- Role
- Secondary
- Nickname
- Arabella calls her
- Profession
- Cook.
- Birthdate
- 12/29/1824
- Relationship Status
- Widowed
- Playby
- Lillian Randolph
- Height
- 5'6
- Build
- Large
- Hair Color
- Black with some silver
- Eye Color
- Brown
- Physical Description
A large black woman in her early 50s.
- Reputation
Fearsome!
- Employment Details
Cook at the Stardust saloon.
- Expertise
Cooking.
- Kith & Kin
Lost touch with her kin when she escaped from slavery.
- Timeline
Born into slavery 29th December 1824, McMahon Plantation near Charles City, Virginia
1824-1842 grew up alongside the similarly aged daughter of the master, Miss Mary Anne McMahon
1843 Mary Anne marries and moves far away, does not take Messalina with her.
1844 Messalina raped by a visiting friend of the young master
1846 Jumps the broomstick with fellow slave James Madison McMahon
1848 Young Master's new wife has Messalina whipped for some minor half-imagined infraction
1850 Old Mars' McMahon dies, young master takes over: plans to sell Messalina and her husband upriver to separate plantations
1850 Messalina manages to escape, alone, up the James River. On the way is helped by various members of the Undergound Railway, including a nameless young white man at Monroe, Virginia.
1851 Makes it to New York, where she manages to scrape a living in service
1863 New York Draft Riots, she is badly beaten up by Irish and German immigrant rioters, protesting against the threat of conscription, which quickly turns into a race riot. She will carry the scars of this for the rest of her life, alongside the scars from her whipping on her back.
1869 The family she works for head West, eventually opening a Saloon in Kalispell Montana in 1870
- Written By
- Javia