In the 2026 Black History Month blog series public programmer and culinary historian Abbey Stansfield examines the important intersections between food and the daily experiences of Freedom Seekers in mid-19th century St. Catharines.

Catch part one No Hogs, No Cows, and All Such Stuff, released February 7.
Catch part two That’s How it Came to Grow There, released February 14.
Catch part three Everything They Had There Was Imported, released February 21.

Part 4: But They Have Gardens and Raise a Great Deal of Stuff

The first three parts of this series I wrote about the importance and availability of pork, corn and cornmeal, and sweet potatoes for Freedom Seekers in St. Catharines. These items formed a very important trio of ingredients in the diets of enslaved peoples and Freedom Seekers in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. However, these three did not represent the entirety of food stuffs available. Many enslaved persons kept gardens as a means of supplementing the rations they were provided and continued this practice to supplement their income while they were resident in St. Catharines. In the fourth and final installment of the Black History Month blog series I’ll look at the importance of the kitchen garden of the 19^th century in St. Catharines.

The basis of my blog series this year was to trace the myths and rumours spread by enslavers to discourage them from finding freedom in Canada. While we may have embraced Canada as a vast expanse of forever-cold landscape in our cultural lexicon, that image was stereotypical to immigrants for hundreds of years, and was harnessed as a part of the misinformation campaign employed by enslavers. While we certainly have cold spells – and this winter was certainly cold! – many Freedom Seekers were led to believe that frigid temperatures existed year-round and that there was no possibility they’d survive.

“I heard a man telling about a colored man who came from the states over here, and he said the colored man came back and said it was so cold here that when they were cutting the grass the ice was so thick on it, they couldn’t get their scythes through.”

– Testimony of J.W. Lindsay as it appears in the Freedman’s Inquiry Commission report by Samuel Gridley Howe, 1863.

The climate we experience in Canada has always been a challenge to settlement and the shorter growing season often cited for lower populations in the Canadian colonies than in the American colonies. It was difficult to encourage settlement because the conditions were thought to be so harsh. That challenge persisted through the 20^th century as the federal government tried to encourage settlement into the west.

Reading that Freedom Seekers also experienced doubt whether Canada was hospitable is comparable to other immigrant experiences. The challenge which makes it unique to their experience is that the story was used to keep people in enslavement, but also the importance of kitchen gardens to supplement the poor quality of daily rations of enslaved peoples as I’ve discussed previously in this series. Using the idea that even grass can’t be successfully grown in Canada is an interesting escalation of the rumours. What are those angry geese that eat all the crops (from part 1 of the series) going to eat if there’s no crops or no grass? I suppose we should not look for logic in these lies but instead the effectiveness at instilling fear of the unknown. Not being able to grow or cut grass would very clearly represent the challenge of trying to keep a kitchen garden. Historian Jennifer Wallach accounts that many slaveholders would encourage enslaved persons to grow their own kitchen gardens as a means of cutting down on “theft” of food from crops or plantation gardens. These gardens allowed for the addition of fresh vegetables to prevent a stagnant diet and the nutritional issues that came from consuming pork, sweet potatoes and corn products exclusively.

“On every plantation, with which I ever had acquaintance, the people are allowed to make patches, as they are called- that is gardens, in some remote and unprofitable part of the estate, generally in the woods, in which they plant corn, potatoes, pumpkins, melons for themselves.”

– Testimony of former enslaved man Charles Ball in Getting What We Need Ourselves, by Jennifer Wallach, 2019.

In addition to the items Charles Ball recollects other garden plots included black-eyed peas, collards, assorted greens, okra and green beans.

Kitchen gardens were not exclusive to this region or era. The term was used to distinguish decorative and ornamental plants and lawns from the beds used to grow foodstuff, items for household use, and medicinal plants. Manuals published in the 1500s include traditions and practices from the Classical antiquity. By the Underground Railroad era the average homeowner would have had a garden that included fruits and vegetables suited to the local climate, herbs for flavouring and medicinal purposes, and plants that were used for an assortment of household purposes (controlling bugs and pests and cleaning).

