Alice Carter

Portrait photograph of Alice Carter taken by Rufus W. Holsinger at an unknown date. Reproduced from the Holsinger Studio Portrait Project.

Alice Coles Carter (ca. 1879 – July 24, 1936) was a Black citizen of Charlottesville in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries whose photograph is included within the Holsinger Studio Collection.

Biography

Carter was born in the Keswick district of Albemarle County in 1879 to Isaac and Mary Coles. As of the 1900 Census, she was unable to read or write. In 1888, she married Newton Carter and made her home in Keswick with him. Alice worked out of the home as a laundress, while Newton labored as a farmhand. As of 1900 (by which time Newton had died), Carter was the widowed mother of three daughters and four sons.

Later in life, Alice moved to Gospel Hill, a Black neighborhood adjoining the University of Virginia that was systematically demolished in the 1970's and 1980's (when the University built its new hospital and expanded its medical and nursing schools). At an unknown date, Alice was photographed in formal attire by Rufus W. Holsinger, with this picture forming a part of the Holsinger Studio Collection.

Alice died on July 24, 1936 in Charlottesville. She was buried in Oakwood Cemetery.