Dr. Louise Celia “Lulu” Fleming: Celebrating Women’s History Month 2022

Born to enslaved parents in Florida, Dr. Louise Celia “Lulu” Fleming (January 28, 1862-June 20, 1899) led a brief but remarkable life.  Seeking freedom during the Civil War, her parents escaped their enslavement when “Lulu” was six weeks old.  This freedom was temporary as the small group of freedom-seekers were betrayed by the river boat captain and returned to enslavement in Jacksonville Florida. Writing of her conversion to Christianity, Dr. Fleming stated, “At the age of fifteen He drew me unto himself, and after passing through the shadow of doubts, I entered into the blessed light of His love, wherein to walk is fullness of joy, December 1877”.  Before attending Shaw University, Dr. Fleming was a public school teacher in Saint Augustine, Florida.  She graduated as valedictorian from Shaw on May 27, 1885. In 1886 Dr. Fleming became the first African American woman to be commissioned for work in Africa by the Woman’s American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society.  She returned to the US from the Congo to improve her skills and briefly attended Leonard Medical School learning as much as she could there before leaving Raleigh for Philadelphia to attend the Women’s Medical College of Pennsylvania – accounted to be among the first African Americans to graduate from that medical school.  Upon her return to Africa again, Dr. Fleming worked tirelessly and sent students from the Congo back to Shaw University to be educated.  It was during this second term of her work in the Congo that Dr. Fleming contracted what is known as African Sleeping Sickness.  She returned to Philadelphia seeking treatment but subsequently succumbed to the illness.  She died at the age of 37.  Her short biography was written by Mr. William Still – known as one of the major conductors of the Underground Railroad – and published in 1893 in Raleigh North Carolina as one of the entries in Dr. L.A. Scruggs’s book, Women of Distinction.  It is worth noting that Dr. Lawson Andrew (LA) Scruggs finished from Leonard Medical School and was one of the first three Black doctors licensed by the state of North Carolina.