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ELYMUS REEVE

Program
NYS Historic
Subject
People
Location
16555 Main Rd, Mattituck, NY 11952, USA
Lat/Long
40.996671, -72.523075
Grant Recipient
Town of Southold
Historic Marker

ELYMUS REEVE

Inscription

ELYMUS REEVE
AFRICAN AMERICAN FARMER
BORN 1783 IN SUFFOLK COUNTY.
FORMERLY ENSLAVED, MANUMITTED
IN 1813. LIVED NEARBY WITH HIS
FAMILY UNTIL HIS 1870 DEATH.
WILLIAM G. POMEROY FOUNDATION 2024

This historical marker located in the town of Mattituck commemorates the legacy of Elymus Reeve, an African American farmer who was born into slavery in 1783 in Suffolk County. Manumitted in 1813, Reeve’s went on to establish a farm, which he would run along with his family until his death in 1870.

In A History of Mattituck, Long Island, written by Charles E. Craven and published in 1906, Reeve’s is described as a man with a “vigorous mind,” who was “wonderfully versed in the scriptures” and who served as a communicant in the Cutchogue Presbyterian Church.

Reeve’s and his wife, Hagar, remained in Mattituck throughout their lives, during which they had eight children. Their youngest son, Reverand John B. Reeve, graduated from Columbia University and of Union Theological Seminary, and went on to serve as both a paster in Philadelphia and as a professor at Howard University. One of their daughters, Parthenia, became an accomplished lecturer and a representative of the National Association of Women’s Clubs.

Reeves would pass away in 1870. Of his legacy, Craven wrote in 1906, “all who remember him speak of him in terms of admiration and affection.”

For more information about Elymus Reeve, visit:


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