Stonington — A sign installed on Barn Island last spring honoring former slave Venture Smith, who became a successful 18th century merchant after buying his freedom, has been removed temporarily because of possible historical inaccuracies.  

Susan Whalen, deputy commissioner of the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, said in a phone interview that historians pointed out the inaccuracies, which were punctuated by the inclusion of Venture Smith's signature despite the fact that some historians believed him to have been illiterate.

"There seems to be a consensus he could not write," Whalen said. "We always strive to be as accurate as possible."

The sign, installed using private funding last May and removed in November after DEEP received complaints from historians, should be amended and returned to the Barn Island Wildlife Management Area sometime this summer, Whalen said.

The dispute erupted in September with the receipt of two letters, one from State Historian Walter Woodward, an associate professor of history at the University of Connecticut, and one from Sara O. Nelson, chair of the Connecticut State Historic Preservation Council.

Woodward's letter cited objections to the signage lodged by historians John Wood Sweet, a professor at the University of North Carolina; Nancy Steenberg, a professor at the University of Connecticut at Avery Point, and Marta Daniels, a Venture Smith researcher.

"They report that the Barn Island signage is misleading, factually inaccurate and based on unwarranted assumptions," Woodward said in his letter.

Both Woodward and Nelson urged DEEP to develop a policy to review historic markers on state lands before they are installed.

But Chandler B. Saint, the man who paid for the sign and reluctantly agreed to take it down, said in a phone interview last week that the objections raised by historians who take an "owner class" view of historical research boiled down to there being no documentation of certain facts related to Venture Smith's autobiography.

The lack of documentation, Saint insisted, was most likely related to the fact that slaves were not allowed to own property and therefore could not afford to properly document their acquisitions.

Many transactions, including those with Indian tribes who could not officially sell or lease property due to their own restrictions, were hidden in the early days of this country, he said.

Saint also questioned whether Venture Smith was illiterate and therefore incapable of leaving behind a signature.

It's true that Smith dictated his autobiography, but that was because of blindness, not necessarily inability to write, Saint said, and the signature was taken from a family copy of Smith's famed autobiography that clearly had been in their ancestor's possession when he was alive and which was signed in a spot typically used by book owners.

Still, Saint agreed to take down the sign and has it in his possession until the issues are resolved.

"I took it down to try to get some space and some air and get these people from just everybody screaming at each other," Saint said.

Saint, who has written two books based on his own Venture Smith research, said the dispute is related to various historians trying to take ownership of the story.

"The man devoted his entire life to not being owned, but they don't even see the irony in that," he said.

Woodward, in his letter, cited Saint as "an enthusiastic champion of the Venture Smith story" who "has been severely criticized by academic reviewers for his previously published research on the subject."

While Saint disagrees with others' assessment of his work, he said he is open to proposed signage changes.

For instance, April 10, 1765, was randomly chosen as Venture Smith's "freedom day" despite the fact that there is no documentation of the exact date he bought his way out of slavery — so an acknowledgment of this liberty would not be a problem, he said.

He said he will pay to make changes to the sign that may be decided after a Venture Smith conference next month at DEEP headquarters.

Some of the factual issues will be taken up at the conference "Confronting Slavery: Venture Smith to the Present" April 7-8 in Hartford, featuring keynote speakers including U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-3rd District.

A panel of experts on the final day of the conference is expected to come up with any proposed sign changes, DEEP official Whalen said, adding that the plan is to ensure that the latest incarnation of the Venture Smith sign is as accurate as possible.

Whalen also said there is a possibility that the sign could be moved to a more prominent spot on Barn Island instead of in the remote section where it was initially placed.

"We could do a better job of portraying his experience on Barn Island," Whalen said.

It was here where Venture Smith started his life as a slave, and it was here on about two dozen acres where he grew the vegetables that allowed him to buy his own freedom and later, after developing other enterprises, to purchase freedom for his wife and two sons as well.

"My freedom is a privilege which nothing else can equal,” Smith said in his 1798 autobiography, considered one of the few great slave narratives.

His freedom cost him 71 pounds and two shillings, a sum equal at the time to about six years of average wages for a Colonial worker.

Smith, purportedly the son of a prince in central Africa, was captured as a boy and brought to America in 1739.

At the height of his prosperity in the New World, he owned three homes and 20 ships in the area near where the now-shuttered Yankee nuclear power plant in East Haddam was located.

l.howard@theday.com