Henry C. Gudgell

Henry Gudgell was born into slavery in Anderson County, Kentucky, in 1826. It is speculated that his young mother’s white enslaver, Samuel Arbuckle, may have been his father. In 1832, Henry moved to Ray County, Missouri, with his mother, Rachael, who was then enslaved by Arbuckle’s daughter, Elizabeth Arbuckle Gudgell, and her husband. Eventually they moved to Livingston County, Missouri, where Henry subsequently spent his life working as a well-regarded blacksmith, silversmith, coppersmith and wheelwright.

John T. Gudgell, the son of Elizabeth Arbuckle Gudgell, sold Henry to his father-in-law, Spencer Hall Gregory, in 1853. In 1861, Henry was once again sold to a Confederate soldier, John Bryan, when he met and married Chloe Woodus, a woman enslaved by Bryan who traveled with him from North Carolina. Soon after, Henry accompanied Bryan to fight in some of the earlier battles of the Civil War.

In 1863, Gudgell carved an intricately detailed walking stick in wood for his enslaver, the army officer Bryan, who had sustained a knee injury during a battle and which left him with a life-long limp. This walking stick, which was proudly used by Bryan until his death in 1899, is currently housed in the Yale Art Gallery collections. The staff appears to have been ebonized to a dark patina with an iron and vinegar mixture, which gives it a similar appearance to the darkened sacred reliquaries crafted by the Fang people of Gabon, while the added detail of snakes on the lower portion of the cane is comparable to the detail often depicted on royal scepters from the Bakongo or Kongo peoples of Central Africa in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

A second walking stick believed to be crafted by Gudgell was discovered by a collector in Indiana in 1982. Both canes contain designs seen in Central African iconography, including reptiles and small human figures, believed to impart prestige and protection to the owner. It is believed that Gudgell may have learned these techniques from other enslaved people over the years, including those he would have encountered in Missouri who came from North Carolina with Bryan. Likewise, other enslaved people in Missouri may have learned from Gudgell, since wood carvings with similar decoration and techniques were crafted in Missouri after he created his walking sticks.

After the Civil War, Gudgell bought twenty-two acres of land in Livingston County, Missouri, from Spencer H. Gudgell, the son of John Gudgell, his former enslaver. Over their life together, Henry and his wife, Chloe, had nine children. Gudgell continued living in Livingston County until his death in 1895 and is now buried along with his wife in the Utica Cemetery in Utica, Missouri.