A former slave from Tennessee who escaped to freedom in Ontario, Canada in 1846, he soon returned to the United States, settling for a period in Detroit, Michigan.

After the end of Reconstruction, Singleton organized the movement of thousands of black colonists, known as Exodusters, to found settlements in the free state of Kansas.

A prominent voice for early black nationalism, he became involved in promoting and coordinating black-owned businesses in Kansas and developed an interest in the Back-to-Africa movement.

Although it is known that Benjamin Singleton was enslaved at birth in 1809 in Davidson County near Nashville, Tennessee, details of his early life remain scant.

[1] As freedmen were still subject to white racial violence and political problems, Singleton concluded that blacks would have no chance for equality in the South.

In 1874, Singleton and Johnson founded the Edgefield Real Estate Association, with the goal of helping African Americans acquire land in the Nashville area.

Convinced that freedmen must leave the South to achieve true economic independence, in 1875 Singleton began to explore the idea of planting black colonies in the American West.

[2] Once the settlers arrived, they began negotiating with the Missouri River, Fort Scott, and Gulf Railroad for land to build their proposed Singleton Colony.

Their timing was late, as rich lead deposits had been discovered in the area the previous year, which led to a mining boom and caused land prices to rise too high for their funds.

The land was marginal, but in the spring of 1878, Singleton's settlers left middle Tennessee for Kansas via steamboats on the Cumberland River.

By 1879 of the "Great Exodus", 50,000 freedmen known as Exodusters had migrated from the South to escape poverty and racial violence following whites' regaining political control across the former Confederacy.

He testified to his own success in setting up independent black colonies and noted the terrible conditions which caused freedmen to leave the South.

The goal of the CUL, which he created in Topeka, was to combine the financial resources of all black people to build black-owned businesses, factories, and trade schools.

The group held several conventions and was successful enough locally that Republican Party officials in Kansas became interested in its potential political strength.

He raised his voice one final time in 1889 to call for a portion of the newly opening Oklahoma Territory to be reserved as an all-black state.

"[9] His son, Joshua W. Singleton, eventually settled in Allensworth, California, a black agricultural settlement founded in Tulare County.