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The financial contributions of Moses Taylor Pyne (Class of 1877), one of Princeton's most prominent benefactors, reveal the complex relationship between Princeton, the American sugar trade, and the slave economy.

John Maclean Jr., Princeton’s tenth president (1854-1868), was a non-slaveholder and held moderate antislavery views. His commitment to attracting southern students to the college and reducing sectional tension on campus, however, contributed to Princeton’s conservatism in the years leading up to the Civil War.

Basil Lanneau Gildersleeve (class of 1849) was a celebrated classical scholar and unrepentant Confederate apologist. Gildersleeve’s education at Princeton, which he considered “almost a Southern college,” shaped his defense of the South during and after the Civil War.

Princeton residents published at least 28 newspaper advertisements for runaway slaves between 1774 and 1818. Each tells a unique story of courage and resistance in the face of tremendous odds.

In the late-19th and early-20th centuries, several African American men attended Princeton as graduate students. Princeton president Woodrow Wilson’s administration may have attempted to erase their presence from institutional memory, creating an inaccurate historical justification for excluding black students from the university.