THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA 
 1619-1865 
 
THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA 
 1619-186? 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN HENDERSON RUSSELL 
 
 A DISSERTATION 
 
 Submitted to the Board of University Studies of The Johns 
 
 Hopkins University in Conformity with the Requirements 
 
 for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 
 
 1913 
 
 BALTIMORE 
 
 1913 
 
V \ A 
 
 COPYRIGHT 1913 BY 
 THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS 
 
 PRESS OF 
 
 THE NEW ERA PRINTING COMPANY 
 LANCASTER. PA. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 PREFACE vii 
 
 CHAPTER I. Number and Distribution of the Free 
 
 Negroes 9 
 
 CHAPTER II. The Origin of the Free Negro Class ... 16 
 
 CHAPTER III. Manumission 42 
 
 CHAPTER IV. The Legal Status of the Free Negro ... 88 
 
 CHAPTER V. The Social Status of the Free Negro . . 123 
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY 178 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The history of the free negro in the slave States forms 
 one of the most interesting chapters in the history of slavery 
 in this country. A number of valuable monographs dealing 
 with the history of the negro or with the institution of 
 slavery in the various States have been published during 
 recent years, but no one of them, so far as the author is 
 aware, has been devoted exclusively to the status or history 
 of the antebellum free negro in a particular Commonwealth 
 of the Union. Such studies are needed, and it is hoped that 
 the present monograph will, as far as Virginia is concerned, 
 supply this need. Moreover, as a study of the free negro in 
 the State in which the African first made his appearance in 
 America, it should supply some of the facts upon which the 
 history of the negro race in the United States must be based. 
 Upon the constitutional side it is hoped that the study will 
 be an aid to a correct conception of the purposes sought to 
 be realized by the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment. 
 
 The author takes this opportunity to acknowledge his 
 indebtedness to Professor W. W. Willoughby for the 
 scholarly guidance and stimulating criticism which were at 
 his service in all stages of the work. It is a pleasure also 
 to acknowledge his obligation to Professor J. C. Ballagh, at 
 whose suggestion the study was undertaken. In the im 
 portant work of discovery and valuation of the sources 
 Professor Ballagh s generous direction was of particular 
 value. The author is also indebted to Professors J. M. Vin 
 cent and G. E. Barnett for helpful suggestions. 
 
 Acknowledgment of special obligation is likewise due to 
 Professor Charles Henry Ambler, of Randolph-Macon Col 
 lege, who placed in the author s hands notes of great value 
 which he had made upon the subject of this monograph. 
 For courtesies extended by officials in charge of county and 
 
 vii 
 
Vlll PREFACE 
 
 state archives, sincere thanks are here given. From the 
 discussion of various phases of the subject with Dr. H. J. 
 Eckenrode, archivist, and Mr. Earl G. Swem, assistant 
 librarian, of the Virginia State Library, suggestions of great 
 value were received. Mr. William G. Stanard, librarian of 
 the Virginia Historical Society, courteously placed at the 
 author s disposal valuable manuscripts. 
 
 J. H. R. 
 
THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA 1619-1865 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 NUMBER AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE FREE NEGROES IN 
 VIRGINIA 
 
 At the beginning of the Civil War there were in Virginia 
 nearly sixty thousand free negroes. 1 This number was far 
 in excess of the number of free colored persons in any other 
 of the great slave States, being about double the number in 
 North Carolina, the State which, south of Virginia, had the 
 largest free colored population. It was in excess of the 
 free negro population in any State, slave or free, with the 
 exception of Maryland. In 1860 the entire number of 
 negroes in New York and New England combined was but 
 little greater than the number of free negroes in Virginia. 
 According to every Federal enumeration from 1790, the 
 aggregate negro population of the State of Pennsylvania 
 was smaller than the free colored population of Virginia, 
 and from 1830 to 1860 the same may be said of New York. 
 At the beginning of the nineteenth century the sum of the 
 free negro populations in New York, New Jersey, and Penn 
 sylvania was only about a thousand more than the number 
 of free negroes in Virginia. 2 Of the free negro population 
 of the United States, Virginia had about one eighth. 3 
 
 1 Except where specific reference is made in footnotes to the 
 sources, the statistical facts in this chapter are based on the United 
 States decennial censuses, 1790-1860. 
 
 3 St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, p. 70 n. 
 
 * It must be kept in mind that free mulattoes and all other free 
 persons having negro blood are included in the use of the word 
 " free negroes." The term includes the persons enumerated in the 
 census reports under the caption, " all other [than white] free per 
 sons except Indians not taxed." In 1771 the general court ruled 
 that negro or mulatto servants and apprentices were to be considered 
 free negroes. It is in this broadened sense that the word is used in 
 this work when used without qualifying words (Howell v. Nether- 
 land, Jefferson s Reports, 90). 
 
 9 
 
IO THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 The condition which made the free negro question in Vir 
 ginia unique and peculiarly interesting was that in that State 
 only was there so large a free colored population living in 
 a society so vitally connected with and dependent upon 
 slavery. It requires but little imagination to see why a free 
 negro population, numbering from twenty to sixty thousand 
 between 1800 and 1860 and living among a slave population 
 almost as numerous as the dominant white element, created 
 social problems more perplexing than those of New Eng 
 land, where the negroes, few in number, were almost all 
 free, and race problems different from those of other great 
 slave States where the free negroes were too few to con 
 stitute a conspicuous factor in the social order. With 
 society in a large area of Virginia composed of about an 
 equal number of masters and slaves, an additional element 
 of free negroes in the proportion of one to about eight slaves 
 acted in no sense as an aid to facilitating the association of 
 the two races. 
 
 Prior to a law of 1782 which removed the restrictions 
 upon the right to manumit slaves by will, the number of 
 free negroes relative to the number of slaves or white per 
 sons was very much smaller than in any decade after the 
 passage of that act. From 1619 to the end of the century, 
 when custom and the law were fixing the status of the Vir 
 ginia negro, no satisfactory statistical estimate can be made 
 of the number of free negroes in the colony. In 1670 Gov 
 ernor Berkeley estimated the total number of " black slaves " 
 in the colony at two thousand. 4 Although he made no ref 
 erence to any free negroes, there is ample evidence to show 
 that there were some in the colony at this time. In 1691 
 and 1723 laws were enacted which limited the increase of 
 the free negro class to natural means and to manumissions 
 by special legislative acts. 5 These limitations upon manu 
 mission remained in force till 1782, when, according to the 
 reliable statement of a contemporary, the free negro class 
 numbered about twenty-eight hundred. Supposing the 
 
 4 W. W. Hening, Statutes at Large of Virginia, vol. ii, p. 515. 
 "Ibid., vol. iii, pp. 87, 88; vol. iv, p. 132. 
 
NUMBER AND DISTRIBUTION OF FREE NEGROES I I 
 
 ninety-one years between 1691 and 1782 to be sufficient time 
 for the numbers of the free negroes to have doubled three 
 times by natural increase, we may judge, by counting back 
 ward on the basis of Tucker s estimate in 1782, that in 1691 
 the number of free negroes in the colony was about three 
 hundred and fifty. 6 
 
 The frequency with which this class of persons is men 
 tioned in church and court records between 1690 and 1782 
 gives a further appearance of reliability to the above esti 
 mate. In 1724 the reports of certain Virginia clergymen 
 to the English bishop mention free negroes among the par 
 ishioners, while certain others show that there were none. 
 The report for St. Anne s parish asserted that in the parish 
 there "are many negro slaves," and that "there maybe 6 free 
 negroes." 7 The rector of Lawn s Creek parish reported that 
 " there are some Indians, bond and free, and some negroes, 
 bond and free." 8 The answer for Newport parish of Isle 
 of Wight County is, "Both bond and free," 9 and for 
 Hungar s parish on the Eastern Shore, " There are Infidels, 
 bond and free." 10 The old parish registers, some of which 
 
 6 St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery in Virginia, published 
 as Appendix to 1803 edition of Tucker s Blackstone, vol. i, note H, 
 p. 66. The edition of the Dissertation on Slavery published in 1796 
 has 1800 (p. 70) where the later edition has 2800 as representing 
 the author s estimate of the number of free colored persons in Vir 
 ginia. An indication that the figures of the later edition are the 
 author s true estimate is contained in a statement made by a member 
 of the House of Delegates in discussing manumission in which he 
 cited Tucker as authority for the statement that in 1782 there were 
 3000 free negroes in Virginia. Evidently the speaker adopted 3000 
 as a round number for 2800 as given in the edition of Tucker, then 
 only two years old. 
 
 7 W. S. Perry, ed., Papers relating to the History of the Church 
 in Virginia, 1650-1776, p. 315. 
 
 8 Ibid., p. 289. 
 
 9 Ibid., p. 274. 
 
 10 Ibid., p. 273. The word " infidels " in these reports is used some 
 what in the sense of "heathen," so that when the answer is made 
 that there are "no infidels that are free," as was made for St. 
 Peter s parish (p. 269), it must be understood to mean that there 
 were no free negroes in the congregation of the minister making the 
 report. One negative answer made to the question as to the num 
 ber of bond or free infidels declared, " There are none of the latter, 
 especially of those who profess the Church of England worship" 
 (p. 271). Negroes, whether baptized or not, were uniformly re 
 ported as infidels. 
 
12 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 date back to 1662, bear witness to the existence of a free 
 negro element in the congregations, although it is difficult 
 to ascertain from this source the numerical strength of the 
 free negro population. 11 The register of the old Bruton 
 parish shows that thirty-seven out of eleven hundred and 
 twenty-two colored persons baptized between 1746 and 1797 
 were free; 12 but the ratio of 37 to 1122, or I to 30, is no 
 doubt much too large to show the relative number of free 
 negroes to the slaves in any large section of the State. 
 From about 1762 to 1782 some seventy free colored persons 
 are mentioned in the records of baptisms, a number larger 
 than could have been found in most areas of the same size 
 included in a single parish. 13 
 
 After 1782 the relative numbers of the three classes of 
 Virginia population are pretty well known. A state census 
 made in I782, 14 although not classifying free negroes sepa 
 rately, bears out the estimate made by Professor Tucker that 
 twenty-eight hundred 15 would represent fairly accurately 
 the number of free negroes in Virginia at that date. The 
 unparalleled increase of this class, which followed the re 
 moval in 1782 of the restrictions on manumission, and also 
 the relative numbers of free colored persons, slaves, and 
 whites in Virginia from 1790 to 1860 will be seen from 
 
 "By the courtesy of the librarian of the Episcopal Theological 
 Seminary at Alexandria, Virginia, the writer was permitted to ex 
 amine the manuscript parish records, which contain valuable in 
 formation not only as to the number of free negroes, but also as to 
 their social position. 
 
 13 Manuscript copy, Williamsburg, Virginia, pp. 24-57. See also 
 W. A. R. Goodwin, Historical Sketch of Bruton Church, p. 153. 
 
 13 The record for a single year reads, with reference to free 
 negroes, as follows: "John, son of Thos. & Sally Pow, a free mu 
 latto was baptized April ye 4. 1762." " Elizabeth, Daughter of 
 Eliza Wallace (a free negro) baptiz d June ye 6, 1762." "Joseph, 
 Son of Anne Freeman, a free Mulatto, bapt z d July ye 4, 1762." 
 
 In further illustration of the evidence contained in parish records 
 of the existence of free negroes in the colony is the following 
 entry: "Diego, free negro died Sept. 3, 1741 " (MS. Register 
 of Christ s Church, Middlesex County, p. 310). 
 
 14 " State Enumeration of Va., 1782-1785 Heads of Families," pub 
 lished with the First Census of the United States, 1790. 
 
 15 St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, ed. 1803, p. 66. 
 
NUMBER AND DISTRIBUTION OF FREE NEGROES 
 
 the following table prepared from the Federal decennial 
 censuses : 
 
 
 1790 
 
 1820 
 
 1840 
 
 1860 
 
 
 12,866 
 
 36,875 
 
 49,841 
 
 58,042 
 
 Slave 
 
 202,627 
 
 4215,148 
 
 448,088 
 
 400.865 
 
 White 
 
 442,117 
 
 603,381 
 
 740,968 
 
 1,047,299 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Total 
 
 747,610 
 
 1,065,404 
 
 1,239,797 
 
 1, 596, 206 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 From these figures one fails to get a correct conception 
 of the significance of the presence of the free colored popu 
 lation in Virginia unless the question of distribution is also 
 taken into consideration. Had the free blacks been equally 
 distributed throughout the white population of the State, 
 the effect would have been different. In the mountainous 
 half of the State, which after 1830 contained half of the 
 white population, free negroes were so scarce as to be an 
 almost negligible social factor. The 58,042 free negroes, 
 together with the slave population, were confined largely 
 to the eastern half of the State, where in 1860 the white 
 population numbered about 600,000. 
 
 The State of Virginia was divided north and south on 
 the basis of the elevation of land into four sections : Tide 
 water, Piedmont, the Valley, and Trans-Alleghany. Of the 
 12,866 free negroes in Virginia in 1790 only 75 resided in 
 Trans-Alleghany, or what is now West Virginia with sev 
 eral counties of the southwestern part of Virginia. In the 
 Valley district there were 815; in the Piedmont region, 
 3640, leaving 8330, or about two thirds of the entire number, 
 in Tidewater. In that section the first census recorded I 
 free negro to 18 slaves and to 18 white persons. In Trans- 
 Alleghany the figures showed I free negro to 30 slaves to 
 517 white persons. 
 
