“All Aunt Hagar’s Children” is about an alcoholic young black man in the 1950’s trying to solve the murder of his cousin, Ike while dealing with the aftermath of his service in the Korean War. He takes on the case at the request of his family, even though it is the last thing he wants to do before setting off for Alaska. When he first starts investigating the case, he looks through the old apartment Ike was staying at and asking questions to the people that knew Ike. Throughout his entire investigation, he drinks and remembers the words of a lady that died in his arms in the street. He cannot figure out what they mean but he keeps repeating them like a mantra. At the end of the story, he finds out that Ike’s wife murdered him by shooting him in the head. At the same time, he learns from the wife of a work colleague the meaning of the words that the lady who died had said.
When looking up the name “Hagar” on the internet, one comes across the story of Hagar and her son Ishmael from the bible. Hagar and her son were cast away from Abraham and Sarah, the couple they were slaves to because Hagar’s son was picking on Sarah and Abraham’s son, Isaac. Hagar and Ishmael can be compared to the characters of Miss Agatha and Ike. Miss Agatha was attacked by a white man when she was a teenager. Together, she and her sisters beat up the white man and ran off. To flee the law, the entire family left their home and headed to Washington DC where they still remained at the time of this story. Ike is similar to Ishmael. When he was alive, he was not well-liked by anyone except for his mother. Even then, his mother felt guilty about bringing him into the world. He was violent and hurt the narrator along with many other people. Ike was “cast out” of society like Ishmael was cast out.
The title “All Aunt Hagar’s Children,” refers to the fact that African-Americans are the ones cast out by the law and society as a whole. Even if Miss Agatha and her family told the police what had happened, the police and the law would not believe them because of their skin color.