The Brooklyn Eagle
May 11, 1927
Slave Girl Sold by Beecher Is Washington Lawyer's Wife
"Pinky." the slave child “sold for freedom" from Henry Ward Beecher's pulpit, 67 years ago, who is to return to Brooklyn for the 80th anniversary of Plymouth Church on Sunday, has been revealed as Mrs. James Hunt, wife of a negro lawyer of 411 Florida ave., Washington, D.C.
Although the Rev. Dr. J. Stanley Durkee, new pastor at Plymouth Church, has maintained the strictest secrecy concerning Mrs. Hunt's identity, he admitted today that she is the original slave girl. He said he has no doubt about her Identity.
Dr. Durkee met Mrs. Hunt in Washington when he was the president of Howard University, the negro college. She had graduated from tho Normal School there many ago and from the record of the school he is convinced of her identity.
Dr. Durkee today described Mrs. Hunt as a "rather stout woman," who Does not look her 76 years, "very cultured refined quiet and retiring,"
He does not care to tell anything further of her history until Sunday night when he will preach on the life of the slave girl, with her at his side in the pulpit – just as she was 67 years ago when Henry when Ward Beecher's stirring sermon against slavery brought her freedom.
After "Pinky" was sold, she lived with a private family in Brooklyn under the name Rose Ward. She returned to Washington with her grandmother, who did not like the North, and was educated at Howard University Normal School, Her husband is still living, and she has three children and several grand-children.
"Pinky's" real name was Sally Diggs, She is a mulatto. Her grandmother, an energetic slave, purchased her own freedom and brought her little granddaughter to Brooklyn to see Henry Ward Beecher, who at that time preaching against slavery.