An excerpt from an essay entitled The Contribution of the Black Community in the History of Fleming County Marvin Suit, Attorney at Law, Flemingsburg Gazette, Flemingsburg, KY, February 24, 2005 .... However, the early Fleming County settlers soon realized the wrong of the system of slavery and set about doing something about it. Long before the Emancipation Proclamation was issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, the record books in the Fleming County Clerk's Office list the emancipation of slaves by many Fleming County citizens in the 1820's, 30's, 40's and 50's. In fact, the first Presiding Justice of the Peace (County Judge), Richard Tilton, a farmer and local Methodist preacher, became so enraged that the Commonwealth of Kentucky would not abolish slavery, that he removed himself and his family to Washington County, Illinois, in 1819. A noteworthy early Fleming County emancipator was Ben Wallace. It is thought that one of his released slaves became the first governor of Liberia the country established to receive former slaves from the United States. Another patriot in Flemingsburg was lawyer James Crawford, who early in his career was also a deputy county clerk under his father-in-law, Joshua Stockton. Crawford and his slave girl, Julia, rendered untiring assistance to the town families who were stricken with the deadly cholera in 1833. As a reward to Julia for her courageous life-threatening care of the victims and their families, Crawford gave her freedom from slavery in December, 1833. ...