Celia, a slave, was probably born in Missouri in 1836. No documentation of her birth date, birthplace, or parentage exists. Her recorded history begins in the summer of 1850 when she was purchased by Robert Newsom, of Fulton Township, Calloway County, Missouri; at the time of the transaction she was about fourteen years old. Celia's recorded history ends five and a half years later when she was tried and hanged for the murder of her owner; she was nineteen years old and the mother of at least two children at the time of her death. Her final resting place and the fate of her children are unknown.
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