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Featured Media | May 1, 2025
Book Review: The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church
Washington History Magazine – “272 Slaves Were Sold to Save Georgetown. What Does It Owe Their Descendants?” asked a front page New York Times headline in April 2016. Written by veteran Times correspondent Rachel Swarns, the article drew national attention to “#GU272,” a campus movement to memorialize the people sold by Georgetown University’s Jesuit leaders in 1838…But Swarns knew that she had not told the full story.
Podcast | December 6, 2024
Criminal Podcast, Episode 295: The Sale
In 1791, three men filed lawsuits in the General Court of Maryland. They were all suing the same person: the Jesuit priest who enslaved them. Listen to the Podcast Here
Podcast | July 16, 2024
The Jesuits sold 272 people into slavery. How can the church make amends with their descendants?
America Magazine – This week on “Jesuitical,” Zac and Ashley are joined by journalist Rachel Swarns to discuss her latest book, The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church. Rachel shares her wisdom about this important issue for U.S. Catholics and her experience as a Black Catholic, opening up a wide-ranging conversation about the work being done to repair such a grave injustice and promote racial justice in the church.
Article | July 1, 2024
Book Review: The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church
US Catholic Historian – The 272 opens on a phone call. Melissa Kemp called Jeremy Alexander just before Thanksgiving in 2016 “because she believed that they had a common ancestor, an enslaved woman who had been born in Maryland and sold to Louisiana.”
Article | May 23, 2024
Book Review: How Bondage Built the Church
The New York Review of Books – Rachel Swarns’s recent book about a mass sale of enslaved people by Jesuit priests to save Georgetown University reminds us that the legacy of slavery is simultaneously the legacy of resistance.
Podcast | March 10, 2024
NYU professor, students expose the legacy of lynchings in the North
More than 4,000 Black people were murdered in brutal lynchings in the United States. Much of the stories told about these killings have centered around mob violence in the South. Now, a new project led by Professor Rachel Swarns of New York University is challenging that narrative, reminding people that this violence happened everywhere — even in New York.
Article | March 9, 2024
There Were Lynchings in the North, Too.
The New York Times – A new website and research project, “Lynchings in the North,” created by Professor Rachel Swarns of New York University, is examining the lives of victims of racial violence as part of the “Hidden Legacies” initiative.
Article | February 16, 2024
The 272 Author Raises Hope of Reconciliation from a Painful History of the Church and Slavery
The Catholic Standard – Raising public awareness about the role of slavery in building the U.S. Catholic Church and sparking hopes for racial justice and reconciliation…
Video | September 20, 2023
Is It Ever Too Late To Correct the Wrong?
CUNY-TV/Black America – In 1838, a group of America’s most prominent Catholic priests sold 272 enslaved people to save their largest mission project, what is now Georgetown University. Rachel L. Swarns joins host Carol Jenkins to discuss her latest book, “The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Church”. A story of the American Catholic Church and one family’s will to survive.
Video | September 19, 2023
The Catholic Church and Slavery
WABC-New York – How the Catholic Church relied on the sale of slaves to expand its’ foothold in America.