Arthur, Melissa’s father, would not. In 1868 Arthur married Sophia Wilson, the daughter of Lloyd and Mary Ann “Polly” Wilson (identified as “mulatto” and American-born in 1861).

By 1871 Arthur and Sophia Smith were the parents of two children, and farming. A year earlier Guelph’s BME Church had been founded on Market Street. The Smiths would soon identify as members, as would Sophia’s brother Peter, a later resident of Essex Street. By 1874 Arthur and Sophia would have at least five children, including their daughter Melissa, born in Queen’s Bush.

Before she was twenty Melissa Smith had distinguished herself as a correspondent for the Plaindealer, Detroit’s first black newspaper. Her letters are full of reports of local events. A typical entry follows:

Mrs. S. Venerable, of Guelph, spent a few days in Hamilton, during the Saengerfest last week.
Rev. J. O’Banyoun and Miss Lottie Bland, of Hamilton, were married at St. Paul’s AME church of Hamilton, Tuesday evening, by the pastor, Rev. Mr. Bell. A few of their most intimate friends were present. Mrs. Bell served refreshments, after which the happy couple left for Chatham, where they will make their home.
John Walden, of Preston, is in the city, visiting his brother Allen Walden who has been seriously ill for a few weeks.
Mrs. Hissin, of Guelph, was called to Dunville last week, to see her sick daughter, Mrs. M. Matthews.
Mr. Henry Lawson, of Toronto, spent Sunday with his parents in the city. We are all pleased to know that Mr. Lawson is getting along so nicely with his trade.
Mr. Richard Wind, a former Guelph boy, was married last Wednesday in Toronto.
Mrs. W. Smith, of Preston, was in the city visiting her mother-in-law, Mrs. Smith.
Mr. J. Spencer has been very ill for a few weeks but is recovering slowly.
A number of Guelph boys have gone to Toronto. It seems to be a famous place for boys wishing to marry, as all the boys that have gone from Guelph to Toronto have married Toronto ladies.

Smith’s comments are for the most part the standard gossipy social fare that one finds in small town newspapers of the era. The difference, of course, is that Guelph’s paper did not report on such activities within the black community, and its members were forced to look further afield if they wanted to see themselves represented in their normal day-to-day lives—in this case to the other side of the border. The Plaindealer was the closest all-black newspaper; moreover, Detroit was the closest US city, and as such a site of migration for black Canadian men seeking opportunities. As Smith observed, young men frequently relocated to larger cities in search of greater opportunities. As a young woman, she was not immune to the idea, subsequently writing “It has been wondered if the girls will meet the same fortune as the boys, as some of the girls are talking of going to Toronto.” In 1891 Smith made her own move:

Your former correspondent, Miss Melissa Smith, left on Monday last, for Hamilton, Ont., to join the Canadian Jubilee Company, and will be absent, if all goes well, about five months. We very much regret to lose Miss Smith from our social and church societies. She was organist of the B.M.E. church and Sunday school, and also secretary of the latter. She has a very fine soprano voice. Success to you Miss Smith.

Founded in Canada in 1879, the Canadian Jubilee Singers and Imperial Orchestra had toured England, the US and Canada in the 1880s, and provided a rare opportunity for black Canadian musicians and performers. Why Smith joined them for only five months is unknown; certainly she did not appear in subsequent mentions of their performances in the 1890s. Instead, we next hear of her in Guelph in 1893, speaking in a debate at the Collegiate Institute Literary society on the subject “Money is not as beneficial as love.”

Smith had to wait for love; perhaps because so many of the young men had relocated while she stayed with her parents, who by 1901 resided in Guelph, with Arthur trading farming for whitewashing. At least on Essex Street the family was close to the BME church with which they had such strong ties. Melissa, who lacked the education so many black female journalists of the era boasted, was employed as a milliner. Finally, on the last day of 1908, Melissa Smith married Samuel Hesson (Hisson), ten years her junior (the son of Henry and Sarah Jane). The couple appears to have moved back and forth between Detroit and Canada, with Samuel working as a teamster and porter. However, the match did not last, there were no surviving children, and by 1921 Melissa was living on her own at 17 Devonshire Street in Guelph, married but with no husband in the house, and employed as a grocer. Smith would die in June of 1893; her brother Arthur—still on Essex Street—reported her death. She is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery.

Smith represents a generation of black women who desired more but were often thwarted by a lack of opportunity. Just as her grandfather appeared to have been held back within the church due to his lack of learning under slavery, Smith was held back in other ways.

Sources consulted
Canadian Census  (1851, 1861, 1871, 1891, 1901, 1921);  The Voice of the Fugitive, 12 August 1852; The Voice of the Fugitive, 26 August 1852; United States Colored Troops records; Plaindealer, 8 August 1891; Plaindealer, 11 September, 1891; Plaindealer, 23 October 1891; Plaindealer, 10 January 1893; Lynn Abbott and Doug Seroff, Out of Sight: The Rise of African American Popular Music, 1889-1895 (2002); Detroit, Michigan, City Directory, 1909; Detroit, Michigan, City Directory, 1911.

Author: Dr. Jennifer Harris, Department of English Language and Literature
Image Source