Isaac Gillam (1844 - 1904)

Born 1844 in Tennessee, United States

Descendants

Biography

Isaac Gillam is a part of US Black heritage.

Isaac was born possibly as early as 1839, but likely about 1844. The Encyclopedia of Arkansas, cited below, says he was born in Hardin County, Tennessee.

His wife Cora Gillam was interviewed in Little Rock, Arkansas about 1937 about her life and her time as an enslaved person.

"I was married by then. Gillam was a blacksmith by trade and had a good business. But in a little while he got into politics in Little Rock. Yes, lady. If you would look over the old records you would see where he was made the keeper of the jail. I don't know how many times he was elected to city council. He was the only colored coroner Pulaski county ever had. He was in the legislature, too."

"Even after the colored folks got put out of public office, they kept my husband for a policeman. It was during those days he bought this home. Sixty-seven years we been living right in this place - I guess - when did you say the war had its wind up? It was the only house in a big forest. All my nine children was born right in this house."

"My husband always believed in using your voting privilege. He has been dead over thirty years. He had been appointed on the Grand Jury; had bought a new suit of clothes for that. He died on the day he was to go, so we used his new suit to bury him in. I have been getting his soldier's pension ever since."

Interview: Cora Gillam was interviewed in Little Rock, Arkansas, by Beulah Sherwood Hagg as part of the Federal Writer's Project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The results are made available by the Library of Congress. ^[1]

Sources

1. ↑ [1] Library of Congress - WPA - Slave Narrative - Cora Gillam - Vol. 2, Arkansas, part 3; pages 27-33, images 32-38 of 394.

• https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/isaac-taylor-gillam-70/

• "United States Census, 1870", database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MNC6-S4G : 28 May 2021), Cora Gillam in entry for Isaac Gillam, 1870.

• "United States Census, 1880," database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MNW2-FGT : 13 January 2022), Cora A. Gillam in household of Isaac Gillam, Little Rock, Pulaski, Arkansas, United States; citing enumeration district , sheet , NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), FHL microfilm .

• "United States Census, 1900", database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M3XS-1G4 : 9 March 2022), Cora A Gilliam in entry for Isaac D Gilliam, 1900.

• "Find A Grave Index," database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:4KV4-95ZM : 15 December 2021), Isaac Taylor Gillam, ; Burial, Little Rock, Pulaski, Arkansas, United States of America, Oakland and Fraternal Historic Cemetery Park; citing record ID 204840714, Find a Grave, http://www.findagrave.com.