With kitchen gardens on the mind, food had once again become a lens with which to examine this history. Suddenly, the testimony and descriptions of activity I was so familiar with shifted. It’s so easy for us to gloss over the hard work of running a garden (as any gardener will tell you) when reading about them in a description like that of William Wells Brown, but imagine the care and work put into these gardens as you take in the description:

“…The coloured settlement is a hamlet, situated on the outskirts of the village and contains about 100 houses, 40 of which lie on North Street, the Broadway of the place. The houses are chiefly cottages, with from 3 to 6 rooms, and on lots of land nearly a quarter of an acre each. Each family has a good garden, well filled with vegetables, ducks, chickens, and a pigpen, with at least one fat grunter getting ready for Christmas.”

– William Wells Brown describing St. Catharines in The Narrative of William Wells Brown, a Fugitive Slave, 1847.

Understanding the importance of the kitchen garden for anyone living in the 1800s made me re-examine some of the testimonies given by Freedom Seekers. I reviewed the testimonies regarding how cold they were led to believe Canada was with a new light. I now think that they were speaking about bearing the cold but also about growing what they needed to sustain themselves. This goes beyond what they preferred to eat and explores what would keep them going.

“I had always heard it said that Canada was a very cold country, that nobody could live in it but those brought up in it; but I had comes to the conclusion that if any human being could live in a cold country, I could live there. I just considered that a man must clothe himself according to the weather- I had sense enough for that; and so when I came to Canada, which was in cold weather, I clothed myself very well, and have always got along as well as I could in Hagerstown, MD.”

– Testimony of George Ross as it appears Freedman’s Inquiry Commission report by Samuel Gridley Howe, 1863.

George Ross’ account shows that despite what Freedom Seekers had been led to believe they were willing to do whatever was necessary to overcome those barriers to achieve freedom.

While I explored growing conditions in Canada in this series previously, today I’m going to explore the kinds of crops grown in small kitchen gardens and show the success and vital importance of these plots to refugee Freedom Seekers. I keep returning to William Wells Brown’s description of refugee homes of “a good garden well filled with vegetables.” This is really what captured my attention and imagination. There are other testimonies that mention the kitchen gardens, highlighting the importance of this activity, like in in Benjamin Drew’s, The Refugee:

“Their [Freedom Seekers in Toronto] houses resemble those of the same class of persons in St. Catharines: but as they have not generally so extensive gardens…”

– Benjamin Drew in The Refugee, 1856.

What did they grow in their gardens? The St. Catharines Constitutional, which provided advice on growing sweet potatoes, also advised on kitchen gardens. Several articles provide information about growing beans, cabbages, carrots, celery, corn, cucumber, eggplant, endives, melons, radishes, onions, spinach and squash, asparagus, rhubarb, beets, cauliflower, chives, cress, tomatoes and garlic. What bounty! I’m sure many of us would count ourselves lucky to grow this variety in our backyards.

Advertisements for local seed stock were also plentifully available from places like John McLearn’s garden at the corner of Lake Street and Welland Avenue in 1865.

Kitchen gardens were also important to supplement a family’s income. Selling off their extra produce at the market was a popular way to earn this extra money. Eleazer Stephenson noted in his testimony to the Freedman’s Inquiry Commission that:

“… if you go through the market, you will see a great many of them [Freedom Seekers] who come in the morning with baskets of stuff to sell and go home at night. You can hardly call them farmers; but they have gardens and raise a great deal of stuff.”

– Testimony of E. Stephenson as it appears in the Freedman’s Inquiry Commission report by Samuel Gridley Howe, 1863.

While Stephenson didn’t specify what kinds of produce might be included in the “great deal of stuff” it’s helpful testimony to certify that Freedom Seekers, especially those who weren’t farmers, were relying on their kitchen gardens for nutrition, comfort, and survival.

Tending kitchen gardens for financial gain was commonplace among enslaved peoples as well. Historian Jennifer Wallach noted that it was common for enslavers to allow enslaved persons to sell excess food they grew in their own gardens.

“Aletha Turner of Washington, DC, was able to make enough money selling her fresh produce so that was able to buy her own freedom for $1,400 (USD) along with that of twenty-two other slaves over a period of twenty-five years.”

– Jennifer Wallach in Getting What We Need Ourselves, 2019.

Using your garden to add some financial stability or even buy your own freedom deepens the importance of kitchen gardens in the lives of Freedom Seekers. To have risked not being able to survive on the effort of your kitchen garden in Canada due to year-round “icy grass” would be a difficult decision to make.

