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Joice Heth

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Joice Heth
Bornc. 1756[citation needed]
Madagascar
DiedFebruary 19, 1836 (aged 79–80)
New York, New York, United States

Joice Heth (c. 1756 [citation needed]  – February 19, 1836)[1] was an African-American woman who was exhibited by P.T. Barnum with the false claim that she was the 161-year-old nursing mammy of George Washington. Her exhibition under these claims, and her public autopsy, gained considerable notoriety.

Biography

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Little is known of Heth's early years. In 1835, she was enslaved by John S. Bowling and exhibited in Louisville, Kentucky.[2] In June 1835, she was sold to promoters R.W. Lindsay and Coley Bartram.[2]

Lindsay introduced her as having been the childhood nurse of George Washington, but, lacking success, he sold her in her old age to P.T. Barnum.[2][3] Posters advertising her shows in 1835 included the lines, "Joice Heth is unquestionably the most astonishing and interesting curiosity in the World! She was the slave of Augustine Washington, (the father of Gen. Washington) and was the first person who put clothes on the unconscious infant, who, in after days, led our heroic fathers on to glory, to victory, and freedom. To use her own language when speaking of the illustrious Father of this Country, 'she raised him'. Joice Heth was born in the year 1674, and has, consequently, now arrived at the astonishing age of 161 years".[4]

Poster advertising Joice Heth

Towards the end of her life, she was blind and mostly paralyzed, but could still talk, and had some ability to move her right arm.[5] Barnum started to exhibit her on August 10, 1835, at Niblo's Garden in New York City.[3][6] For those who were skeptical of the claims about Heth's longevity, her body aided in the belief of her exaggerated age. Harriet A. Washington writes that, at the time of her display, Heth had a very small frame, deep wrinkles, was toothless, and had fingernails that resembled talons. Washington claims that Heth's toothless mouth was the result of Barnum forcefully extracting her teeth so that she would look older.[7] As a 7-month traveling exhibit for Barnum, Heth told stories about "little George" and sang a hymn.[8]

Historian Eric Lott claimed Heth earned the impresario $1,500 a week, a princely sum in that era (equivalent to $46,000 in 2024).[9] Barnum's career as a showman took off.[10][5]

Her case was discussed extensively in the press. As doubt had been expressed about her age, Barnum announced that after her death she would be publicly autopsied. She died the following year (1836), in Bethel, Connecticut at the home of Barnum's brother, Philo.[1][6] Barnum stated that Joice's remains were "buried respectably" in his home town of Bethel, Connecticut.[11]

Public autopsy

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Joice Heth died in New York County, New York on February 19, 1836, at the age of 79 or 80. To gratify public interest, Barnum set up a public autopsy.[12] Barnum engaged the service of a surgeon, Dr. David L. Rogers, who performed the autopsy on February 25, 1836, in front of fifteen hundred spectators in New York's City Saloon, with Barnum charging admission of US$0.50 (equivalent to $14.32 in 2024).[2] When Rogers declared the age claim a fraud, Barnum insisted that the autopsy victim was another person, and that Heth was alive, on a tour to Europe. Barnum later admitted the hoax in writing.[3]

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ a b "Joice Heth". hoaxes.org. Archived from the original on 9 April 2016. Retrieved 21 October 2025.
  2. ^ a b c d "Heth, Joice (17??–19 Feb. 1836)". American National Biography (Oxford University Press. Retrieved March 12, 2015. (subscription required)
  3. ^ a b c Washington, Harriet A. (2006). Medical Apartheid. New York: Doubleday. p. 86ff. ISBN 0-385-50993-6.
  4. ^ "Joice Heth Poster 1835". The Lost Museum Archive. Archived from the original on 6 January 2003. Retrieved 22 October 2025.
  5. ^ a b Benton, Joel (1891). Life of Hon. Phineas T. Barnum. Edgewood Publishing Company. p. 69-72.
  6. ^ a b Freed, Robin. "Joice Heth". MA candidate, University of Virginia American Studies Department. Archived from the original on May 18, 2002. Retrieved April 8, 2007.
  7. ^ Washington, Harriet A. (2006). Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present. New York: Anchor Books. pp. 86–89, 92. ISBN 978-0-7679-1547-2.
  8. ^ Freed cites this to Phineas T. Barnum, Barnum's Own Story, ed. Waldo R. Browne (Massachusetts: Peter Smith, 1972), p. 49.
  9. ^ Lott, Eric (1993). Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class. Oxford University Press. p. 76-77. ISBN 9780195078329.
  10. ^ "P.T. Barnum", Britannica Eleventh Edition references Barnum's claim that Heth was George Washington's nurse and lists Barnum's exhibiting her as the first significant event in his career.
  11. ^ The Life of P.T. Barnum: Written By Himself. Originally published 1855. Reprint ed., Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2000; ISBN 0-252-06902-1
  12. ^ Reiss, Benjamin (2001). The Showman and the Slave: Race, Death and Memory in Barnum's America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. p. 3. ISBN 978-0-674-00636-2.

References

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  • Joel Benton. Life of Phineas T. Barnum at Project Gutenberg, Edgewood Publishing, 1891; accessed December 3, 2007. The most detailed of these accounts, including information about Barnum's purchase of Heth, a detailed description of her appearance, how Barnum exhibited her, etc.
  • Lott, Eric (1993). Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 76–78. ISBN 0-19-507832-2.
  • Boese, Alex. "Joice Heth". Hoaxes.org. Archived from the original on April 5, 2017. Retrieved December 10, 2017.
  • Freed, Robin. "Joice Heth". MA candidate, University of Virginia American Studies Department. Archived from the original on May 18, 2002. Retrieved April 8, 2007.
  • Washington, Harriet A. (2007). Medical Apartheid:The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on African Americans from Colonial Times to the Present. New York: Doubleday Press. pp. 86–90. ISBN 978-0-19-507832-9.
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