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To the Editor:
My South Kingstown family held the last person officially enslaved here. The history of our town is sometimes uncomfortable, but it must be publicly told.
My familyâs involvement began when William Reynolds, my 9-times great grandfather, came to Providence in 1637 and soon began making his money in Bermuda, where after the Pequot War, New England settlers traded goods and local Indigenous People into slavery. In the mid-1600s, Williamâs son James Reynolds and wife Deborah Potter moved south to Narragansett Country, also called Kingâs Country. Their oldest son died during Metacometâs War (King Phillipâs War). Even so, my family thrived at the end of the war by establishing slave plantations. Like other colonists, my ancestors acquired large landholdings after the 1675 Great Swamp Massacre (West Kingston), as the Narragansetts were severely weakened through widespread death and enslavement in the Caribbean.