Although the Circuit Court's ruling in 1830 went against Dupuy, she had worked for wages for 18 months and lived in the household of Martin Van Buren, the succeeding Secretary of State, while it was decided.
In about 1806, she met and married Aaron Dupuy, a young man held by Henry Clay on his Ashland plantation in Lexington, Kentucky.
Charlotte Dupuy and her family enjoyed the relative freedom of living in Washington, D.C., where they met other enslaved people and joined some of the city's activities.
As Clay began making preparations in 1829 to leave the capital when his service ended, Dupuy filed a petition for her freedom and that of her children.
The petition asked the courts to use their power to keep Clay from removing Charlotte Dupuy from the District of Columbia while her lawsuit for freedom was underway.
[7] While the Court allowed Charlotte Dupuy to stay in Washington while the case was heard, it permitted Clay to take her husband Aaron and children Mary Ann and Charles back to Kentucky.
[4] Her case was taken seriously for, according to a letter by Henry Clay, Dupuy stayed in DC "upwards of 18 months" after he left for Kentucky, awaiting the results of the trial.
[8] Dupuy worked for wages for the succeeding Secretary of State, Martin Van Buren, who also lived at Decatur House.
Clay had Dupuy removed from Washington and transported to New Orleans, to the home of his daughter and son-in-law Martin Duralde Jr.. She was enslaved there for another decade.
[8] Finally, on October 12, 1840, Henry Clay freed Charlotte Dupuy and her daughter Mary Ann in New Orleans.
[5] Clay, either before he died in 1852 or by his will, or his descendants, freed Charlotte's husband Aaron Dupuy or "gave him his time".