 From the census of 1860 it appeared that the free negroes 
 of Tidewater were between one sixth and one seventh of 
 the colored and about one fourteenth of the entire popula 
 tion of that section. Tidewater contained 32,841 free ne- 
 
14 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 groes, over one half of the entire free colored population, 
 while the region beyond the Alleghanies now had 2513, 
 which was about one eleventh of the blacks of that section 
 and i to every 160 persons living there. It appears that 
 Tidewater always had from one half to two thirds of the 
 entire free negro class, although after 1830 that section 
 contained less than one fourth of the white people of the 
 State. In 1860 Trans-Alleghany had more than one third 
 of the white population of Virginia and about one twenty- 
 fifth of the free negroes. The two sections west of the 
 Blue Ridge, sometimes called the western half of the State, 
 had in 1860 over one half of the white and but one seventh 
 of the entire free colored class. A few of the lower coun 
 ties in the Valley contained a large part of the 8354 free 
 colored persons who lived in the western half. Thus it is 
 apparent that an important aspect of the free negro problem 
 in Virginia was the fact that the free negro population was 
 largely concentrated in the eastern half of the State and 
 came in contact with only about one half of the white 
 population. 
 
 With respect to the relative numbers of free negroes in 
 smaller localities some interesting observations may be made. 
 As between rural and urban communities the latter had the 
 larger share of free negroes. In 1790, when the average 
 ratio of free negroes to slaves and to whites in the Tide 
 water section was I to 18, in Petersburg the free negroes 
 constituted one fourth of the colored population of the town, 
 and were to the whites as I to 4^. In this town of 3000 
 people there were 310 free negroes. In Richmond, out of 
 a population of 3700 there were 265 free negroes. In 
 Portsmouth, where 1702 persons lived, there were 47 free 
 blacks. 
 
 The increase of free negroes in the town populations is 
 best seen by considering the figures of some of the later cen 
 suses. Petersburg in 1830 had 2032 free negroes, 2850 
 slaves, and 3440 white persons. In 1860 this town was the 
 home of 3164 free negroes, 5680 slaves, and a number of 
 
NUMBER AND DISTRIBUTION OF FREE NEGROES 15 
 
 white persons about equal to the total black population. 
 In 1860 Winchester, a town of 3000 white inhabitants, had 
 675 free negroes, only nineteen less than half of the blacks 
 of the town. In 1850, 10,450 free negroes out of a total of 
 54,333, that is, nearly one fifth, lived in towns, while only 
 about one tenth of the white population lived in cities and 
 towns. In 1860 between a fourth and a third of the whole 
 free colored population lived in towns and cities. 16 
 
 In some counties a large proportion of the black inhabi 
 tants were free. In Accomac County 3392 of the 8000 
 black inhabitants were free. In James City County 926 
 out of 2764 blacks were free. In Nansemond County there 
 were 2470 free negroes and 581 slaves. Other counties in 
 Tidewater in which from one sixth to one half of the col 
 ored population was free were Charles City, Fairfax, Hen- 
 rico, Isle of Wight, James City, Norfolk, Northampton, 
 Prince William, Richmond, Southampton, Warwick, and 
 Westmoreland. The counties in Piedmont which had the 
 largest free colored population relative to the slave class 
 were Loudoun and Goochland. In the former, one sixth of 
 the negroes were free, in the latter, one ninth. 
 
 Occasion may arise for calling attention to other facts 
 relative to the numbers and the distribution of the free ne 
 groes in Virginia, but the facts given above will be sufficient 
 for a general conception of the numerical importance of 
 that class at different times and in different places. 
 
 "Census of 1860, Population, p. 516. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 THE ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 
 
 The popular misconception of the beginnings of the free 
 negro population in Virginia which this chapter should cor 
 rect may be stated as follows : The first negroes brought to 
 Virginia in 1619 were from the very outset regarded and 
 held as slaves for life. They and all Africans who came 
 after them experienced immediately upon entering Virginia 
 a perpetual loss of liberty. Unlike the white servant, whose 
 freedom was only temporarily withheld, the freedom of the 
 negro could only be restored by an act of emancipation. 
 This being so, the free negro class was nothing but a diver 
 gence from, or a by-product of, slavery, dependent in its 
 origin and existence upon the disintegration of slavery. 
 This erroneous view was expressed by a slavery apologist of 
 the decade immediately preceding the Civil War as follows : 
 " Every negro in this country, or his ancestors, came in as a 
 slave. Every negro, legally free, has reached that condition 
 by his ancestors or himself having been emancipated by a 
 former master." 1 
 
 This popular error is maintained and supported by a large 
 number of writers who have discussed the introduction of 
 negroes into America. Besides Virginia historians such as 
 Burk, Campbell, and Cook, who through thoughtless infer 
 ence have written the word " slave " where they should, in 
 view of all the evidence before them, have written "ne 
 gro," there are two classes of writers who have given cre 
 dence to the theory as a means of supporting some cause 
 of which they were the champions. The first authorities 
 to make use of this historical error were the antebellum 
 
 1 " Calx," Two Great Evils of Virginia. Bound in " Political 
 Pamphlets/ vol. xii, p. 5, in Virginia State Library. 
 
 16 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS I/ 
 
 proslavery advocates. Judge Tucker of the Virginia su 
 preme court, when delivering an opinion in 1806 in support 
 of the principle of presuming slavery from color, made the 
 following assertion : " From the first settlement of the colony 
 of Virginia to the year 1778, all negroes, Moors, and mu- 
 lattoes . . . brought into this country by sea, or land, were 
 slaves." 2 The school of proslavery writers in Virginia be 
 tween 1832 and 1860 made this assumption the basis of 
 an argument for the reduction of all free negroes to slavery : 
 " Every negro in this country or his ancestors came in as a 
 slave." Hence they argued that " the free condition of all 
 negroes in this country is novel or superinduced, artificial 
 and abnormal. The great political problem which is re 
 quired to be solved, is the recovery of the free negroes from 
 their false position in this slave-holding community." 3 
 
 The other writers whose conclusions have been influenced 
 by their wishes in regard to the early history of the negro in 
 America are historians of sectional bias who desire to assure 
 themselves and their readers that American slavery had its 
 origin in Virginia and not at the North. Thus, Henry Wil 
 son, in his Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America, 4 
 assures us that " in the month of August, 1620, a Dutch ship 
 entered James River with twenty African slaves. They 
 were purchased by the colonists, and they and their offspring 
 were held in perpetual servitude." He therefore concludes 
 that " four months before the feet of the Pilgrims had 
 touched the New World, began that system which over 
 spread the land." 
 
 Without attempting to say whether slavery had an earlier 
 beginning in Virginia than in the other colonies, and with 
 out entering into the merits of the contention of the pro- 
 slavery advocates that the free negroes should have been 
 universally reduced to slavery, it can be asserted that 
 any contention based solely upon the theory that the first 
 Afro- Virginians and their offspring were slaves from the 
 
 1 Hudgins v. Wrights, i Hening and Munford, 137. 
 "Calx," p. 5. 
 Third edition, vol. i, p. 2. 
 
 2 
 
1 8 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 time of their arrival in the colony is not well founded. 5 
 Regardless of the bearing upon past or present controversies 
 of the conclusions reached, an examination of the records 
 will be made with the sole object of finding out what was 
 the early status of the negro in Virginia. 
 
 If the simple fact of the introduction of negroes into the 
 colony of Virginia is not to be taken as conclusive evidence 
 of the beginning of slavery, upon what facts should its origin 
 or earliest existence be posited? Throughout the seven 
 teenth century there were in the colony persons called ser 
 vants whose relations to their masters during the time of 
 their service resembled the relations of slavery. Such tem 
 porary servitude must be distinguished from slavery. The 
 difference between a servant and a slave is elementary and 
 fundamental. The loss of liberty to the servant \vas tem 
 porary; the bondage of the slave was perpetual. It is the 
 distinction made by Beverly in 1705 when he wrote, " They 
 are call d Slaves in respect of the time of their Servitude, 
 because it is for Life." 6 Wherever, according to the cus 
 toms and laws of a colony, negroes were regarded and held 
 as servants without a future right to freedom, there we 
 should find the beginning of slavery in that colony. Dr. J. 
 C. Ballagh, in his History of Slavery in Virginia, very prop 
 erly treats slavery as a legal status ; but by drawing a sharp 
 line between negro servitude and slavery at the date of stat 
 utory recognition of slavery he has overemphasized the im 
 portance of legislation in determining the origin of the insti 
 tution. 7 Slavery in Virginia was instituted and developed 
 in customary law, and was legally sanctioned at first by 
 
 8 J. C. Ballagh, in A History of Slavery in Virginia, was the first 
 to point out the error in the assumption that slavery was introduced 
 into Virginia. His thesis in the chapter entitled " Development of 
 Slavery " is that " servitude . . . was the historic base upon which 
 slavery, by the extension and addition of incidents, was constructed." 
 Although we are not primarily concerned in this study with the 
 origin of slavery in Virginia, the facts here presented in relation 
 to the origin of the free negro seem to bear out Dr. Ballagh s thesis 
 as above stated. 
 
 6 The History and Present State of Virginia, bk. iv, p. 35. Cf. 
 Ballagh, Slavery in Virginia, p. 28. 
 
 7 Pp. 34, 43- 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 19 
 
 court decisions. Hence, not in statute law, but in court 
 records and documents which contain evidence of the con 
 dition of individual negroes prior to the date of statutory 
 recognition of slavery are to be found, if found at all, the 
 facts relative to the beginning of slavery. 
 
 The first act of the Virginia slave code, that is to say, the 
 first act dealing directly with the status of negroes, was 
 passed in 1662. 8 The wording of the act is abundant proof 
 that those who framed it viewed slavery as a practice well 
 established and well understood, the word " slave " being 
 used without an attempt to define its significance. The idea 
 that the act was to establish slavery or to provide the insti 
 tution with a legal basis seems to have been entirely absent ; 
 the sole object was to fix a rule by which the status of mu 
 latto children could be determined. Prior to this act the 
 word " slave " had occurred in the statutes at three different 
 times. In 1655 it was enacted that " if the Indians shall 
 bring in any children as gages of their good and quiet inten 
 tions to vs and amity with vs . . . the countrey by vs their 
 representatives do engage that wee will not vse them as 
 slaves." 9 This pledge to the native Indians would seem to 
 justify the inference that some persons, if not some Indians, 
 in the colony had been reduced to slavery. Again, in 1659 
 in an act concerning commercial relations with the Dutch it 
 was declared "that if the said Dutch or other foreigners 
 shall import any negro-slaves, They . . . shall for the to 
 bacco really produced by the sale of the said negro pay only 
 the impost of two shilling per hogshead, the like being paid 
 by our owne nation." 10 While here the subject of legisla 
 tion is not even related to status and the reference to slaves 
 is in a conditional clause in the act, it is hardly to be sup 
 posed that the persons who drew the act would have used 
 
 " Whereas some doubts have arisen whether children got by an 
 Englishman upon a negro woman should be slave or free, Be it 
 therefore enacted . . . that all children borne in this country shall 
 be held bond or free only according to the condition of the mother " 
 (Hening, vol. ii, p. 170). 
 
 9 Hening, vol. i, p. 396. 
 
 10 Ibid., vol. i, p. 540. 
 
20 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 the word " slave " where " servant " or " negro " was meant. 
 The act came very close to a recognition of the legal possi 
 bility of slavery in the colony. 11 
 
 Two years later the wording of an act prescribing certain 
 punishments for runaway English servants shows beyond a 
 doubt that some negroes in the colony were slaves. The 
 act is entitled " English running away with negroes," 12 and 
 reads as follows : " In case any English servant shall run 
 away in company with any negroes who are incapable of 
 makeing satisfaction by addition of time, bee it enacted 
 that the English so running away in company with them 
 shall serve for the time of the said negroes absence as they 
 are to do for their own by a former act." 13 The clause which 
 here refers incidentally to negroes certainly shows that some 
 of them were servants for life, slaves, incapable of compen 
 sating for lost time by any addition to their terms ; but 
 there is nothing in the act which asserts that all negroes 
 were or should henceforth be slaves. 
 
 This is the act which has been interpreted by Dr. Ballagh 
 in his History of Slavery in Virginia as not only a recogni 
 tion of slavery, but also as a statutory reduction to slavery 
 of all free or servant negroes. 1 * As thus interpreted, the 
 law is made to supply a legal basis hitherto lacking upon 
 
 u There is some indication in the records of the Dutch settlement 
 in New York that the supposition in the act was at times a reality. 
 Four years before this act the Council of the Colony of New 
 York granted to Edmund Scharbuch "permission to sail in his 
 vessel with some purchased negroes from here to Virginia" (Docu 
 ments Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, 
 vol. xii, pp. 93, 94). 
 
 12 Hening, vol. ii, p. 26. Italics my own. 
 
 13 In the repetition of this act the following year the words " if 
 they [the negroes] had not been slaves" are added, showing that 
 a negro who was not a slave was required to make up his own time 
 lost by running away (Hening, vol. ii, p. 117). 
 
