Octavius Valentine Catto was born free on February 22, 1839, in Charleston, SC, to Sarah Isabella Cain and the Rev. William T. Catto, an ordained Presbyterian minister. His mother was a descendant of one of Charleston's most distinguished mulatto families, and his father had been an accomplished millwright, the equivalent of a civil engineer today.

William Catto brought his family north when Octavius was about five years old, first to Baltimore and finally settling in Philadelphia. The family arrived in the city in 1848 to a dynamic and politically active free black community that had already built many founding institutions. In Philadelphia, Catto was afforded an excellent education, attending Vaux Primary School and then Lombard Grammar School, both segregated institutions.

In 1854, he became a student at that city's Institute for Colored Youth, which would later become the historically black college, Cheney University. There, he excelled as a student. In 1858, he graduated valedictorian of his class.

Catto did a year of post-graduate study, including private tutoring in both Greek and Latin, in Washington, D.C. In 1859, he returned to Philadelphia, where he was hired as a teacher of English and Mathematics at the Institute.

By his early twenties, Catto was one of the most influential African American leaders in Philadelphia. The Civil War stoked Catto's activism for the abolition of slavery and equal rights for all men. He joined with Frederick Douglass and other black leaders to form a Recruitment Committee to sign up black men to fight for the Union and emancipation. 

Around 1863, Catto joined the Pennsylvania National Guard’s 5th Brigade at the invitation of the Brigade Commander General Louis Wagner and was promoted to Brigade Inspector General with the rank of Major. He was the highest ranking African-American in the military services at that time. Catto was among the leaders who led the “Call to Arms” recruitment of eleven “colored” regiments of the United Stated Colored Troops organized and trained at Camp William Penn, the first and largest federal training facility for African American soldiers.

Catto was a member of numerous civic, literary, patriotic and political groups, including the Franklin Institute, the Philadelphia Library Company, the Fourth Ward Black Political Club, and the Union League Association. He was also an athlete — helping establish Philadelphia as a major hub of the Negro baseball league. His team, the Pythian Base Ball Club, was the first prominent and successful African American base ball club in Philadelphia. In the face of being barred from joining the ranks of white baseball clubs, Catto and the Pythians persevered on the field. Even though the Pythian Base Ball Club dissolved after his death, its name was resurrected in the National Negro Baseball League and represented in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Coopertown, NY.

Equality and civil rights was Catto’s passion and he was tirelessly dedicated to social justice for all African Americans. In 1864, he and other black leaders from all over the country met at the National Convention of Colored Men in Syracuse, NY, and established the National Equal Rights League (NERL) with Frederick Douglass as president. NERL focused on removing racial barriers in Union states.

In 1867, Catto along with other black leaders, convinced the state legislature to sign a bill into law allowing black ridership on streetcars in Philadelphia. In 1870, Catto’s greatest legacy is his work towards ratification of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments - the Civil War Amendments designed to ensure the equality for recently emancipated slaves. These amendments reframed what it means to be an American and laid the foundation for the work of those who came after him. Among them, Ida B. Wells Thurgood Marshall and Martin Luther King.

With the ratification of the 15th Amendment, which granted the right of all citizens of the United States to vote, Catto's life would take a tragic turn. Catto’s fight for voting rights now enabled black men to vote in the City election of 1871 and Philadelphia’s white power structure recognized the threat. To suppress the vote, Election Day is violent and deadly, filled with terror. His own Pennsylvania National Guard unit was activated in order to assist in stopping the widespread violence. Catto begs City officials to stop the bloodshed and was assured the violence would cease. Late afternoon, near his home, he is gunned down in the street. A message sent to black voters on the first Election Day that African Americans were not allowed to vote. His murder was the result of widespread intimidation and violence aimed at African Americans in an effort to deter them from going to the polls. He was only 32 years old.

Octavius V. Catto’s funeral was one of the largest public funerals in Philadelphia history. General Wagner and Catto’s National Guard Brigade were instrumental in the planning of the public funeral held to honor him. Catto’s body lay in state at the City Armory on October 16, 1871 where thousands walked past his body. In memory of the martyred hero, the Pennsylvania National Guard through General Wagner issued the “Catto Medal” awarded to Guard members who were judged most dedicated, brave and efficient in their duty.

Although there were dark days following Catto’s death regarding the much expected rights and opportunities for equality that Catto and his colleagues envisioned and wanted, these laws remain in our Constitution. They became the legal basis for the efforts of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund under Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall and provided the seeds for the Modern Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King.

Octavius Valentine Catto’s work laid the important foundations that are the democratic values we hold dear today. While the issues of citizenship, voting rights, equity and opportunity remain unresolved it is vital to continue working toward completing his unfinished revolution.