XII
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.
emy, in Middleborough, Mass. He remained there two-
years, taking an English course wTith French and book¬
keeping. Prof. J. W P Jenks, of Brown University, who
was then the principal of the academy, wrote as follows:
" During the twenty-nine years that I was principal of
Pierce Academy in Middleborough, Mass., from '42 to '71,
I never made any distinction of nationality, race, or color
in receiving pupils, and, but in one instance, and that not
while Prof. Crogman was there, was any race prejudice
shown among my pupils, though till the war there was not
one year that the children of slaveholders were not mem¬
bers of the school, and quite frequently there were Negroes
at the same time. My domestic relations were such that I
took no boarders into my own family, and again I must
confess with shame that the boarding-house over whichi
previously I had some control, having been given up, L
could find no boarding place for Crogman, and with diffi¬
culty a lodging room, on account of that race prejudice.
So he was obliged to board himself under great disadvan¬
tages. A much more pleasing reference is to his splendidl
scholarship. Beginning with me in the elementary Eng¬
lish branches, I may safely say, in them all, he accom¬
plished in one quarter as much as the average student did
in two, mastering almost intuitively, and with equal facil¬
ity, both mathematical and linguistical principles. I formed
him into a class of one, lest he should he hindered by the
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