Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1886-02-19
SYLVIA THE CENTENARIAN,
Negroes Who Was a Prize Fighter
One Hundred Years Ago.

All this past week and during the
week previous an old negro woman
has been trsmping up and down one
end of this county and over in Hunt
erden county. The woman is Sylvia
Dubois, the Eegress. That she is III
years of age admits of scarcely any
doubt. Once year, and fer some
strange reason nearl y always ia cold
weather, she leaves her queer little
cabin on the top of Sourland noun
tain and visits the people in the valley
on each side. Her visits are usually
anticipated, and her wants are gener-
ally satisfied.
Sylvia was fighter a century ago
and has been so for five score years
slnce- Born on the mountain where
the snow lives, as the slave of man
named Dubois, she was taken when
quite child to Great Bend, Pa, and
bound over to a man and his wife
there. Great Bend was sort of trad
ing station then, where people came
to be ferried over from Pennsylvania
TO New York. Sylvia says she was
very powerful and athletic, and was
often ordered to row parties across the
SusquehanRa. Her capacity for fight
ing and drinking brandy must have
been marvellous, if her stories are at
all trustworthy. She says she
knocked out" half a doz IN white
men in a regular prizs-ring before she
was 20. She soon became the terror
of the neighborhood.
One of her favorite stories is to the
effect that one night muscular look
ing stranger arrived at the tavern
kept by her master. This stranger
did a good deal of talking about his
pugilistic abilities and his record as a
fighter. He cowed all the habjtues of
the bar-room, and no one would fight
him. Sylvia came in TO steal drink
of brandy on the sly-brandy of
quality which she says is not made
now. She overheard the stranger
Dragging about his proves, and at
once challenged HIM. He laughed at
her, but some OF the men in the room,
who had tested the colored girls fist,
encouraged her. She rolled up her
sleeves and shook her fist in the
strangers face. He thought il Joke.
Then she tapped with more or less
vigor on the nose. This angered him
and he put himself in pugilistic at
ttude. Someone tod him he had
better take off his coat, but he said it
wasn't necessary, as ne could kill the
niger in minute" When he said
this Sylvia told him to come on and
hurry up. He responded with blow
on her chin that staggered her. This
reused her blood. She says it was
good fight for few minutes, and then
she began pounding the life cut of
him." and in five minutes laid him
groaning and bleeding on the floor.
1t was Sylyia's use of her fists that
finally caused her to leave Great Bend
and return to New Jersey. She liked
her master, but detested her mistress
The mistress was always scolding her
and using a whip over her shoulders
she submitted for while, and then
grew rebellious. One day the mistress
rebuked her for some trivial matter and
rushed at her with the whip. Sylvia
waited until she was close at hand,
and then struck her mistress terri
BILE blow in the face. 1t knocked her
against the door, from which she fell
to the floor unconscious. Sylvia did
not wait for more. She knew her
life was IN danger when the people
around heard of 1t. So she rushed
up stairs where her little babe lay,
for, like many of the slaves of that
day, Sylvia was immoral and utterly
oblivious OF the duty of chastity, and
i, grabbing the child in her arms, rush
ed oat of the house and made for thu
woods. Her story of the tramp from
there back to Sourland mountain is
not only pathetic, but, as she tells it
is as exciting as any border nara
tive IN the average dime novel. She
encountered bears and wild cats, and
experienced all the pargs of hunger.
But she finally got back and was free.
No one claimed her for slave. and
PROFESSIONALLY was one of the first
free negroes in New Jersey, and one
of the longest to remain such. In
few monthe she established her claim
here, as she had done in Pennsylvan-
ia. She INDUCED in a number of
fights, in none o: which, as she ex-
presses it, was licked, or anywhere
near licked"