 14 At page 71 are used the words, "negro servants reduced to 
 slavery in 1661." The words from which this inference is drawn 
 are quoted thus : " Negroes are incapable of making satisfaction by 
 addition of time" (p. 34). These words as they stand are indeed 
 of universal application, but it will be noticed that two words have 
 been omitted from the text of the act which when supplied give to 
 the clause a restricted meaning and application. /The clause should 
 read : " Any negroes who are incapable of makeing satisfaction by 
 addition of time." 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 21 
 
 which courts might rule against the liberation of negroes 
 suing for freedom. But, manifestly, the act was not in 
 tended for such a purpose, and there is abundant evidence 
 that it was not used to alter the status of free or servant 
 negroes then in the colony. The truth is that no attempt 
 was ever made to supply legal grounds for holding negroes 
 in a status of slavery. Custom supplied all the authority 
 that appeared to be necessary, and legislation at first merely V 
 performed the part of resolving some uncertainties concern 
 ing a well-established institution. "When the progress of 
 the times," wrote Savigny, " calls for new institutions . . . 
 there is necessarily a time of transition in which the law is 
 uncertain, and it is to put an end to this uncertainty that 
 Statute Law is required." 15 
 
 This truth is well illustrated in the growth of slavery in 
 Virginia. The time of transition from slavery sanctioned 
 by customary law to slavery defined by statute law was the 
 decade between 1660 and 1670. A few quotations from 
 the preambles of the acts of this period will reveal the object 
 of the first legislation concerning the Africans in Virginia. 
 In 1662 we read that " whereas some doubts have arisen 
 whether children got by an Englishman upon a negro woman 
 should be slave or free, be it therefore enacted," 16 and so 
 forth. " Some doubts have [ing] arisen whether negroes 
 that are slaves by birth should by vertue of baptism be made 
 free," the answer was made in 1667 by the enactment of a 
 statute. 17 An act of 1668 begins with the words, "/Whereas , 
 doubts have arisen whether negro women set free should 
 be accompted tithable," 18 and another two years later was 
 explained by a preamble which asserted that "it has been 
 questioned whither Indians or negroes manumitted or other 
 wise free could be capable of purchasing Christian ser 
 vants." 19 Doubts arose as to whether Indians captured in 
 
 15 Savigny, System, Sec. 13, quoted in J. M. Lightfoot s Nature of 
 Positive Law, pp. 283, 284. 
 ^ 18 Hening, vol. ii, p. i/o. 
 
 " Ibid., vol. ii, p. 260. 
 
 18 Ibid., vol. ii, p. 267. 
 
 19 Ibid., vol. ii, p. 280. 
 
22 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 war should be slaves, and in 1670 was passed an act enti 
 tled " An act declaring who shall be slaves." 20 
 
 Even after this decade of legislation the question as to 
 who should or should not be slaves was not fully answered. 
 The act of 1670 merely applied to servants brought in by 
 ship after 1670 the test of Christianity to determine whether 
 they should be servants for a limited time or slaves for life. 
 The status of Africans who came or were brought to Vir 
 ginia before 1670 was not determined by statute law either 
 before or after that date. Hence, if by statute law slavery 
 was merely regulated and not established or instituted, the 
 only use that can be made of the statutes in determining the 
 origin of the institution is to fix an upper limit to the period 
 in which the beginning was made. Knowing that slavery 
 had its beginning some time before 1661, the date of the first 
 act recognizing it, a study of the period from 1619 to 1661 
 should throw much light on the question of the earliest 
 beginnings of the free negro class. 
 
 From the quaint narrative of Master John Rolfe, who 
 possibly wrote as an eyewitness of the introduction of ne 
 groes into Virginia, it is learned that " About the last of 
 August [1619] came in a Dutch man of Warre that sold 
 us twenty negars." 21 In the very year of the arrival of this 
 group of African immigrants a system of labor known as 
 indented servitude received recognition in the laws of the 
 colony. 22 It was not an uncommon practice in this early 
 period for ship masters to sell white servants to the plant 
 ers; 23 hence, an inference that these twenty negroes were 
 slaves, drawn from the fact that they were sold to the colony 
 or to the planters, would not be justified. Prior to 1619 
 every inhabitant of the colony was practically "a servant 
 manipulated in the interest of the company, held in servi- 
 
 20 Herring, vol. ii, p. 283. 
 
 21 Works of Captain John Smith, ed. by Arber, p. 541. 
 
 22 The first assembly of the colony provided that all contracts of 
 servants should be recorded and enforced, and thus gave legislative 
 recognition to servitude (Colonial Records of Virginia, 1619-1680, 
 State Senate Document, Extra, 1874, pp. 21, 28; J. C. Ballagh, White 
 Servitude in the Colony of Virginia, p. 27 n.). 
 
 23 Ballagh, White Servitude, p. 45- 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 23 
 
 tude beyond a stipulated term/ 24 The word " freeman " 
 was just beginning to be used to distinguish persons set free 
 from service to the London Company from persons still in 
 a condition of servitude either to the company or to indi 
 vidual freemen. 25 Beyond all question the first twenty ne 
 groes brought in were not introduced as freemen. The 
 only question is whether, upon entering the colony, they be 
 came servants or slaves. The possibility of their becoming 
 slaves must be recognized because it is conceivable that a 
 status different from that of any person in Virginia at that 
 time was given to persons so different from white settlers 
 as were the Africans. 
 
 Since it is the fact that the white population in the colony 
 in 1619 had not been familiar in England with a system 
 of slavery or with a model slave code, and since they had 
 developed in Virginia a system of servitude and were forti 
 fying it by law, it is plausible that the Africans became ser 
 vants in a condition similar to the status of white servants, 
 who, after a term of service varying from two to eight 
 years, 26 were entitled to freedom. According to the " Lists 
 of living and dead in Virginia" 27 in 1623 and the "Muster 
 Rolls of the Settlements in Virginia/ 28 a census made in 
 1624-1625, there were in the colony twenty-three Africans. 
 They are all listed as " servants," thus receiving the same 
 class name as many white persons enumerated in the lists. 29 
 Some had names, as, for instance, "Angelo, a negro wo 
 man," and " John Pedro, a neger aged 30." Others appar 
 ently had no names, and were designated simply by the word 
 " negro " under the caption " servants." In the opinion of 
 
 "Ballagh, White Servitude, p. 14. 
 
 25 Hening, vol. i, pp. 126, 128. 
 
 26 Ballagh, White Servitude, p. 49. Two hundred and fifty serv 
 ants were brought into Virginia in 1619 (ibid., pp. 18, 30). 
 
 27 Colonial Records of Virginia, p. 37 et seq. 
 
 28 J. C. Hotten, Lists of Emigrants to America, passim. 
 
 28 They were distributed as follows : Abraham Piersey, 7 ; George 
 Yeardley, Kt, 8; Capt William Piercey, i; Richard Kingsmall, i; 
 Edward Bennett, 2; Capt. William Tucker, 3; Capt. Francis West, 
 i. All these persons held other servants beside the negroes, and 
 some of these masters, being officers in the colony, may have had 
 merely the right of an officer over company servants (Hotten, pp. 
 218-258). 
 
24 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 Thomas Jefferson, "the right to these negroes was com 
 mon, or, perhaps, they lived on a footing with the whites, 
 who, as well as themselves, were under the absolute direc 
 tion of the president." 30 
 
 Were any or all of these negroes permitted to realize the 
 freedom to which servants were entitled under the laws and 
 customs of servitude? In the records of the county courts 
 dating from 1632 to 1661 negroes are designated as "ser 
 vants," " negro servants," or simply as " negroes," but never 
 in the records which we have examined were they termed 
 " slaves." 31 By an order of the general court a negro 
 brought from the West Indies to Virginia in 1625 was de 
 clared to "belong to Sir Francis Wyatt (then governor) 
 as his servant." 32 There is nothing in the record which in 
 dicates that " servant " meant the same as " slave." Among 
 the twenty-three African " servants " enumerated in 1624 
 was a negro man named Anthony 33 and a negro woman 
 named Mary, 34 serving under different masters. In the 
 county court records of Northampton, of date February 28, 
 1652, is the following order: 
 
 Upon ye humble petition] of Anth. Johnson Negro; & Mary his 
 wife; & their Information to ye Court that they have been Inhab 
 itants in Virginia above thirty years consideration being taken of 
 their hard labor & honoured service performed by the petitioners 
 in this County, for ye obtayneing of their Livelyhood And ye great 
 Llosse they have sustained by an unfortunate fire wth their present 
 charge to provide for, Be it therefore fitt and ordered that from the 
 day of the date hearof (during their natural lives) the sd Mary 
 Johnson & two daughters of Anthony Johnson Negro be disingaged 
 and freed from payment of Taxes and leavyes in Northampton 
 County for public use. 35 
 
 30 Jefferson s Reports, iign. 
 
 81 Examples or illustrations may be seen in MS. Court Records of 
 Accomac County, 1632-1640, pp. 55, 152 et seq. ; Lower Norfolk 
 County, 1637-1646, 1646-1651. 
 
 32 The case is one which Jefferson noted from the records of the 
 general court (Jefferson s Reports, ugn.)- 
 
 33 Hotten, p. 244. In the second edition the entry referring to 
 Anthony is as follows : " Anthony, negro, Isabell, a negro, and Wil 
 liam her child, baptised." In an earlier edition (1874) the entry 
 appeared as follows : " Antony Negro : Isabell Negro ; and Wil 
 liam theire Child Baptised." 
 
 34 " Mary, a negro Woman [came in] in the Margarett and John, 
 1622" (Hotten, p. 241). 
 35 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 161. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 25 
 
 Subtracting thirty or more years from 1652, the date of 
 this court order, we find that Anthony Johnson and possibly 
 the woman who became his wife were inhabitants of Vir 
 ginia before 1622. 36 If additional evidence is required to 
 establish the fact that Anthony Johnson and his family were 
 free in 1652, it is contained in a land patent of 1651 assign 
 ing to him in fee simple two hundred and fifty acres of 
 land, 37 or in the records of a suit which he maintained in 
 the county court in i655. 38 
 
 Just what part of the period of over thirty years of An 
 thony Johnson s residence in the colony was a term of servi 
 tude or how long before 1652 he had enjoyed his freedom 
 is not clear. The term of service for white servants was 
 not uniform, being dependent upon the conditions of the 
 contract. Before 1643, servants without contracts gener 
 ally became freemen after terms of service varying from 
 two to eight years. After 1643 tne terms of service for 
 servants "brought into the colony without indentures or 
 covenants to testify their agreements " were fixed by law 
 at four to seven years, the period varying somewhat with 
 the youthfulness of the servant. 39 The variations in the 
 terms of service for negro servants appear to have been 
 greater than the variations for white servants. In 1651 
 " head rights " were allowed upon the importation of a 
 negro by the name of Richard Johnson. 40 Only three years 
 later a patent calling for one hundred acres of land was 
 issued to this negro for importing two other persons. 41 
 Hence, it appears that Richard Johnson came in as a free 
 
 36 It is evident from the census of 1624 that the negress Mary, 
 there enumerated, was not then the wife of Anthony; but granting 
 that Anthony and Mary Johnson were in Virginia thirty years be 
 fore 1652, it is not an unreasonable inference that the only negro 
 man named Anthony and the only negro woman named Mary in the 
 colony thirty years before 1652 were the negroes afterward called 
 Anthony and Mary Johnson. 
 
 ST MS. Land Patents of Virginia, 1643-1651, p. 326. 
 
 88 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, P- 226; 
 1655-1658, p. 10 ; below, p. 32. 
 
 39 Hening, vol. i, pp. 257, 441. 
 
 40 MS. Land Patents of Virginia, 1643-1651, p. 326. 
 
 41 Ibid., 1652-1655, p. 294. 
 
26 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 negro or remained in a condition of servitude for not more 
 than three years. A negro who came to Virginia about 
 1665 was bound to serve Mr. George Light for a period of 
 only five years. 42 It appears from certain indentures to be 
 found on record that the term of service to which a negro 
 might be bound could be for almost any number of years. 
 In the following agreement, for example, the term was for 
 ten years : " Be it thought fitt & assented unto by Mr. Steph. 
 Charlton in Court that Jno. G. Hamander Negro, his ser 
 vant, shall from ye date hereof [1648] serve ye sd Mr. 
 Charlton (his heyers or assns.) until ye last days of No 
 vember wh shall be in ye year of our Lord . . . one thou 
 sand six hundred Fifty & eight and then ye sd Negro is to 
 bee a free man." 43 
 
 As another example of the contracts of indented negro 
 servants the following extract from the Northampton County 
 court records of 1645 is quoted: 
 
 This Indenture witnesseth yt I Capt. Francis Pott have taken to 
 service two Daughters of my negro Emanuell Dregis to serve & bee 
 to me my heyers Exors. Adms. or Assigns. The one whose name 
 is Elizabeth is to serve thirteene years whch will be compleat & 
 ended in ye first part of March in ye yeare of our Lord God one 
 thousand six hundred Fifty & eight. . . . And ye other child whose 
 name is Jane Dregis (being about one yeare old) is to serve ye 
 said Capt. Pott as aforesaid untill she arrive to ye age of thirty 
 years old wh will be compleate & ended . . . [May, 1674], And I ye 
 said Francis Pott doe promise to give them sufficient meate, drinke, 
 Apparel & Lodging and to use my best endeavor to bring them up 
 in ye feare of God and in ye knowledge of our Saviour Christ Jesus. 
 And I doe further testify yt the Eldest daughter was given to my 
 negro by one who brought her upp by ye space of eight years and 
 ye younger he bought and paid for to Capt. Robert Shephard (as 
 maye bee made appear). In witness whereof have hereunto sett 
 my hands & scale in ye 27th of May one thousand six hundred forty 
 & five. 
 
