Benjamin Sterling Turner (1825—1894)

A former slave who became the first black member of the House of Representatives from Alabama.

Benjamin Sterling Turner was born into slavery in Halafax county North Carolina on March 17, 1825 and was brought to Alabama in 1830. Although it was criminal to aid in the education of a slave Turner secretly obtained an impressive education.

During Selma’s occupation by General Wilson's U.S. Army, Turner helped manage the troop quarters and stables at the St. James hotel. After the Civil War he was engaged in local business and politics. By 1870 he had been a tax collector, foreman of a fire brigade and a Selma city councilman.

In 1871 he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in the Forty-second Congress as a Republican. He ran again for a second term but was defeated. During his term in Congress Turner achieved the passage of a bill allowing a pension for black Civil War soldiers. In 1880 he was a delegate to the Republican National Convention.

Benjamin Sterling Turner died in Selma on March 21, 1894 and is buried in Selma's Live Oak Cemetery.



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