"Amanda-America-Dickson"

The daughter of a slave and her owner,one of the wealthiest African

American women in nineteenthcentury she was born on the Hancock County plantation of her daddy,the famous white agricultural reformer,David Dickson (1809-85).Her birth was the result of the rape of slave mama,Julia Frances Lewis Dickson,when Julia was twelve.At the time,David was forty and the wealthiest planter in the county.Amanda spent her childhood and adolescence in the house of her white grandma and owner,Elizabeth Sholars Dickson,where she learned to read and write play the piano-the survival skills of a young lady but not ordinarily the opportunities of a slave.According to the Dickson family oral history,David  doted on Amanda,and Julia openly became his concubine and housekeeper.

In 1865 or 1866 she married her white first cousin,Charles Eubanks,a rencently returned Civil War (1861-65) veteran.The union produced two sons:Julian Henry (1866-1937), who married Eva Walton,the daughter of Isabella & George Walton of Augusta;and Charles Green (1870ca-1900),who married Kate Holsey,the daughter of Harriet & Bishop Lucius Holsey of Augusta.Amanda left Charles in 1870 and with her sons returned to her daddy's plantation.At that time she and her children took the last name of Dickson.

From 1876-1878 she left the plantation to attend the Normal School of Atlanta University.In the Winter of 1885 David died,leaving the bulk of his estate to Amanda,and subsequently to her children after her death.Executors appraised the estate,which included 17,000 acres of land in Hancock and Washington counties,at $309,000.In his will,David stated that the administration of his estate was to be left to the sound judgment and unlimited discretion of Amanda without interference from any quarter,including any husband she might have.A host of David's white realtives contested the will,the superior court of Hancock County ruled in favor of Amanda in November 1885. The disgrunited relatives then appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court,which upheld the lower court  decision in 1887. The higher court stated that the "rights of each race are controlled and governed by the same enactments or principles of law-in other words,whatever rights and privileges belonged to a bastard white child  belonged to a mixed-race child as well.

Before the supreme court decision,Amanda purchased a large house at 452 Telfair Street,in the wealthiest section of the then integrated city of Augusta. By the time the courts settled the Dickson will case,she had firmly ensconced herself  in this new home and decorated it with Brussels carpets,oil paintings,a walnut dinning room table and chairs,and books. Members of the Dickson family went about their private lives.

In 1892 Amanda married Nathan Toomer of Perry.Their marriage lasted until her death of neurastheria,or nervous exhaustion.