Secretary Wardrobe

Black cabinetmaker John Gough signed his name to the bottom case of the only known piece of his work, making his secretary wardrobe a rare surviving example of early American furniture attributed to a Black artisan. Made of mahogany, the secretary wardrobe and its neoclassical influences reflect Charleston furniture styles on the eve of the Revolution. Gough first appears in the documentary record in Elizabeth Akin’s 1763 will, which included the manumission arrangement that Gough pay her executors £250 to secure his freedom. Akin also included a clause that once Gough was freed, her executors would pay him £50 to buy the tools that enabled him to craft a life after enslavement. It took just two months after Akin’s death for Gough to earn the money and be declared a free man.