 MR. FRANCIS POTT. 
 
 Witness the names of Thorn. P. Powell & John Pott.* 4 
 
 It appears from this record that one of the negro chil 
 dren was bound to serve for a period of thirteen years and 
 the other for a term of twenty-nine years. The latter 
 
 42 General Court Records, Robinson Transcripts, p. 161. 
 
 43 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1645-1651, P- 150. 
 
 44 Ibid., p. 82. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 2/ 
 
 served, however, only seven years of her term ; for in 1652 
 her father purchased her release from the contract, and 
 upon payment was given the following receipt: "24, May 
 1652. This day Capt. Pott acknowledged yt hee hath reed 
 of Emanuell Driggs Negro satisfaction & full payment for 
 & in consideration of the present freedome of Jane Driggs 
 daughter of ye sd Emanuell Driggs, the sd girle beinge aged 
 about eight years." 45 
 
 It is quite clear that the children of Emanuel Dregis or 
 Driggs became indented servants and not slaves for life, 
 but a question arises as to their status before this contract 
 was made. Emanuel Dregis may not have been regularly 
 married to the mother of these two daughters of his, and 
 the owner of their mother seems to have claimed some right 
 to dispose of them by gift and sale to their father. But 
 the status of Emanuel Dregis and his wife Frances is fairly 
 well explained in other records. In 1649 Dregis and his 
 wife Frances and one other negro called Bashasor were 
 assigned by Roger Booker to Stephen Charlton. 46 Two 
 years later the following record was made concerning the 
 property rights of these negroes : 
 
 Whereas Emanuel Driggs and Bashasar Farnando negroes now 
 servants unto Capt. Franc Pott have certain cattle, Hoggs & poultry 
 now in their possession ye wch they have honestly gotten and pur 
 chased in their service formerly under ye sd Capt. Pott & since 
 augmented and increased under the service of Capt. Steph. Charlton 
 now we, sd Pott & Charlton, doe hereby declare yt ye said cattle, 
 hoggs, & poultry (with their increase) are ye proper goods of the 
 above sd Negroes; and yt they may freely dispose of them either 
 in their life tyme or att their death. In witness our hands 3Oth 
 December 1652. 
 
 FRANCIS POTT." 
 
 The fact that these negroes had an absolute right to this 
 property, a right which was not destroyed by the death of 
 the property owner, is convincing that their status was higher 
 than the status of the slave, whose loss of liberty was abso 
 lute. Bills of sale recording the transfer of property to 
 
 45 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 82. 
 
 46 Ibid., p. 28. 
 
 47 Ibid., p. 114. 
 
28 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 these negroes were recorded by the county court, which 
 shows that the negroes were regarded as capable of making 
 and enforcing a contract. 48 It may be of some significance 
 in this connection to note that later in that century there 
 was a Dregis or Driggus family of free negroes living in 
 Northampton County. 49 
 
 An instance very similar to the case of Emanuel Dregis 
 is found in the records of the general court of Virginia for 
 1640-1641. The example is of special importance because 
 there is very little specific information of earlier date con 
 cerning the condition of negroes. An order of the court 
 runs as follows : " It appeareth to the court that John Gea- 
 ween being a negro servant unto William Evans was per 
 mitted by his said master to keep hogs and make the best 
 benefit thereof to himself provided the said Evans might 
 have half the increase which was accordingly returned unto 
 him by the said negro and the other half reserved for his 
 own benefit." 50 Geaween, like Dregis, accumulated prop 
 erty, and purchased from Lieutenant Robert Sheppard his 
 child s freedom ; by order of the court the child was de 
 clared to " be free from the said Evans," its father s master, 
 and "to be and remain at the disposing and education of the 
 said Geaween and the child s god-father," Robert Sheppard. 
 
 The status of negroes like John Geaween, Emanuel 
 Dregis, and Farnando fits precisely the description of servi 
 tude written in 1656 by John Hammond. :< There is no 
 master almost," says Hammond, "but will allow his Ser 
 vant a parcell of clear ground to plant some Tobacco in 
 for himself . . . which in time of shipping he may lay out 
 for commodities, and in Summer sell them again with ad 
 vantage, and get a Sow-Pig or two, which anybody almost 
 
 48 Bill of sale by Francis Pott to Emanuel Dregis of " a black 
 cow and a red calf" (MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 
 1645-1651, p. 83). In 1647 Tony Kongo, a negro, was compelled 
 in court to make good a debt, due Lewis White, amounting to three 
 hundred and eighty-two pounds of tobacco. By the order of the 
 court, he was allowed thirty days to guarantee payment out of "ye 
 next croppe " (ibid., p. 131). 
 
 49 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1689-1698, p. 463. 
 
 60 General Court Records, p. 30. Published in Virginia Magazine 
 of History, vol. xi, p. 281. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 2 9 
 
 will give him and his Master suffer him to keep them with 
 his own . . . and with one year s increase of them may 
 purchase a Cow-Calf or two and by that time he is for 
 himself." 51 
 
 Upon the completion of a term of servitude negro ser 
 vants were sometimes granted a written discharge, as was 
 Francis Pryne in 1656. The court record of the discharge 
 of this man reads as follows : 
 
 I Mrs. Jane Elkonhead . . . have hereunto sett my hand yt ye 
 aforesd Pryne [a negro] shall bee discharged from all hinder- 
 ances of servitude (his child) or any [thing] yt doth belong to ye 
 sd Pryne his estate. 
 
 JANE ELKONHEADE. 62 
 
 The priority of the origin of the free negro class over the 
 origin of the slave class and the continuity of the free negro 
 class will appear as plainly when historical evidence of the 
 beginning of slavery is sought as when examples of negro 
 servitude are looked for. When the court records are ex 
 amined with a view to finding the earliest beginnings of 
 slavery, it appears that between 1640 and 1660 slavery was 
 fast becoming an established fact. In this twenty years the 
 colored population was divided, part being servants and part 
 being slaves, and some who were servants defended them 
 selves with increasing difficulty from the encroachments of 
 slavery. 
 
 In 1640 the general court 53 rendered in a singular case a 
 judgment which is very instructive as to the earliest devel 
 opment of slavery. " Three servants " of Hugh Gwyn, to 
 wit, a Dutchman called Victor, a Scotchman named James 
 Gregory, and John Punch, a negro, having run away from 
 their master, were overtaken in Maryland and brought back 
 to Virginia to stand trial for their misbehavior. The ver 
 dict of the court was " that the said three servants shall 
 
 51 P. Force, Tracts and Other Papers, no. 14, p. 14. Cited as Force 
 Tracts. 
 
 52 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1654-1655, p. 100. 
 
 " The General Court so called because it trys the Causes of 
 the whole Country, is held twice a Year by the Governors and 
 Council as Judges at Jamestown; viz: in the Month of April and 
 October" (Hartwell, Blair, and Chilton, The Present State of Vir 
 ginia, and the College, p. 44). 
 
3O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 receive the punishment of whipping and to have thirty 
 stripes apiece." Thus far there was no discrimination in 
 penalty, but the court went on to order that the Dutchman 
 and the Scotchman should " first serve out their times with 
 their master according to their Indentures and one whole 
 year apiece after the time of their service is expired ... in 
 recompence of his loss sustained by their absence," and that 
 then they should serve the colony for three years. But 
 "the third, being a negro . . . shall serve his said master 
 or his assigns for the time of his natural life." 54 While 
 there is no mention of an indenture or contract in the case 
 of the negro, it must be remembered that not all white ser 
 vants had formal contracts. If John Punch was not merely 
 a servant with a future right to freedom, his punishment 
 was much less severe than that of his white accomplices. 
 If he was such a servant, his penalty was greater than the 
 penalties inflicted upon the white men. The most reason 
 able explanation seems to be that the Dutchman and the 
 Scotchman, being white, were given only four additional 
 years to their terms of indenture, while " the third, being 
 a negro," was reduced from his former condition of servi 
 tude for a limited time to a condition of slavery for life. 55 
 
 54 General Court Records, pp. 9, 10. Printed in Virginia Magazine 
 of History, vol. v, p. 236. 
 
 55 A case which came up for trial before the general court at the 
 July session of 1640, three months later than the case above cited, in 
 dicates that some negroes were being held as slaves as early as 1640. 
 The record reads : " Six servants and a negro of Mr. Reginald s has 
 plotted to run away unto the Dutch plantation." In addition to 
 the fact that the negro is not here called a servant, the nature of the 
 penalties inflicted indicates that the negro was a slave. The " prime 
 agent " in the plot was a white man named Miller. His punishment 
 was to be thirty stripes, burning of the letter R on the cheek, the 
 wearing of shackles on his leg for one year, and seven years service 
 to the colony when his term to his master should expire. The 
 punishments ordered for the other five white men were less severe, 
 but none of them escaped with less than two years additional ser 
 vice. When the court came finally to the negro, he was given a 
 penalty exactly equal to that of the prime agent, except the addition 
 to his time of service. These facts indicate that the negro was a 
 slave " incapable of making satisfaction by addition of time," and 
 that such discriminations as were made because of his race or color 
 were made by inflicting upon him a severer corporal punishment than 
 his white fellow-conspirators received (General Court Records, 
 p. ii. Printed in Virginia Magazine of History, vol. v, p. 236). 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 3! 
 
 Some time before 1644 Thomas Bushrod, assignee of Col 
 onel William Smith, sold a mulatto boy named Manuel " as 
 a slave for-Ever, but in September, 1644, the said servant 
 was by the Assembly adjudged no Slave and but to serve 
 as other Christian servants do and was freed in September, 
 i66"5." 56 By " Christian servants " here is meant covenant 
 or indented servants. This case makes possible the state 
 ment that although some negroes were being treated as 
 slaves, others retained their right to freedom and were not 
 reduced to a state of slavery, not even by the statutes of 
 1661 and 1662 recognizing slavery. Another case in point 
 is that of a negro set free in 1665 by order of the general 
 court, " after serving seven years." 57 A similar ruling of 
 this court in the same year was transcribed by Robinson 
 simply as "a judgment of a negro for his freedom." 58 
 
 Even these cases decided in court favorably to individual 
 servants are no better evidence of the continuity of the free 
 negro class than they are of the encroachments which slavery 
 was making upon the freedom rights of negro servants. It 
 was estimated in 1649 tnat there were in Virginia at that 
 time three hundred Africans. 59 A majority of this number 
 had been imported in the decade immediately preceding this 
 date, and it appears certain that the greater part of the 
 negroes brought in after 1640 were not permitted to realize 
 freedom. Most of them had no indentures or contracts, 
 and the difficulty with which such as had no contracts could 
 have defended any rights that they possessed under the laws 
 and customs may be inferred from the success with which 
 some who had indentures were reduced to perpetual servi 
 tude. 
 
 69 Journal of House of Burgesses, October, 1666, in Randolph MS. 
 in Virginia Historical Society, and printed in Virginia Magazine of 
 History, vol. xvii, p. 232. 
 
 67 General Court Records. Printed in Virginia Magazine of His 
 tory, vol. viii, p. 237. 
 
 58 General Court Records. Printed in Virginia Magazine of His 
 tory, vol. viii, p. 243. 
 
 59 " There are in Virginia about fifteen thousand English, and of 
 negroes brought thither, three hundred good servants " (A Perfect 
 Description of Virginia, printed for Richard Wodenoth, 1649. Re 
 printed in Virginia Historical Register, vol. ii, no. ii, p. 62). 
 
32 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 A very instructive and interesting case in point is that of 
 John Casor, 60 a negro of Northampton County, who came 
 to Virginia about 1640. Strange to relate, John Casor s 
 master was the negro Anthony Johnson, who, as we have 
 seen, came in before 1622, and who owned a large tract of 
 land on the Eastern Shore. According to the records made 
 of the case, John Casor set up the claim in 1653 "Yt hee 
 came unto Virginia for seaven or eight years of Indenture, 
 yt hee had demanded his freedom of Anth. Johnson his 
 Mayster; & further sd yt hee had kept him his serv[an]t 
 seaven years longer than hee should or ought." Casor ap 
 pealed to Captain Samuel Goldsmith to see that he was 
 accorded his rights. Goldsmith demanded of Johnson the 
 servant negro s indenture, and was told by Johnson that the 
 latter had never seen any indenture, and " yt hee had ye 
 Negro for his life." Casor stood firmly by his assertion 
 that when he came in he had an indenture, and Messrs. 
 Robert and George Parker confirmed his declaration, say 
 ing that "they knewe that ye sd Negro had an Indenture 
 in one Mr. [Sandys] hand, on ye other side of ye Baye & 
 ... if the sd Anth. Johnson did not let ye negro go free 
 the said negro Jno. Casor would recover most of his Cows 
 from him ye sd Johnson " in compensation for service ren 
 dered which was not due. Whereupon Anthony Johnson 
 " was in a great f eare," and his " sonne in Law, his wife, & 
 his own two sonnes persuaded the old negro Anth. Johnson 
 to set the sd Jno. Casor free." 
 