Fortunately for the refugees who arrived in Canada they did not find any truth to the old lies spread by their former enslavers. Instead, they were able to enjoy the fruits (or vegetables) of their labours and their hard-earned freedom. And what did they make with those fresh vegetables? For the answer, we turn once again to Malinda Russell’s, A Domestic Cookbook, to prepare a recipe titled To Cook Irish Potatoes.

To Cook Irish Potatoes

Pare and boil quickly; when done, turn into a colander. Mash them and dress with cream, butter, pepper and salt, pat them out into cakes and bake them.

– Malinda Russell’s A Domestic Cookbook, 1866.

The outcome of the recipe was mashed potatoes, but they turned out little drier than we would expect on account of the baking. I made the recipe a second time and gently fried the potato cake instead of baking and it was good. It reminded me of my own family using leftover mashed potatoes in this method growing up.

Out of all the recipes I tried this was the one where I didn’t have to look up measurements or methods and I wondered why something so simple might be included in a cookbook. It’s likely that this recipe was included for the purpose of introducing a new food or new way of preparing a familiar food. The recipe is accompanied by another with instructions for preparing parsnips.

To Cook Parsnips

Pare the parsnips and put them in a bag, season with salt, boil until done. When cold, slice, roll them in flour, and pepper them. Brown them in lard and turn drawn butter over them.

– Malinda Russell’s A Domestic Cookbook, 1866.

Both of these recipes and another one featuring cranberries shows how Freedom Seekers took advantage of the availability of these new foods despite needing more formal advice on how to prepare them in a way that matches their culinary styles and traditions.

Throughout our series this year I have focussed on the idea that Freedom Seekers, expecting the worst when they arrived in Canada, still made the journey to freedom. They had a keen understanding that life would be difficult (even if they doubted some of the rumours) and that they would need to work hard to survive here. Thankfully, they found a place of refuge that could support their new lives in St. Catharines. While they may have had to experiment and bend their traditional recipes, the important and traditional ingredients they were used to cooking and eating were available after all they had been told.

We also cannot underestimate the importance of food in the daily lives of Freedom Seekers. As enslaved persons, food represented one of the only things over which they might have any control – whether it was shared meals during break times or tending a kitchen garden. As Freedom Seekers, food was a reminder of home and comfort, important a source of survival, and even as a tool to maintain their newfound freedom.

The achievement of that freedom and their success in establishing themselves in Canada is part of what makes the story of the Freedom Seekers so inspiring. Freedom Seeker John Briggs provided further testimony on the perseverance of those who journeyed to St. Catharines despite what they might discover in the unknown land of freedom. His below testimony gets to the heart of the matter (and provides this blog series with its title):

They said Canada was the worst place that could be, and even the people of the North [Northern United States], after I started, told me it was a very poor place to come to… If I live to see the sixth day of next April, I shall have been here ten years; and those ten years that I have seen here have been more pleasure to me than all my life- more pleasure to me and more comfort.”

– Testimony of John Briggs as it appears in the Freedman’s Inquiry Commission report by Samuel Gridley Howe, 1863.

Briggs’ testimony summarizes so nicely the hard work needed to grow and support a life for yourself in a new place. That they overcame the unknown and known, mythical and real challenges of making a life in Canada despite the efforts of enslavers to stop them shows such a strength of character. It helps us to understand the motivation to find freedom and the value of that freedom for which they were willing to risk their lives. I hope this series has you thinking about the important food traditions and ingredients in your life. I hope too that you feel as equally inspired by these stories of perseverance and grounded in a shared appreciation of the important culinary history of the Freedom Seekers in St. Catharines.

Abbey Stansfield is a culinary historian and a public programmer at the St. Catharines Museum and Welland Canals Centre.

Check out our previous Black History Month blog series for more fascinating local stories.

Selected Sources

Board of Agriculture. 1863. The Canadian Agriculturalist and Journal and Transactions of The Board of Agriculture of Upper Canada. Toronto: The Board of Agriculture.

Drew, Benjamin. 1856. A North-Side View of Slavery. New York: Sheldon, Lamport and Blakeman.

Opie, Frederick Douglass. 2008. Hog & Hominy : Soul Food from Africa to America. New York: Columbia University Press.

Russell, Malinda. 1866. A Domestic Cookbook. PawPaw: University of Michigan Press.

Still, William. 1872. The Underground Railroad. Philadelphia: People’s Publishing Company.

Wallach, Jennifer Jensen. 2019. Getting What We Need Ourselves : How Food Has Shaped African American Life. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.