Very little is known of Elizabeth Denison Forth, but, hers is a story worth remembering for the magnanimous gift she left to Detroit upon her death to build a “Fine Chapel for the use of the Episcopal Church.”
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Elizabeth Denison Forth (c. 1793 – d. August 7, 1866). That a former enslave would have the wherewithal to bequeath money to build a church is an extraordinary accomplishment in itself. But a close look at the story of Elizabeth Denison Forth also uncovers historical firsts, an unflagging search for justice, and an ultimate irony worthy of a well-told fictional tale. Lisette, as Elizabeth was called, was born a slave in 1793 to Peter and Hannah Denison of the Michigan Territory. The family was owned by William Tucker, who stipulated in his will that upon the death of his wife Catherine, Peter and Hannah would gain their freedom. Their eight children, however, were to be left to his sons. Tucker died in 1805, and the following year Catherine indentured the family to Elijah Brush, who in the same year became the second mayor of the town of Detroit.
When Catherine reclaimed the family in 1807, Brush apparently influenced Lisette’s father to sue for their freedom. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 passed by Congress had prohibited slavery in the territory, but Judge Augustus Brevoot Woodward ruled that, in accordance with the Jay Treaty of 1794, the law applied only to new enslaves. Existing enslaves–and that included their children— were exempt. Soon after this decision, Judge Woodward ruled that enslaves who escaped to Canada would retain their freedom upon returning to the United States. Again Brush stepped in to help and arranged for Lisette’s family to be housed in Ontario. Lisette returned to Detroit several years later, where she was employed by Solomon Sibley, the first mayor of Detroit.
In 1827, she married Scipio Forth, though he died within three years. Meanwhile, Lisette had used her meager earnings to buy four lots in Pontiac, Michigan, making her that city’s first Black property owner. In 1803 she was hired as a domestic servant in the household of yet another former Detroit mayor, Major John Biddle, where she worked for thirty years. She continued to invest wisely, in a steamboat and in bank stock, and at her death in 1866 her estate was worth approximately $1,500. She made Biddle’s son William executor of her will, which stated that the money be used to build a “Fine Chapel for the use of the Protestant Episcopal Church.”
ironically, though she bequeathed her estate in order to provide a place of worship to address the “inadequacy of the provisions made for the poor in our houses of worship,” the land that William’s brother James donated for the site of the church was located on Grosse Ile, where many of Detroit’s most affluent citizens–including people like R. E. Olds of Oldsmobile and Charles and William Fisher of Fisher Body–built their summer homes.
St. James Episcopal Church was consecrated in 1868 and exists to this day.
Side elevation of church, showing main entrance doors dedicated to Lisette Denison Forth.
Lisette is buried in “Stranger’s Ground” at Detroit’s Elmwood Cemetery.
references:
Black Women in America, by Darlene Clark Hine, et. al, Oxford University Press, 2005.
Looking for Lisette: In Quest of an American Original, Mark R. McPherson (Dexter, MI” Mage Press, in conjunction with Thomson-Shore, 2001).