 The case would be interesting enough and very instructive 
 if it had ended here, but the sequel is more interesting still. 
 Upon more mature deliberation Anthony Johnson deter 
 mined to make complaint in court 61 "against Mr. Robert 
 Parker that hee detayneth one Jno. Casor a negro the plain 
 tiff s Serv[an]t under pretense yt the sd Jno. Casor is a free- 
 
 60 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 226; 
 1655-1658, p. 10. The spelling of the servant negro s name is not 
 quite clear. As it appears in some places in the records it looks 
 as if it might be Fasor. 
 
 61 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 226; 
 1655-1658, p. 10. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 33 
 
 man." His complaint was received, and the court, " se 
 riously considering & weighing ye premises," rendered the 
 following verdict, than which there are none stranger on 
 record: "The court . . . doe fynd that ye sd Mr. Robert 
 Parker most unrightly keepeth ye sd Negro John Casor 
 from his r[igh]t Mayster Anthony Johnson & ... Be it 
 therefore ye Judgment of ye court & ordered that ye sd Jno. 
 Casor negro shall forthwith return into ye service of his 
 sd Mayster Anthony Johnson and that the sd Mr. Robert 
 Parker make payment of all charges in the suite and ex 
 ecution." 
 
 This record is quoted at length because in itself it sup 
 ports a number of important propositions: (i) Before the 
 middle of the seventeenth century some negroes in the 
 colony were servants by indenture under the laws of servi 
 tude. (2) Some negro servants who had become freemen 
 owned indented negro servants. The act of 1670 forbidding 
 free negroes to own Christian servants but conceding them 
 the right to own servants of their own race 62 is thus given 
 a concrete explanation. (3) By the middle of the century 
 it was with difficulty that an African immigrant escaped 
 being reduced to slavery. If by the aid of a county court 
 one negro could reduce to slavery another who unfortu 
 nately was unable to produce his indenture, this proceeding 
 taking place prior to any statute supporting slavery, it can 
 readily be seen how difficult it had become for negroes to 
 escape being made slaves for life by white masters into 
 whose hands they came. 
 
 It is noteworthy that all the records after the middle 
 of the century indicate that slavery was fast becoming the 
 rule. An entry upon the minutes of the general court in 
 1656 shows that a " Mulatto was held to be a slave and 
 appeal taken." 63 Negro servants were sometimes compelled 
 by threats and browbeating to sign indentures for long terms 
 after they had served out their original terms. In 1675 
 
 M Hening, vol. ii, p. 280. 
 
 83 General Court Records. Printed in Virginia Magazine of His 
 tory, vol. viii, p. 163. 
 
 3 
 
34 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 complaint was made by Philip Cowen, a negro, that Charles 
 Lucas, "not being willing that he should enjoy his freedom, 
 did with threats and a high hand and by confederacy with 
 some other persons " compel him to set his hand to a writ 
 ing which Lucas claimed was an indenture for twenty years, 
 and to acknowledge it in the county court of Warwick. 6 * 
 
 Fifteen years before the passage of the first act in the Vir 
 ginia slave code, white persons were making assignments of 
 negroes as slaves, and county courts were recording and 
 recognizing the validity of contracts involving the service 
 of negroes for life, and, in the case of female negroes, the 
 service of the female and her offspring. In 1646 Francis 
 Pott, preparing to return to England, sold to Stephen Charl- 
 ton a negro woman called Marchant and a negro boy called 
 Will, to be " to ye use of him ... his heyers etc. forever." 65 
 A contract was made and recorded in Northampton County 
 in 1652 according to the terms of which William Whitting- 
 ton "bargained & sold unto Jno. Pott ... his heyers, 
 Exors. Adms. or Assigns one negro girle named Jowan, 
 aged about ten years, with her Issue and produce . . . and 
 their services forever." 66 
 
 64 MS. in Virginia State Archives, at one time on exhibition in a 
 glass case; compare Calendar of Virginia State Papers, vol. i, p. 10. 
 
 The petitioner says that at the expiration of his term of service he 
 was entitled to " enjoy his freedom & be paid three barrels of corn 
 and a suit of clothes." This illustrates the statement of P. A. 
 Bruce that upon the close of the negro servant s term he was 
 entitled to the same quantity of clothing and corn as the white ser 
 vant (Economic History of Virginia, vol. ii, p. 53). The practice 
 is clearly stated in a petition made by a servant to the governor and 
 council in 1660 : " yor petins lately servid Henry Sprat of ye County 
 of Lower Norff. who icfuseth to pay him Corn and Cloths accord 
 ing to custome for wh ye petins obtained order of ye aforesaid 
 Court against ye sd Mr. Sprat & C" (Calendar of Virginia State 
 Papers, vol. i, p. 4. See also Hening, vol. iii, p. 451). 
 
 65 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 28. 
 Six years later the woman was living with Charlton, although dur 
 ing the six years since her sale by Francis Pott she had run away 
 from her new master to go and live with John Pott, and later left 
 his service to return to Charlton. She apparently exercised some 
 liberty in the choice of her master (MS. Court Records of North 
 ampton County, 1651-1654, p. 81). 
 
 66 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 124. 
 See also MS. Records of Lower Norfolk County, 1646-1651, p. 23, 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 35 
 
 Some time before 1660 Jane Rookins and Henry Ran 
 dolph jointly purchased a negro woman called Maria, with 
 the understanding that she and her children should belong 
 to William Rookins and William Randolph and their heirs. 
 William Randolph died, and his father, Henry Randolph, by 
 deed gave to William Rookins all his right and title to the 
 negro woman and her children. A creditor of William 
 Randolph obtained an order against the estate of the de 
 ceased, and the Surry County court adjudged one half of 
 the negroes, the negroes being Maria and her children, to 
 belong to the estate of William Randolph. 67 
 
 If further evidence is required to show that some negroes 
 were regarded and held as slaves between 1640 and the date 
 of the statutory sanction of slavery, it may be found in 
 inventories of estates of some persons who held negroes. 
 From the records of various counties it appears that negroes 
 for whose service no limit is mentioned are valued in in 
 ventories at 20 to 30 sterling, while white servants of the 
 longest terms of service receive a valuation of not more 
 than 15 sterling. 68 In the journal of the House of Bur 
 gesses is recorded a petition of William Whittaker, an ex- 
 member of the House, that he might be reimbursed from 
 the public treasury for a loss incurred by an act of the 
 House which set free a negro for whom the petitioner had 
 
 for the deposition of Cornelius Loyd concerning " a little black 
 negro boy" and his mother. The boy was given as a present to 
 Thomas Silsey. See also Records of Northampton County, 1654- 
 1655, April, 1654, for record of sale " unto Henry Armsteadinger 
 one negro girle named patience to him . . . awid his heyers . . . for 
 ever with all her increase both male and female." 
 
 67 Petitions to the Governor and Council, in Virginia State Ar 
 chives ; also printed in Calendar of Virginia State Papers, vol. i, 
 PP- 2, 3. 
 
 68 MS. Court Records of York County, 1657-1662, p. 195, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. In 1668 two servants, one having four and a 
 half and the other three years to serve, were valued at 12 each, but 
 a negro woman whose term was not specified was valued at 27 
 (ibid., 1664-1672, p. 291, in Virginia State Library). In an inven 
 tory of the latter part of the century an Indian woman was valued 
 as follows: " I Indian Woman, if a slave for life 25" (MS. Court 
 Records of Elizabeth City County, 1684-1699, p. 223, in Virginia 
 State Library). Compare P. A. Bruce, Economic History, vol. ii, 
 PP- 51, 52. 
 
36 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 paid 25 sterling, but from whom he had had only twenty- 
 one years of service. Hence it would seem that 25 was 
 regarded as a price too high for servants except those whose 
 terms were for life. 
 
 In the inventory of the estate of William Burdett, re 
 corded in 1643, Nehemia Freenton, aged twenty-two years, 
 having eight years to serve, was rated at a thousand pounds 
 of tobacco, while " Caine the negro boy, very Obedient/ 
 was rated at three thousand pounds of tobacco. Edward 
 Southers, "a. little Boy having seaven years to serve," was 
 valued at seven hundred pounds of tobacco, while " one 
 negro girle about 8 years old " was put down at two thou 
 sand pounds. 69 The inventory of Major Peter Walker s es 
 tate, recorded in 1655, shows that two good men servants 
 having four years to serve were worth thirteen hundred 
 pounds of tobacco each, and that a woman servant having 
 two years to serve was worth eight hundred pounds of to 
 bacco. Two negro boys with no term limit specified were 
 rated at forty-one hundred pounds of tobacco each, and a 
 negro girl was rated at fifty-five hundred pounds. 70 The 
 valuation put upon the servants of Thomas Ludlowe of 
 York County in 1660 reveals the fact that a white boy, a 
 "seasoned hand," with six years to serve, was worth less 
 than an old negro man and just half as much as Jugg, a 
 negro woman. 71 The only reasonable explanation of the 
 wide difference in the valuation of white servants having 
 long terms of service and negroes whose terms of service 
 were not specified is that the negroes were servants to whose 
 service no limit was set, that is, slaves. 
 
 Thus it appears that before legislation affected in any way 
 the development of slavery the institution had grown up, 
 and without doubt included within its scope a large part of 
 the African immigrants who arrived after 1640. Be it re 
 membered, however, that the legislative recognition and 
 
 09 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1640-1645, p. 225. 
 70 Ibid., 1654-1655, p. no. 
 
 T1 MS. Court Records of York County, 1657-1662, pp. 275, 278, 
 in Virginia State Library. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 37 
 
 sanction so abundantly given to slavery between 1660 and 
 1670 did not broaden the institution to include all Africans. 
 The first slave laws reduced to a status of slavery no free 
 negroes or negroes who were servants by covenant or con 
 tract. On the contrary, these first laws dealing with the 
 status of the Africans in Virginia recognized the free negro 
 as amply as they did the slave. The first one of these acts, 
 passed in 1662, provided that the status of offspring should 
 follow the status of the mother. 72 Far from reducing free 
 negroes to slavery, this act provided for the perpetuation 
 of the free negro population in the provision which, as ap 
 plied to this class of persons, guaranteed to free colored 
 females the right to extend their free status to their off 
 spring. The act of 1668 dealing with the condition of the 
 colored population related solely to the tax obligations of a 
 free negro woman, 73 and two years later an act guaranteed 
 to "negroes manumitted or otherwise free" the right to 
 own servants of their own race, and expressly denied to 
 them the right to purchase or to own white or " Christian " 
 servants. 74 Here again we see in the first laws which rec 
 ognized and sanctioned slavery a guaranty of the continuity 
 of the free negro class. 
 
 Proof of the persistence of a free negro population, how 
 ever, is not confined to inference from statutes. The county 
 court and church records continue without a break the 
 record of the free and servant negro through the period 
 when slavery was given the legislative sanction. In Decem 
 ber, 1656, Benjamin Doyle, a negro, was granted a patent 
 for three hundred acres of land in Surry County, " due 
 ... by and for the transportation of six persons into the 
 colony." 75 In addition to the free negro landowners of 
 Accomac County already mentioned, the records specify a 
 few others. In 1651 John Johnson, a negro, received as 
 head rights for the importation of eleven persons a tract of 
 
 73 Hening, vol. ii, p. 170. 
 X " Ibid., vol. ii, p. 267. 
 
 74 Ibid., vol. ii, p. 280. 
 
 75 MS. Land Patents, 1655-1664, pp. 71, 72. 
 
38 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 five hundred and fifty acres adjoining the tract granted to 
 Richard Johnson. 78 There is also a record of a grant in 
 1651 of fifty acres to John Johnson, sr. 77 A few years later 
 John Johnson, a negro, entered suit against John Johnson, sr., 
 to recover four hundred and fifty acres of land. 78 Certainly 
 this land owned by free negroes remained, for many years 
 at least, in their possession or in the possession of their de 
 scendants. 79 In 1667 Emanuel Cambew, a negro, received 
 a grant of fifty acres in James City County. 80 The next 
 year a deed calling for fifty acres was executed by Robert 
 Jones, a tailor of Queen s Creek, to " John Harris negro his 
 heyers, Executrs, Admtrs, & Assigns forever." 81 Some 
 time after 1676 a lease of two hundred acres for a period 
 of ninety-nine years was issued by John Parker to Philip 
 Morgan, a negro. 82 In one instance at least a negro ser 
 vant became the overseer of his master s servants. Beverly 
 defines an overseer as " a man who having served his time 
 has acquired Skill and Character of an experienced Planter 
 and is, therefore, intrusted with the Direction of the Ser 
 vants and Slaves." 83 In 1669 Hannah Warwick, probably 
 a white servant, on trial before the general court, produced 
 in extenuation of her case convincing evidence that her 
 overseer was a negro. 84 In 1673 a judgment was rendered 
 by the general court against Mr. George Light, who had 
 unlawfully detained in servitude beyond his contract term 
 of five years a negro indented servant. It was ordered that 
 
 78 MS. Land Patents, 1652-1655, p. 101. 
 
 7T MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, pp. 
 17, 18. 
 
 78 Ibid., p. 200. 
 
 79 J. C. Wise, Ye Kingdome of Accawmacke, p. 285. 
 
 80 MS. Land Patents, no. 6, p. 39. 
 
 81 MS. Court Records of York County, 1664-1672, p. 327, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
 82 MS. Court Records of Accomac County, 1676-1690, p. 185, 
 quoted in P. A. Bruce, Economic History, vol. ii, p. 127 n. See MS. 
 Records of Northampton County, 1683-1689, p. 258, for a judgment 
 against the estate of a mulatto. 
 
