Peter Hill (1767-1820)

Peter Hill (1767-1820)
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This person of African descent has 3 related events in the database, listed at the bottom of this page.
Identifier
NJS-PER-04782
Given Name
Peter
Family Name
Hill
Birth Date
July 19, 1767
Death Date
December 1, 1820
Sex
Male
Occupation
Crafts and Trades
Biographical Description
Peter Hill is famous as the first African American clockmaker who learned and practiced the craft in the late 18th century. He was born into slavery in Burlington on 19 July 1767 and grew up in the household of clockmaker Joseph Hollinshead Jr. He learned clockmaking from his master and was manumitted in 1795 at age 27. The same year, he married Tina Lewis, who was a free woman of color.

Around 1797 or 1798, the New Jersey Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery counted the number of free Black people who lived in Burlington. Peter Hill's name appeared on the list, which noted that he had a wife and one daughter at that time.

Peter Hill established a clockmaking business in his home in Burlington, which was located on the east side of High Street, near Broad Street, near the Quaker Meeting House. He lived across the street from a white man named Rowland Jones, and he made a tall case clock for Jones in 1812. This clock is one of the few of Peter Hill's clocks that survive to this day, and it is now at the Westtown School in Westtown, Pennsylvania. Another clock of Peter Hill's is at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, DC.

By the mid-1810s, Peter Hill was operating a second location for his clockmaking business in Mount Holly on Main Street. He eventually relocated to Mount Holly, making it his primary place of residence. He died in December 1820 and was buried at the Friends' Burial Ground adjacent to the Quaker Meeting House in Burlington, although his grave was unmarked.

A detailed biographical essay about Peter Hill was published in 1999 by Silvio A. Bedini, and it cites many Burlington County historical documents that mention Peter Hill.
Keywords
African descent person
Places
Burlington
Mount Holly (formerly Bridgetown, Northampton Township)
Enslaved by
Joseph Hollinshead Jr. (b. 1751)
Spouse of
Tina Lewis Hill
Related Person
Rowland Jones (1778-1867)
References

“Hill, Peter (1767-1820),” in Dictionary of American Negro Biography, by Rayford W. Logan and Michael R. Winston (Norton, 1982), http://archive.org/details/dictionaryofamer00loga, pages 310-311.

Silvio A. Bedini, “Peter Hill, the First African American Clockmaker,” in A Question of Manhood: A Reader in U.S. Black Men’s History and Masculinity, ed. Darlene Clark Hine and Earnestine Jenkins, vol. 1, 2 vols. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999), 252–73.

"Peter Hill Tall Case Clock," Smithsonian National Museum of American History, https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object/nmah_856728.

This person is represented on the following page(s):
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hill_(clockmaker)
Image Rights and Source
Peter Hill Tall Case Clock detail, Smithsonian National Museum of American History, Record ID Number nmah_856728, https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object/nmah_856728. Reproduced under fair use for non-commercial educational purposes.
Record Contributor
Jesse Bayker
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