William Henry Harrison
When his father passed away in 1791, William Henry Harrison, who came from a slave-owning family, received numerous slaves as an inheritance. His family held several slaves to maintain the Berkeley farm, where the family resided in Virginia. However, even if he is still one of the US Presidents who were pro-slavery during his lifetime, Harrison only had 11 slaves under his ownership.
Harrison, who was Indiana’s governor at the time, passed legislation favoring slave owners, authorizing them to bring their slaves into the newly established region despite Indiana’s restriction on the sale and purchase of slaves. Harrison considered the practice to be a matter of states’ rights overall.