 83 Book iv, p. 37; compare P. A. Bruce, Economic History, vol. ii, 
 p. 18. 
 
 84 General Court Records. Printed in Virginia Magazine of His 
 tory, vol. viii, p. 163. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 39 
 
 the negro should " be free from his said master and that the 
 said Mr. Light pay him Corne and Clothes according to the 
 Custome of the Country and four hundred pounds tobac & 
 Caske for his service Done him since he was free and pay 
 costs." 85 
 
 The upper limit of the period in which it was possible for 
 negroes to come to Virginia as servants and to acquire free 
 dom after a limited term is the year 1682. A law of 1670 
 was intended to enslave all negroes brought in after its 
 enactment, but in practice it permitted a few to escape. 
 In 1678 two men of African blood were sold for terms of 
 seven years by inhabitants of Boston to residents of Vir 
 ginia. 86 Under the provisions of the law of 1670 "all ser 
 vants not being Christians imported into this colony by ship 
 ping" were to be slaves for their lives, but such servants 
 as came by land were to "serve, if boys and girls until 
 thirty years of age, if men or women, twelve years and no 
 longer." 87 After this act had been in force twelve years, 
 the preamble of a new act asserted that "many negroes, 
 Moors, mulattoes and others " born in a heathen country 
 and of heathen parents had, before coming to Virginia, been 
 converted to the Christian faith, and that such persons, 
 when sold in Virginia, had to be sold as servants for a lim 
 ited term. Hence an act was passed repealing the law of 
 1670 and making slaves of all persons of non-Christian 
 nationalities thereafter coming into the colony, whether 
 they came by sea or land and whether or not they had been 
 converted to Christianity after capture. 88 
 
 After the enactment of this law the free negro population 
 
 S5 General Court Records, p. 161. 
 
 89 Bill of Sale: "I, John Indicott, cooper, Inhabitant of Boston 
 in New England, have sold unto Richard Medlicott A Spanish 
 Mulatto, by name Antonio. I having full power to sell him for his 
 life time. But at the request of William Taylor, I doe sell him 
 But for seven years from the day that he shall Disembark in Vir 
 ginia " (MS. Court Records of Middlesex County, Virginia, March 
 5, 1677-1678. See also ibid., May 18, 1678. Cited in William and 
 Mary College Quarterly, vol. vi, p. 117). 
 
 T Hening, vol. ii, p. 283. 
 
 88 Ibid., vol. ii, pp. 490, 491. 
 
4O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 in Virginia received from imported negroes no more re 
 cruits of which we have any record until after the non 
 importation act of I778. 89 By 1662 other means of growth 
 had been opened up to this class. For the next two hun 
 dred years the free colored population was increased by five 
 classes of colored persons springing from the population 
 already existing. The classes may be enumerated as 
 follows : 
 
 (1) Children born of free colored parents. The rule of 
 partus sequitur ventrem was applied consistently from 1662 
 to 1865, and natural increase or procreation was throughout 
 this period an important factor in the growth of the free 
 negro population. 
 
 (2) Mulatto children born of free colored mothers. 
 
 (3) Mulatto children born of white servant or free 
 women. 
 
 The most numerous class of the mulattoes was of slave- 
 women parentage, but such children were slaves. Both 
 classes of free mulattoes were the product of illegitimacy, 
 since the laws prohibited the intermarriage of whites and 
 negroes, bond or free. 90 Under the provisions of the law 
 of 1691 free mulatto bastards were bound by the church 
 wardens as apprentices to responsible white persons for 
 a term ending upon their attaining the age of thirty years. 91 
 In the revision of this act in 1705 one year was added to 
 the period of apprenticeship. 92 By 1774 this long-term 
 apprenticeship had come to be regarded as bearing "an 
 unreasonable severity toward such children," and it was 
 shortened to twenty-one years for males and eighteen years 
 for females. 93 After the disestablishment of the Anglican 
 
 89 The last clause of the act of this date for preventing the further 
 importation of slaves into Virginia declared: "That every slave 
 imported into this commonwealth, contrary to the true intent and 
 meaning of this act, shall upon importation become free" (Hening, 
 vol. ix, p. 471; vol. xii, p. 182). Under the operation of this pro 
 vision a few negroes occasionally recovered their freedom (5 Call, 
 425; MS. Petitions, A 2880, A 2882). 
 
 80 Hening, vol. iii, p. 87. 
 
 91 Ibid. 
 
 92 Ibid., vol. iii, p. 453- 
 
 93 Ibid., vol. viii, pp. 134, 135- 
 
ORIGIN OF THE FREE NEGRO CLASS 4! 
 
 church in 1785 this class of persons were bound out by the 
 overseers of the poor as they had been previously by the 
 church wardens. 94 
 
 (4) Children of free negro and Indian mixed parentage. 
 If such children had no visible means of support, they were 
 bound out as apprentices, just as were free mulatto children. 
 The offspring of all colored apprentices born during the 
 apprenticeship became, by the mere force of the law, ap 
 prentices to the masters of their mothers on terms similar 
 to those under which the mothers were bound. 95 All col 
 ored apprentices were counted with the free colored popu 
 lation even during their apprenticeship. 
 
 (5) Manumitted slaves. Manumission was the most im 
 portant of all the methods by which the free colored popula 
 tion was increased in numbers. In an act of 1670 occurred 
 the words " negroes manumitted and otherwise free." Hav 
 ing considered in this chapter the "otherwise free," the 
 following chapter will be devoted to those who were 
 manumitted. 
 
 M Hening, vol. xii, pp. 27, 28. 
 
 95 Gwinn v. Bugg, Jefferson s Reports, 87 (1769); Howell v. 
 Netherland, Jefferson s Reports, 90 (1770). 
 
CHAPTER III 
 MANUMISSION 
 
 Manumission is the term which may be applied to all the 
 various processes by which negroes in Virginia were taken 
 from a condition of slavery and legally raised to a status 
 of freedom, saving only that act of the nation by which 
 slavery was abolished in all the States and to which is prop 
 erly applied the term emancipation. 1 There are three gen 
 eral methods by which slaves in Virginia were manumitted 
 or legally set free during the life of the institution of slav 
 ery: (i) by an act of the legislature, (2) by last will and 
 testament, and (3) by deed. A still more general classifica 
 tion recognizes only two kinds of manumission public and 
 private, the first of the three methods above being classed 
 as public manumission and the last two of the three bearing 
 the name of private manumission. 
 
 According to strict legal theory and the conception of 
 slavery maintained by the courts in Virginia in the nine 
 teenth century, there were no private manumissions. A so- 
 called private manumission, that is, a manumission by will 
 or deed, was not in fact the act of the slave-owner, but was 
 " the conjoint act of the law and the master." 2 " The ques 
 tion of emancipation," said the Virginia supreme court of 
 appeals in 1830, " is a question of statutory law and can only 
 be resolved by referring to the terms of the statute." 3 In 
 theory, a master who freed a slave exercised a power dele- 
 
 1 Emancipation in Virginia came as a result of the Civil War, 
 and was an accomplished fact at its close in the spring of 1865. 
 Emancipation was formally accepted by the General Assembly in 
 a joint resolution of February 6, 1866 (Acts of the General Assem 
 bly of Virginia, 1865-1866, p. 449, cited as Acts; Richmond Whig, 
 August n, 1865; J. P. McConnell, Negroes and their Treatment in 
 Virginia from 1865 to 1867, P- I] 0- 
 
 2 Wood v. Humphreys, 12 Grattan, 333 (1855). 
 
 3 Thrift v. Hannah, 2 Leigh, 319. 
 
 42 
 
MANUMISSION 43 
 
 gated to him by statute. To regulate or determine the status 
 of individuals was a sovereign power. By manumission, 
 individuals who were " in truth civiliter mortuus"* and who 
 had the character of property rather than of persons were 
 raised to life and personality within the State and accorded 
 civil rights and civil liberty. The power to do this was of 
 such a high and sovereign character that not even the legis 
 lature could exercise it except by delegation from the con 
 stituent legislative authority. Indeed, a practical applica 
 tion was made of the theory in 1849, when the constitutional 
 convention expressly denied to the General Assembly the 
 power to manumit a slave. 5 
 
 Viewing slavery as a legal status imposed upon persons 
 by the laws, it is not surprising that the colonial legislature, 
 which enacted the first slave laws and freely imposed the 
 slave status upon certain persons, should assume that it had 
 the power to set slaves free. The first use in Virginia of 
 the legislative power to break the bonds of a slave was made 
 in 1710. A negro slave named Will had been " signally 
 serviceable in discovering a conspiracy of divers Negroes 
 for levying war in this colony," and in recognition and re 
 ward of this public service an act was passed conferring 
 freedom upon him. 6 However, it was never the policy of 
 the colonial legislature to exercise its power to manumit 
 slaves except for some such special service or merit as that 
 for which the slave Will received his freedom. In 1723 it 
 delegated to the governor and the council the power to pass 
 upon the merit of any claims to freedom based upon meri 
 torious service performed by a slave. 7 But upon an occa 
 sion which arose out of circumstances connected with the 
 Revolutionary War the legislature deemed it expedient to 
 resume the exercise of its right to pass a private act of 
 
 * Peter v. Hargrave, 5 Grattan, 12. 
 
 5 Constitution of Virginia, 1851, sections 19, 20, 21; Journal, Acts, 
 and Proceedings of a General Convention, 1850, appendix, p. 8. 
 
 " The said Negro Will is and shall be forever hereafter free from 
 his slavery . . . and shall enjoy and have all the liberties, privileges, 
 and immunities of or to a free negro belonging" (Hening, vol. iii, 
 P- 536). 
 
 7 Hening, vol. iv, p. 132. 
 
44 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 manumission. The circumstances were that while Lord 
 Dunmore, the royal governor, who had deserted his office 
 and fled the province, was absent from the seat of govern 
 ment, application was made for permission to manumit the 
 slaves of John Barr, of Northumberland County, who had 
 in his will expressed the desire that they should be free. In 
 the absence of His Excellency the consent of the governor 
 and the council obviously could not be obtained. Fortu 
 nately for the petitioners, the Assembly considered that the 
 peculiar circumstances justified a special legislative dispen 
 sation. An act was passed confirming Barr s will, but spec 
 ifying that the act should establish no precedent except in 
 cases exactly similar. 8 
 
 The act did, however, become a precedent in one respect, 
 namely, as to the location of the power to pass upon appli 
 cations for permission to manumit slaves. The Assembly 
 continued to perform the function, previously exercised by 
 the council, of receiving and passing upon the merit of ap 
 plications. " Application having been made" in 1779, a 
 special act of the legislature was passed manumitting three 
 slaves, John Hope, a mulatto named William Beck, and 
 Pegg. 9 Upon similar application made in 1780 the legisla 
 ture set free Ned, the property of Henry Delony, and Kate, 
 who belonged to Benjamin Bilberry. 10 
 
 As indicative of the policy of the legislature with refer 
 ence to the use of this power of freeing persons from slav 
 ery, as well as in illustration of the form of such acts, we 
 quote from the laws the following specimen of acts of 
 manumission : 
 
 An act for the manumission of a certain Slave. 
 
 WHEREAS a negro man slave named Kitt the property of Hinchia 
 Mabry, of the County of Brunswick, hath lately rendered meritori 
 ous service in this commonwealth, in making the first information 
 and discovery against several persons concerned in counterfeiting 
 money, whereby so dangerous a confederacy has been in some meas 
 ure broken, and some of the offenders have been discovered and 
 
 8 Hening, vol. ix, p. 320. 
 
 9 Ibid., vol. x, p. 211. 
 
 10 Ibid., vol. x, p. 372. 
 
MANUMISSION 45 
 
 brought to trial; and it is judged expedient to manumit him for 
 such service; Be it therefore enacted by the General Assembly, That 
 the said Kitt be, and is hereby declared to be emancipated and set 
 free ; any law or usage to the contrary notwithstanding." 
 
 From the Revolutionary War onward a more extensive 
 and general use was made of this form of manumission than 
 merely to reward acts of public service. The legislature be 
 came a sort of court of equity for granting relief to masters 
 who were confronted with legal or other difficulties in free 
 ing their slaves as well as for extending mercy to slaves of 
 a deserving or piteous character. 12 In more than one in 
 stance special legislative acts were obtained to give legal 
 validity to wills of manumission recorded before the act of 
 1782 authorizing this procedure. 13 Hundreds of colored 
 petitioners sought special acts that they might not be de 
 prived of freedom because of mistake or oversight or fraud 
 in the execution of a will or of an expressed intention of a 
 master to set them free. 1 * Among the acts of a private 
 nature passed in the period of the Commonwealth down to 
 about 1825 are to be found a large number of acts setting 
 slaves free or granting such as were already liberated a 
 legal right to reside in the State. 15 
 
 The method of manumission by an act of the legislature 
 is not the method the genesis of which requires the more 
 detailed explanation. The colonial House of Burgesses, the 
 sovereign legislative body in Virginia, inferred from its 
 right to make, its right to unmake, a slave. But what was 
 
 "Hening, vol. x, p. 115 (1779). It was further enacted that the 
 treasurer of the Commonwealth " pay to Hinchia Mabry . . . the 
 sum of one thousand pounds [of tobacco] out of the publick treas 
 ury, as a full compensation for the said slave." In all cases where 
 the special act of manumission was in reward of a public service, 
 provision was made for compensating the owner of the slave for his 
 loss. Cf. Hening, vol. iii, p. 619; vol. xi, p. 309. 
 
