A rare piece of musical history from Trinity College’s Watkinson Library plays an integral part in a new series from Connecticut Public called “Unforgotten: Connecticut’s Hidden History of Slavery.” The special project features radio storytelling, in-depth videos, digital stories, pictures, a podcast, and a television special.
The fourth chapter of the five-part series, “A Musician’s Melodies Come Back to Life,” explores the music of perhaps the earliest published free Black composer in America, Sawney Freeman of Essex, Connecticut. Freeman’s music manuscript is archived at the Watkinson Library in Trinity’s Raether Library & Information Technology Center.
According to Eric Johnson-DeBaufre, rare books and special collections librarian at the Watkinson, Freeman published a collection of his music in 1801. “An ad for it appeared in the Connecticut Journal on September 30, 1801, and identified Freeman as ‘a free Black man in the State of Connecticut,’” Johnson-DeBaufre said. “Sadly, none of the printed copies appear to have survived, but the father of Watkinson’s first librarian—Gurdon Trumbull of Stonington, Connecticut—must have had access to a copy and copied out Freeman’s music by hand into his copybook. Without that manuscript, we would not have any of Freeman’s compositions.”
Johnson-DeBaufre said that it’s possible no one would have known what that manuscript contained were it not the for the research work of two musicologists in the 1970s and early 1980s, Kate Keller and Carolyn Rabson. “They created the census of early American secular music in manuscript form that made it possible for the researchers in Essex not only to know that Freeman was a composer, but also where to find the manuscript containing his music,” he said.
The audio and video series from Connecticut Public features performances of music by Freeman. “It’s a story of mystery and music. An enslaved man’s music was hidden for centuries,” writes Connecticut Public. “Go on a journey to rediscover Sawney Freeman’s music—tucked away in a library—and hear it performed today.”
Explore the series “Unforgotten: Connecticut’s Hidden History of Slavery” here.
Fine Books & Collections—a quarterly magazine and daily blog about rare books, fine art, and collecting—reports on a discovery at Trinity College’s Watkinson Library of a page of previously unrecorded 15th century printing.
Trinity has announced that it will cover full tuition, housing, and meals for admitted students who live in Hartford. Trinity also is eliminating application fees and offering half-tuition grants to admitted students from Hartford County and five neighboring counties.
Trinity College is included in The Princeton Review’s newly released list, “The Best 392 Colleges: 2027 Edition.” Trinity is among 10 higher institutions in Connecticut to be featured on the unranked list.
Trinity College’s Austin Arts Center and its resident theater company, HartBeat Ensemble, will present Athol Fugard’s South African drama “A Lesson from Aloes” from October 8 through October 17, 2026.
