To the manor born: African American Revolutionary War Veteran Andrew Frazier

To the Manor Born: The Extraordinary Journey of Dutchess County’s African American Revolutionary War Veteran Andrew Frazier Bill Jeffway Andrew Frazier was a person of color born at the Manor of Morrisania (now the Bronx) c. 1743, most likely enslaved . The Graham family he would have served there, and especially the Graham family member he served as “waiter” in the Revolutionary War, would fall into some obscurity. By contrast, Frazier’s profile would rise: As a patriarch of a large family who lived the Jeffersonian dream, owning and cultivating farmland in Milan, NY. As the progenitor of a woman who would reference her great-grandfather’s patriotism, attracting national attention as a late 19th century trailblazer of women’s and women of color’s “capacity” and rights. And as a veteran whose grave is marked annually to this day. Inaccurately and posthumously portrayed as a body servant to George Washington just in time for the 1932 Washington bicentennial, we explore Frazier’s story: a reversal of fortune, and how the bifurcation of a factual and fictional legacy came to be. History Speaks www.historyspeaks.us Feb 2017, Milan NY