Cyrus Bustill
Cryus Bustill was born in Burlington in 1732, the son of an English
attorney and an African slave. After learning the baker's trade from
Thomas Prior, a local baker and member of the Friends Meeting, Bustill
gained his freedom at age 36. During the Revolutionary War, he was
commended for supplying American troops with baked goods at the Burlington
docks, and reportedly given a silver piece by General Washington.
Bustill and his wife, the daughter of an Englishman and a Delaware
Indian, later moved to Philadelphia where they and their eight children
attended the Arch Street Friends Meeting. Bustill was an early member
of Philadelphia's Free African Society, started in 1787. After retiring
from baking, he started a school in Philadelphia. He died in 1806.
You may have heard of his great-great-grandson, Rutgers University
valedictorian, singer and actor Paul Robeson.
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