“…[T]he time to do right is always NOW” 

Esther Burgess responds to SCLC’s call for help in the Civil Rights movement, March 1964

[Note:  The terms "Negro" and "white" were part of the vernacular of the time for both races and are being quoted to be accurate, not to be offensive.]

On Easter Sunday 1964, four women of faith flew from Boston to Jacksonville, Florida at the invitation of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) to join Martin Luther King’s efforts to desegregate key facilities in Saint Augustine.  The two who attracted most attention were Esther Burgess of Newton Centre, wife of the suffragan bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, John Melville Burgess, and Mary Parkman Peabody, mother of the then sitting Governor of Massachusetts, Endicott Peabody.  All four women were active in the Episcopal Church; three of them were married to bishops.  The women in their straw hats, gloves, and Sunday best (an image they kept up all week in St. Augustine) looked nothing like typical protestors of that era.  From the moment they assembled at Boston’s Logan Airport, the foursome attracted press.[i] And this was exactly what SCLC had hoped would occur – a new angle to draw national attention to the mounting tensions in St. Augustine. 

While her travelling companions were grandmothers, Esther Burgess, at 53, was a mother of two teenagers.   And while the others were all white, Esther was Black.  In addition, Esther’s background was distinctly different from any of the others.  Esther Julia (Taylor) Burgess was born and raised in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada, the fourth of five children of Thomas Richard Taylor and Julia McCarty (O’Ree) Taylor.  Life was not easy on the modest family farm (in her mother’s family since 1790), but two driving forces kept Esther focused on the future:  a strong spiritual calling and an unending thirst to learn.  She was 32 years old with a responsible job with the Canadian government before she felt free to leave home to attend St. Augustine College in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1943.  While in North Carolina, Esther met John Burgess, a young clergyman, at a church conference. They married in 1945, spent time in Ohio and Washington,l DC, and landed in Newton in 1958, living near Crystal Lake.  John Burgess was a rising star in the Episcopal Church: the first Black man to hold a number of key church positions.

Mary Peabody, at 72, was a take-charge blueblood: forthright with her opinions on how the world should operate and confident in her ability to change people’s minds on race issues.  She was used to attention.  She assumed the leadership of the quartet.  On the plane, Mary announced she had no intention of breaking any laws.  She would use her voice to convince city leaders of the error of their ways.  No one challenged Mary’s stance at the time, but after listening to SCLC leaders and hearing local members of the Black community, Esther knew she had to stand with the Black protestors and risk jail by refusing to leave when directed to go.  Esther revealed her new resolve to her bunk mate, Hester Campbell, that night – and to SCLC’s Hosea Williams and the others in the morning when protestors gathered for instructions and assignments.

The Boston group’s assignment was to get seated at a café or movie theater – but to leave if refused service.  They were turned away at several spots before being seated at McCartney’s Drug Store.  While waiting for their orders, Mrs. Peabody realized that staff had not recognized Esther as Black since she was light skinned.  When the waitress brought orders, Mary Peabody announced, “I’m so glad to see that you serve Negroes.”  The waitress responded that they did not serve Negroes.  Mary added, “Well my friend, Mrs. Burgess, is a Negro.”  In seconds the manager was at their side, asking Mrs. Burgess to verify her race which she did.  They were asked to leave.  From then on, Mary Peabody made clear at each stop that the management knew that Esther Burgess was Black.  They were refused at several more places before reporting to SCLC leaders at lunch.  At that gathering, Esther Burgess was told that on her afternoon trips she should refuse to leave.  Joining them for the planned confrontation was Dr. Robert Hayling (a Black dentist in St. Augustine and current local movement leader), a Pembroke College student, and two Yale Divinity School professors.  Esther and her four new companions were to refuse to leave while the other Boston ladies would retreat. 

After a failed attempt to enter a hastily shuttered restaurant, the integrated group of eight found its way to the posh Ponce de Leon Motel Restaurant around 5:00 PM.  Seeing the dining room closed, they headed to the bar and seated themselves.  The sheriff soon arrived and told them to leave.  Mrs. Peabody retorted that he was obliged to read to them the ordinance explaining their offense.  It took about 30 minutes for the sheriff to locate a copy of the ordinance and return.  After the sheriff’s reading, the three Bostonians excused themselves and Esther Burgess and the others remaining seated were arrested.  Segregated by race, Dr. Hayling and Mrs. Burgess were ushered to one car and directed to slide in next to a large police dog; and the Yale professors and the Pembroke student were brought to another.  Esther was photographed, fingerprinted, and ushered to a crowded cell reserved for non-whites (24 prisoners with 16 bunks) in the county jail.  Before processing, Esther had a brief opportunity to speak with news reporters.  She made the front page of The Boston Globe on March 31st.

“My only crime was the color of my skin,” replied Mrs. Burgess to reporters’ questions about breaking the law.  Bishop Burgess expressed 100% support for his wife’s actions.  Meanwhile Esther’s Boston companions were beginning to feel uncomfortable.  Hester Campbell quickly knew in her heart she had to stand with Esther. By morning Mary Peabody, with a not too subtle push from several SCLC leaders, also felt remorse at letting Esther step forward by herself to face jail while she remained free.  After calls home, Hester and Mary told Hosea Williams they were prepared to be arrested. Florence Rowe (the last of the original four) quietly flew home at the urging of her husband.  That afternoon Hester Campbell, Mary Peabody and five women from St. Augustine’s Black community -- Georgie Mae Reed, Rosa Phelps, Cuter Eubank, Nellie Mitchell, Lillian Twine Roberson – went to the Ponce de Leon Motel, where Esther had been arrested and seated themselves for lunch.  It was a replay of the previous day.  Soon seven women dressed in their Sunday best were off to St. John’s County Jail.  The arrest and jailing of the 72-year-old mother of the Governor of Massachusetts made the evening news and front pages of newspapers across the country.  Esther was released on bail Tuesday evening after 24 hours in jail, while Mary and Hester spent Tuesday and Wednesday evening behind bars.  The three women reunited Thursday and flew home on Friday.  The national outrage they generated against St. Augustine’s actions was everything SCLC had hoped it would be.  Demonstrations and marches continued with a continual stream of college and high school students, clergy and seminarians keeping up the pressure.  Some historians credit the 1964 spring/summer civil rights actions in St. Augustine with being the key push that helped get the 1964 Civil Rights Act enacted.   

Esther returned to her life in Massachusetts, remained active in Church Women United especially in support of migrant workers, served on the Board of Freedom House in Roxbury, and followed closely the issues over de facto segregation in the Boston Public Schools and the creation of the METCO program.  Esther and John Burgess left Newton in 1976 and lived for five years in New Haven (Rev. Burgess teaching at Yale Divinity School) before retiring to Vineyard Haven, where they lived out their final years.  Esther died at age 93 in 2004; Reverend Burgess pre-deceased her in 2003.

[i] The general story of the trip by the four to St. Augustine is taken from the following: Hester Campbell’s, Four for Freedom, New York: Carlton, 1974; an excerpt from Mary Peabody’s diary available on-line at the Accord Museum; daily articles in The Boston Globe, March 30 to April 5, 1964; and Church Militant, May 1964, “Witness at St. Augustine Florida,” Mrs. Esther J. Burgess [a publication of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts.]; and a Sept 2018 phone interview between the author and Esther’s daughters Julia Burgess and Margaret Harrison.   

The initial portrait photo of Esther Burgess, circa 1970, is courtesy of the Provincial Archives New Brunswick, Canada.