 13 See, for example, an act of 1792 manumitting Rosetta Hailstock 
 and her three children, who had been barred from freedom by a 
 legal technicality (Hening, vol. viii, p. 618). See also ibid., vol. xi, 
 P- 363. 
 
 * Hening, vol. xii, pp. 611-613; vol. xiii, p. 619. 
 
 " For example, see MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1818, A 9290. 
 
 "Acts of a private character, 1811-1812, p. 131; 1813-1814, p. 153; 
 1814-1815, p. 151. The private acts of almost any year within the 
 above-named period will afford examples. 
 
46 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 the origin of the right of an individual slave-owner to be 
 stow civil rights and civil liberties upon a slave, which in 
 the eyes of the law was a thing? Manumission by a will 
 or a deed cannot be regarded as merely a transfer of the 
 property rights in the slave from the master to the slave, 
 because in the eyes of the law there existed " no right in the 
 slave to acquire property." 16 " Manumission," said Judge 
 Tucker, " is not strictly speaking a gift of property. It is 
 the exoneration of a human being from the bonds which 
 our institutions have fastened upon him." 17 
 
 Now, the first law which could be construed as delegating 
 to or conferring upon slave-owners any right to make free 
 men of their slaves was enacted in 1691, 18 but it appears 
 from the records of the county courts that manumissions 
 had been taking place several decades before this act was 
 passed. In fact, the act itself, which was a rigid restriction 
 upon the right of private manumission, shows that the act 
 did not originate the right. The first wills of manumission 
 in the colony were made and recorded not only prior to the 
 statute of 1691, but also in advance of any statute in regard 
 to slavery. To reconcile these facts with the nineteenth 
 century theory of manumission, Judge Brooks, speaking 
 for the court in Thrift v. Hannah, said, "Although it had 
 been the practice of owners of slaves to emancipate their 
 slaves before the act of 1691, that practice gave no perfect 
 right to owners, of their own will to emancipate their 
 slaves." 19 
 
 The origin of that practice has its explanation in the close 
 relations of indented servitude and slavery in the seven 
 teenth century. Before slavery as an institution had fully 
 diverged from indented servitude it borrowed from that 
 system the practice of manumission by individual masters. 
 Under the system of indented servitude the time or term 
 of service for which a servant was bound was, though the 
 
 19 Ruddle s Executors v. Ben, 10 Leigh, 480 (1839). 
 "Parks v. Hewlett, 9 Leigh, 511 (1838). 
 
 18 Hening, vol. iii, p. 87. 
 
 19 2 Leigh, 319. See also argument of council in Phoebe et al. v. 
 Boggess, i Grattan, 129 (1844). 
 
MANUMISSION 47 
 
 servant himself was not, regarded as property. The unex- 
 pired time of a servant could be alienated, like other prop 
 erty, by gift, sale, or bequest. 20 The servant, unlike the 
 slave of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, was capa 
 ble of contracting and of holding property. If the master 
 of a servant chose to sell or make a gift of the servant s 
 unexpired time to the servant himself, the servant was 
 capable of receiving the same and would thereafter owe 
 service to no man. For example, the will of Samuel 
 Thacker, of Essex County, contained this item : " I give 
 unto my servant, John Glary, one year of his time." 21 It 
 has been noted in the chapter on negro servitude that evi 
 dence of the discharge of a negro servant was sometimes 
 recorded in a written instrument. Now, in the seventeenth 
 century the processes by which masters set negroes free, 
 whether they were servants for a time or for life, were more 
 like discharges from servitude than manumissions from 
 slavery. 
 
 In 1655 Richard Vaughan, of Northampton County, had 
 recorded by the county court the following declaration re 
 specting one of his negroes : " These testify that Mr. Rich 
 Vaughan doe hereby acquitt & discharge one negro Boye 
 known by the name of James from all Claymes or Demands 
 of service for myself, heyers, Exors., Adms. provided the 
 negro do not covenant with any person but shall keepe him- 
 selfe free." 22 
 
 Two years later Anne Barnhouse, of York County, exe 
 cuted an instrument of writing which in form was quite 
 similar to the deeds of manumission of the eighteenth and 
 nineteenth centuries. It reads as follows : " Mihill Gowen 
 
 20 As an example of the transfer of the time of servants by be 
 quest, note the following will, of date 1657 : " I Francis Jones Wid- 
 dow of ye county of York Doe freely give unto my Loving Sonne 
 Francis Townshend these servants and cattle . . . Five Servants & 
 one child their names John Reeves, John Keech, Richard Poutry, 
 John Swillinante & one negro woman named sarah and his child 
 Francis two years old" (MS. Court Records of York County, 
 1657-1662, p. 88. Compare Ballagh, White Servitude, pp. 43, 44). 
 
 a Essex County Records, 1713, abstracts printed in Virginia Mag 
 azine of History, vol. xviii, p. 329. 
 
 22 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1655-1658, p. 3. 
 
48 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 negro late servant of my brother Xopher Stafford Deced^ 
 . . . had his Freedome given him by his last will & Testa 
 ment 1654 after expiration of four years service unto 
 my Uncle Robert Stafford therefore know that I absolutely 
 quitt & discharge the said Mihill Gowen from any service 
 and forever set him free." 23 
 
 In a similar writing of the same date Anne Barnhouse 
 assigned as a gift to Mihill Gowen a child of his, born of a 
 negro woman belonging to Anne Barnhouse during Gowen s 
 four-year term of service. The writing binds Anne Barn- 
 house "never to trouble or molest the said Mihill Gowen 
 or his said son William or demand any service of Mihill or 
 his son." 24 Even if the negroes discharged by these legal 
 instruments were slaves prior to their discharge, it is per 
 fectly clear that the conception which their owners had of 
 slavery was not such as prevailed at a later time. A slave, 
 in the seventeenth century conception, was merely a person 
 serving for life. If such slave, who was then regarded as 
 a person and not as a thing (as he later came to be), were 
 discharged and given a pledge by his master that no further 
 service would be demanded, he went as a free man, just as 
 did a servant freed at the expiration of a period of contract 
 servitude. In the nineteenth century the gift or assignment 
 of a slave child to its free father, as in the case of the gift 
 by Anne Barnhouse of the child William to its father, would 
 have rendered the child a slave to its father ; but in the sev 
 enteenth century the result of such a process was the com 
 plete freedom of the child. 
 
 Not only in such of these early writings as took the form 
 of deeds of manumission, but also in the earliest recorded 
 wills bequeathing freedom we see the analogy between man 
 umission as first practiced and the discharge from servitude 
 of indented servants. As was shown in a former chapter, 
 it was the custom and later the law of indented servitude 
 that the servant, white or colored, receive from his master 
 
 23 MS. Court Records of York County, 1657-1662, p. 45, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
 24 Ibid. 
 
MANUMISSION 49 
 
 at the time of his discharge from servitude a certain amount 
 of property called " freedom dues." 25 Nearly all of the 
 seventeenth century wills of manumission contained grants 
 of property to the liberated negroes. The earliest of which 
 we have any record is that of Richard Vaughan, written in 
 1645 and recorded in 1656, making bequests of a consider 
 able amount of property to each negro set free. 26 In 1657 
 Nicholas Martin, of York County, left a will setting free 
 two negroes, and providing that "each of them have . . . 
 one Cow and Three Barrells of Corne Clothes & Nayles to 
 build them a house." 27 Thomas Whitehead of the same 
 county died about 1660, leaving a will which shows that the 
 testator believed that he was merely releasing his negro 
 from further obligations of service or simply shortening a 
 servant s term. The item of the will giving to the negro the 
 right which the testator had had to his service reads : " I 
 sett my negro free ... he shall be his own man from any 
 person or persons whatsoever." 
 
 This negro was considered by his master as having the 
 
 26 See above, p. 34 n. 
 
 " The last will and testament of Mr. Richard Vaughan planter 
 in Ocohamocke, in Accomacke. . . . 
 
 "And for my old Negro woman (after my decease) to remayne 
 with her Dame, till her Dames decease; and then bee free; and to 
 receive twoe Cowes wth calfe (or calves by their side) two suits 
 of clothes, a bedd & a Rugge, a chest & a pott with foure Barrells 
 of Corne & a younge breedinge Sowe; Likewise my Negro girle 
 Temperance (after my decease) to bee possessed of two Cowes and 
 to have their increase male and female ; and she to remayne with 
 her Dame ... to be brought up in the Fear of God & to be taught 
 to read & make her owne clothes, and after her Dames decease 
 [and when] she come to twenty yeares of age ... to receive two 
 cows with calves (or calves by their side) Two good suits of clothes, 
 a good Bedd & Bowlster & a Rugg & two Blanketts & a pott and 
 one great Brass Kettle with Four Barrells of corne & a younge 
 breeding sowe." 
 
 The rest of the negroes, three in number, were provided for in 
 a similar way, and then there was appended the clause " that ye 
 three Negro girls be possessed of the plantacon of Jno Walthome 
 beinge to this plantacon some hundred & forty & four acres of land; 
 and he to build them a Home twenty-five feete in length and 
 twenty feete broad, with one chimney" (MS. Court Records of 
 Northampton County, 1654-1655, pp. 102, 103). 
 
 27 MS. Court Records of York County, 1633-1694, p. 108, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
5O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1661-1865 
 
 capacity to receive the property rights in the negro s time 
 and also certain of the master s personal effects ; for other 
 items of the will provided as follows : " I give my negro 
 man named John all my wearing clothes, my shirts & hatts 
 & shoes and stockings and all that I used to weare. I give 
 unto my negro named John Two Cows One called gentle 
 and the other a black heifer & I give him house & ground 
 to plant upon as much as he shall tend himselfe & peaceably 
 to enjoy it his life time without trouble." A short time 
 after this will was recorded the county court of York de 
 cided that the instrument had the effect of making the negro 
 a free man, and that he was legally entitled to come into 
 possession of the property bequeathed to him by his master. 28 
 All the instances of manumissions by individual masters 
 above cited occurred before the institution of slavery had 
 reached the legislative phase of its development. The first 
 slavery legislation, in 1662, in no way interrupted the prac 
 tice of manumission. Whether the frequency of private 
 manumissions in the seventeenth century was a result more 
 of a strong body of sentiment favorable to freedom than 
 of an imperfect, immature development of the system of 
 slavery is a question that may not be answered with cer 
 tainty. Probably the freedom of some negroes was due to 
 the one and the freedom of others due to the other of these 
 conditions, but the evidence points clearly to the fact that 
 up to 1691 the class of " negroes manumitted " was becom 
 ing noticeably larger. The tax obligations of this class 
 formed a subject of legislation in i67O. 29 In 1684 John 
 Farrar, of Henrico County, wrote in his will the following 
 item : " I give unto my negroe Jack his freedom after Christ 
 mas day next & in ye meantime he continue on my plantation 
 & use his endeavors with the rest of my hands to make a 
 Cropp." 30 Daniell Parke, of York County, in 1687, " con 
 sidering the time and ffaithful Service" of one of his ne- 
 
 28 MS. Court Records of York County, 1657-1662, p. 217, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
 29 Hening, vol. ii, p. 280. 
 
 30 MS. Court Records of Henrico County, 1677-1692, p. 299, in 
 Virginia State Library. 
 
MANUMISSION 5 1 
 
 groes, willed that he should be free at the time of the tes 
 tator s death, and should have an annual allowance of 
 provisions. 31 The will of Nathaniel Bacon, sr., in 1691, 
 bequeathed to " Molatto Kate her freedome, Itt being 
 formerly promised by my deceased wife." 32 The will of 
 John Carter, proved in Lancaster, June n, 1690, gave free 
 dom to " several negroes." 33 
 
 By the year 1690 the free negro class had become an object 
 of suspicion and fear. The increasing frequency of manu 
 missions created apprehensions as to the consequences of 
 allowing the practice to continue, and restrictive legislation 
 was deemed expedient. The preamble of the restrictive act, 
 which was passed in 1691, declared a law to be necessary 
 to prevent manumissions, because " great inconvenience may 
 happen to this country by setting of negroes and mulattoes 
 free by their either entertaining negro slaves or receiving 
 stolen goods or being grown old bringing a charge upon the 
 country. 34 Under the provisions of this act no negro or 
 mulatto was to be set free unless the person so doing should 
 pay the charges for transporting the manumitted negro be 
 yond the limits of the colony. Thus was devised a scheme 
 which would offer three obstacles to the increase of the free 
 negro class: A charge of transportation would restrain the 
 master; the prospect of banishment would restrain the de 
 sire of the slave to be free. Should both of these restraints 
 fail in any case, removal would prevent addition to the free 
 colored class. 35 
 
 31 The will bound the executors to " allow unto the said negro 
 fifteene Bushells of Clean shilled Corne and fifty pounds of dryed 
 beif to be delivered him annually as long as hee shall live. Also 
 one Kersey Coat and Britches, two pair of yarne stockings two 
 white or blew shirts one pair of blew drawers an Axe a Hoe and to 
 pay his leavies " (MS. Court Records of York County, 1687-1691, 
 p. 278, in Virginia State Library). 
 
