J. F. Pierpont Dickson (also known as J. F. P. Dickson or Julie Dickson) was an African American woman who taught at the Thomas Run/Clark’s Chapel school. The exact date of her assignment to this school is unknown, but she filed monthly teacher’s reports from January to June, 1870. Previously she had taught at a school in Dorcester County, Maryland. Dickson’s sponsoring benevolent society was the New England Freedmen's Aid Society (aka the New England Branch of the Freedmen’s Union Committee). Her home state is unknown and she has not been identified with confidence in the U.S. census.
In January, 1870, Dickson sent a letter directly to Freedmen’s Bureau Commissioner Oliver O. Howard, seeking redress for an incident that took place in October of 1869, when Dickson was teaching in Dorcester County. She was boarding a train with other passengers, when the brakeman, Charles Stewart, approached and told her that she must ride in the smoking car. Dickson refused, whereupon Stewart called over the conductor, Daniel Muze, and again insisted that the car she was boarding was “for white folks” only. As this was happening, Stewart opened the door for some white passengers to enter, and as Dickson attempted to enter with them, he grabbed “violently” by the arm, tearing her cloak and gloves. He dragged her away from the train and threw her against the platform railing. Still, Dickson refused to board the smoking car. She threatened to sue, and was told by Stewart to “sue and be damned.” She ended up standing on the open area at the end of the train car for the journey, and in her letter she told Howard that she was still suffering from the ill effects of her resulting exposure to the cold. There is no evidence that the Bureau took any action in response to her letter among the records of the commissioner's office.
