Northern Family, Southern Ties

Opens November 6th, 2025

Curators are researching the complex connections between northern and southern families, and the interstate movement of enslaved people unveiling a story stretching from the late eighteenth century through the Civil War. The exhibit demonstrates how regional differences were not always as cleanly drawn as they may have been portrayed.

Curators are researching the complex connections between northern and southern families, and the interstate movement of enslaved people unveiling a story stretching from the late eighteenth century through the Civil War. The exhibit demonstrates how regional differences were not always as cleanly drawn as they may have been portrayed.

Irish-born John Potter was a wealthy merchant in Charleston, South Carolina, responsible for importing both sundry goods as well as human cargo. His marriage to Catherine Fuller of that city proved a successful step to consolidating generational wealth. Their only daughter married Robert Field Stockton of Princeton, a seafaring Naval Lieutenant Commandant. How did their 1823 marriage impact the social, economic, political and physical landscape of New Jersey?

Through their Colerain, Argyle, and Tweedside plantations along the Savannah River, and a sugarcane plantation in Glynn County, the Potters and Stocktons enslaved hundreds of men, women, and children. Interstate movement of enslaved people between these southern plantations and northern homes occurred regularly. How might these people experienced different models of American slavery?

Learn how these two families straddled the growing divide of antebellum United States and the choices they made when the union was ultimately torn apart.

This exhibition is made possible by Lisa and Michael Ullmann.

Additional support from Liza and Schuyler Morehouse, Colleen Goggins, Helen R. Buck Foundation, and The George H. and Estelle M. Sands Foundation.