New London — The probate inventory of Samuel Seabury, first American Episcopal bishop and third rector of the St. James Episcopal Church, listed a variety of estate items set to be auctioned off soon after his death in 1796, including books, silverware — and two enslaved people.

Nell, 38, and her 9-year-old daughter, Rose — their surnames unrecorded — were memorialized Monday during a ceremony inside the Federal Street church not far from where the two toiled in Seabury’s service.

The solemn event capped a yearlong effort conducted by church members, Williams School students and the Witness Stone Project to bring attention to the lives of Nell and Rose, while also shining a harsh light on New England’s role in the 18th century slave trade.

“It’s important we give witness and voices to those people, so often ignored and voiceless, and their roles in our community,” said The Rev. Denise Cabana, priest-in-charge at St. James. “The Episcopal Church has lot of reconciliation to do with its past and this is a step toward that healing. We need to acknowledge this part of our history.”

The project began last fall as part of the church’s 300th anniversary celebration, which will culminate in June. During her research, church historian Mary Lycan said she was “shocked” to discover Seabury’s slaveowning past.

“It’s important we give witness and voices to those people, so often ignored and voiceless, and their roles in our community. … The Episcopal Church has lot of reconciliation to do with its past and this is a step toward that healing. We need to acknowledge this part of our history.”

THE REV. DENISE CABANA, PRIEST-IN-CHARGE AT ST. JAMES

“But members of the clergy and professional class back then would have had such slaves, which they considered the equivalent of owning a nice car,” Lycan said.

Cabana and Lycan reached out to the Williams School — Lycan graduated from the New London preparatory day school in 1964 — for research help, which brought the Witness Stone Project into the loop.

The non-profit group, formed in 2017, helps uncover and document the lives of people enslaved in the northern states with the help of local community members and students by providing research help. The group has identified more than 100 people held in bondage in Connecticut, including in Norwich, Old Lyme, Killingly and Plainfield.

“Slavery may have not been on a large scale as it was in the south, but they did work on small farms and in households in the north, and that was no better,” Cabana said.

Stone cubes with the names and short biographies of the enslaved are created and laid at locations where they worked.

The markers for Nell and Rose will be placed on the St. James grounds next month.

Witness Stone Project members worked with Williams students last year to research the life of Adam Jackson, who was enslaved at the Hempsted Houses for decades in the 1700s before becoming a free man.

Members of Sarah Marvel’s 11th grade advanced history class took a deep dive into census, baptismal and other records to try and piece together the lives of Nell and Rose, though a lack of primary documents made the work challenging.

“Slavery was not a uniquely southern institution and the contributions of the enslaved have gone unrecognized,” Marvel said. “What’s astounding is how much we don’t know about Nell and Rose.”

Marvel said Rose may have eventually become a free woman after Connecticut passed a “gradual abolition” law in 1784 that stated children born into bondage were to be freed at age 25.

Nell likely was required to handle several unpleasant household tasks for the Yaleeducated Seabury — who also owned an enslaved man inherited from his father — including emptying chamber pots and washing clothes in fireheated outdoor kettles. That labor freed up Seabury to enjoy a debt-free life and focus on his congregational duties, Cabana said.

“We all benefited from the lifestyle (Seabury) was able to have,” she said. “We need to make amends, to bring these stories to life as best we can for these people who were so invisible when they walked the earth. Their stories help us understand why things are the way they are today.”

Monday’s program, attended by Mayor Michael Passero and several City Council members, included comments by Claire McGuinness, Sydney Caplan and Connor Gingras, the Williams School students who helped research the project; Head of School Mark Fader; and Witness Stone Project Executive Director Pat Wilson Pheanious.

“We get to give Nell and Rose a face and a voice that they would have lacked,” Pheanious said. “Their very existence is confirmed. This work facilitates the healing of a deep American pain.”