 32 MS. Court Records of York County, 1690-1694, p. 154, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
 33 Virginia Magazine of History, vol. xi, p. 237. 
 M Hening, vol. iii, p. 87. 
 
 85 Under the provisions of this law Richard Trother, of York 
 County, near the close of the century made his will which reads : 
 " I will that old negro Peter and negro Tom have their true and 
 
52 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 The conduct of the legislature in 1710 in manumitting by 
 special act a negro slave might appear to be inconsistent 
 with the restrictive policy begun in 1691, unless the legis 
 lative purpose in both instances be kept in view. The 
 policy of the colonial legislature, begun in 1710, of reward 
 ing with freedom any acts of special merit in slaves was no 
 indication of the growth of freedom sentiment. Its real 
 intent was a more perfect disciplining of negroes in slavery. 
 Freedom in the case of the negro Will was awarded as an 
 example to discourage in slaves that which most free ne 
 groes were suspected of encouraging, namely, insubordina 
 tion and any disposition to plot mischief. Danger from con 
 spiring and plotting negroes was the common object at 
 which both laws were designed to strike. 
 
 Notwithstanding the effort made to prevent servile insur 
 rection, new conspiracies were discovered within the next 
 dozen years, and the fears of the people were again much 
 aroused. " Tumultuous and unlawful meetings," " secret 
 plots and conspiracies carried on among" all classes of ne 
 groes, " dangerous combinations," the exchange of advice 
 " to rebel and make insurrection," brought the colonial leg 
 islature to declare existing laws " insufficient." 36 The free 
 negroes, suspected and accused upon every occasion of an 
 outbreak, became in this instance the objects of restrictive 
 legislation. By an act passed in 1723 they were forbidden 
 to visit or meet with slaves and to carry or own a firelock. 37 
 They were deprived of the right to vote at elections and dis 
 criminated against in the levying of taxes ; 38 but still, de 
 spairing of success in restraining the free negro by drastic 
 police measures, the legislature determined to prohibit en 
 tirely manumission by individual slave-owners. In 1723 
 an act was passed which declared that under no pretense 
 
 perfect liberty and freedome six days after my wife s decease and 
 15 pounds sterling money to be paid apiece for their transporta 
 tion" (MS. Court Records of York County, 1694-1/02, p. 194, in 
 Virginia State Library). 
 39 Hening, vol. iv, p. 126. 
 
 37 Ibid., vol. iv, p. 131. 
 
 38 Ibid., vol. iv, p. 133. 
 
MANUMISSION 53 
 
 whatsoever could a master, without the license of the gov 
 ernor and the council, manumit a slave. 30 Moreover, " meri 
 torious service " was made the sole ground upon which per 
 mission might be obtained for setting free a slave. 40 If 
 this law prohibiting manumission were violated, it became 
 the duty of the churchwardens of the parish in which the 
 violation occurred to apprehend and sell the negro "by 
 public outcry," and to apply the receipts to the use of the 
 vestry. 
 
 From this time till near the end of the colonial period, or, 
 in other words, for nearly half a century, the policy of pro 
 hibiting voluntary manumission met with little opposition. 41 
 The provisions of 1723 were reenacted in 1748 with no 
 alterations that indicate a desire to allow to the free negro 
 class wider liberty or possibility of increase. 42 Under the 
 enforced prohibitions of these laws, manumissions were few 
 and widely separated. 43 The " meritorious service " for 
 which a slave could expect to be rewarded with freedom 
 was something more than faithfulness of service. In 1729 
 the discovery by a slave of an herb medicine by which won 
 derful cures could be effected merited favorable action by 
 the governor and the council. 44 Rev. Charles Greene de- 
 
 ^Hening, vol. iv, p. 132. 
 
 40 Cf. J. B. Minor, Institutes of Common and Statute Law, vol. 
 i, p. 167. 
 
 41 That " the manumission of slaves was never popular in the 
 colony" was the opinion of a writer so careful of statement as 
 H. B. Grigsby (Collections of the Virginia Historical Society, vol. 
 x, p. 133- Cited as Virginia Historical Collections). 
 
 42 Hen ing, vol. vi, p. 112. 
 
 " The number of manumissions under such restrictions must 
 necessarily have been very few" (St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on 
 Slavery, ed. 1796, p. 71). 
 
 44 Governor Gooch asserted in a letter to the Board of Trade that 
 he had " met with a negro, a very old man who has performed many 
 wonderful cures of diseases. For the sake of his freedom he has 
 revealed the medicine, a concoction of roots and barks. . . . 
 There is no room to doubt of its being a certain remedy here & of 
 singular use among the negroes it is well worth the price (60) of 
 the negro s freedom since it is now known how to cure slaves with 
 out mercury" (Sainsbury Transcripts from the British Public 
 Record Office, vol. ix, p. 462). 
 
54 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 sired to manumit his slave woman, Sarah, in 1767, but under 
 the laws in force he could not carry out his desire. 45 
 
 Up to 1763, the date of the close of the struggle between 
 the English and the French colonies in America, wars and 
 troubles with the Indians had occupied so much of the at 
 tention of the people that there was little opportunity for the 
 growth of an enlightened sentiment favorable to freedom 
 for the negroes, whose labor was proving so valuable in the 
 development of the resources of the colony. Jefferson once 
 wrote that at the time when our controversy with England 
 was still " on paper only, few minds had yet doubted but 
 they [the negroes] were as legitimate subjects of property 
 as their horses or cattle." 46 Andrew Burnaby, travelling in 
 Virginia from 1759 to 1760, asserted that "their [the peo 
 ple s] ignorance of mankind and of learning exposes them 
 to many errors and prejudices, especially in regard to In 
 dians and Negroes, whom they scarcely consider of the 
 human species." 47 
 
 This statement was written at about as late a date as it 
 could have been truthfully made, for the principles of the 
 rights of man and freedom by nature could not effect a revo 
 lution against foreign oppression and not ameliorate the 
 hard situation of Virginia s black population. An article 
 in the Virginia Gazette in 1767 began with the following sig 
 nificant words, " Long and serious reflections upon the na 
 ture and consequences of slavery," and went on to say that 
 "now, as freedom is unquestionably the birth-right of all 
 mankind, Africans as well as Europeans, to keep the former 
 in a state of slavery is a constant violation of the right and 
 
 45 MS. Petitions, Fairfax County, 1785, A 5460. 
 
 48 To Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, in H. S. Randall, Life of 
 Thomas Jefferson, vol. iii, p. 643. W. Goodell erroneously used this 
 sentence from Jefferson s letter to describe the condition or state 
 of sentiment in Virginia at the time the letter was written (The 
 American Slave Code in Theory and Practice, p. 48). The time of 
 which Jefferson was writing was when he " came into public life " 
 before the war with England. The statement would not have been 
 true had it been made with reference to conditions in 1814. 
 
 * T Travels through the Middle Settlements of North America, p. 54, 
 
MANUMISSION 55 
 
 therefore justice." 48 Two years later Thomas Jefferson be 
 came a member of the legislature, and upon his initiative 
 and with his aid Colonel Bland, one of the oldest, ablest, 
 and most respected members of that body, pressed forward 
 a proposition to remove the restrictions which for forty-six 
 years the laws had imposed upon voluntary manumission. 
 "I seconded his motion," wrote Jefferson, "and as a younger 
 member was more spared in the debate, but he was de 
 nounced as an enemy to his country and was treated with 
 the greatest indecorum." 49 Opposition to the measure was 
 as yet overpowering, but the kind of support it received 
 augured well for a later victory. Even a legislature as con 
 servative as this one declared that the discriminatory tax 
 levied upon free negroes and mulattoes since 1668 was 
 " derogatory to the rights of free born subjects," and, there 
 fore, that it stood repealed. 50 A new antislavery spirit 
 which was nation-wide in its operation was powerfully 
 affecting sentiment in Virginia. While that spirit was ris 
 ing at the North which was to culminate from 1777 to 1785 
 in acts of emancipation in Vermont, Pennsylvania, Massa 
 chusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, 
 and in a manumission act in Maryland, it was destined to 
 grow and spread in Virginia till it effected the repeal of the 
 old restraints upon manumission, and strongly threatened 
 the existence of the institution of slavery in that State. 
 
 The movement in Virginia kept a remarkably even pace 
 with the American Revolution. Since both were applica 
 tions of the principles of natural equality and individual lib 
 erty, they must indeed be viewed as two parts of the same 
 current of progress. " The glorious and ever memorable 
 Revolution," argued many petitioners of the legislature, 
 "can be justified on no other principles, but what do plead 
 with still greater force for the emancipation of our slaves 
 
 48 Virginia Gazette, March 19, 1767, quoted in Views of American 
 Slavery, Taken a Century Ago, p. 109. 
 
 "Jefferson to Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, in Randall, Life of 
 Jefferson, vol. iii, p. 643 ; G. Tucker, Life of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 
 i, p. 46. 
 
 60 Hening, vol. ii, p. 267 ; vol. viii, p. 393. 
 
56 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 in proportion as the oppression exercised over them ex 
 ceeds the oppression formerly exercised over the United 
 States by Great Britain." 51 
 
 This logical application of the Revolutionary philosophy, 
 though not quite convincing to the legislature, was freely 
 and conscientiously accepted by many individuals. 52 From 
 the beginning of the war it became quite common among 
 slave-owners to apply the doctrine; for example, John 
 Payne, of Hanover County, in the year of the Declaration 
 of Independence freed his slave because he was "persuaded 
 that liberty is the natural condition of all mankind. " 53 Some 
 slave-owners ignored the laws, as did Charles Moorman, a 
 Quaker, of Louisa County, who in 1778 executed a deed of 
 manumission relinquishing his right to thirty-three slaves 
 as if there were no laws forbidding such action. 54 Joseph 
 Mayo, of Henrico County, owner of nearly a hundred slaves, 
 was more desirous that his act be in conformity with the 
 laws, and expressed in his will a " most earnest request that 
 the executors petition the General Assembly for leave to 
 
 51 MS. Petitions, Hanover County, 1785 ; Frederick County, 1786, 
 A 6340. 
 
 62 In 1814 Thomas Jefferson expressed his disappointment that the 
 generation who had received "their early impressions after the 
 flame of liberty had been kindled in every breast, and had become, 
 as it were, the vital spirit of every American" had not gone even 
 to the extent of making possible a general emancipation of slaves 
 (Jefferson to Edward Coles, in Randall, Life of Jefferson, vol. iii, 
 p. 644). 
 
 53 See quotation of the original will in R. A. Brock s prefatory note 
 to " The Fourth Charter of the Royal African Company," in Vir 
 ginia Historical Collections, vol. vi, p. 18. In 1771 Jonathan 
 Pleasants, a large slave-owner, attempted to provide that his slaves 
 be set free by a will beginning thus : " and first believing that all 
 mankind have an undoubted right to freedom and commiserating the 
 situation of my negroes" (2 Call, 270). William Binford, of Hen 
 rico County, set free twelve youthful slaves in 1782 because he was 
 " fully persuaded that freedom is the nat l right of all mankind " 
 (MS. Deeds of Henrico County, no. I, p. 421). In 1790 Colonel 
 William Grason manumitted all of his slaves "born after the Dec 
 laration of Independence" ("History of the Virginia Federal Con 
 vention, of 1788," in Virginia Historical Collections, vol. ix, p. 211). 
 For similar expressions see MS. Deeds of Henrico County, no. 3, p. 
 378; no. 7, P- 131- 
 
 M Hening, vol. xii, p. 613. 
 
MANUMISSION 57 
 
 set free all" his slaves. 55 Some masters made their wills 
 in anticipation of an act permitting manumission. A notable 
 instance was the devise made in 1777 by John Pleasants, a 
 Quaker, whose will, when later held valid by the supreme 
 court of appeals, set free several hundred slaves. 50 The 
 contingency upon which this devise of freedom in futuro 
 was based was that "the laws of the land . . . admit them 
 to be set free without their being transported out of the 
 country." 
 
 A still more novel instance of anticipating action by the 
 legislature was the devise by Cloister Hunnicutt, of Sussex 
 County, of six slaves to the Monthly Meeting of the Society 
 of Friends, to be manumitted by such members as the meet 
 ing should appoint. In passing upon the validity of this 
 will, recorded two years prior to the act of 1782 permitting 
 manumission, the supreme court said : " He knew the exist 
 ing laws forbade it and that his society had been anxiously 
 endeavoring to procure an enabling statute for that purpose 
 from the legislature; which was generally believed would 
 shortly be obtained." Counsel, in defending the legality of 
 the will, observed that the testator must have known " that 
 a sentiment existed in the country very favorable to the pas 
 sage of such a law." 57 
 
 In the forefront of the movement which culminated in 
 the repeal of restrictions upon the right of private manu 
 mission were two religious sects the Quakers and the 
 Methodists. Many Quakers in Virginia had been owners 
 of slaves up to the period of the Revolutionary War, but 
 they were among the first to recognize and admit fully the 
 humanity of the negro and the injustice of depriving him 
 of his right to freedom. Committees of their meetings were 
 appointed "to labor with such Friends as still hold their 
 negroes in bondage, to convince them, if possible, of the 
 
 55 Hening, vol. xii, p. 612; MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1886, 
 A 8990. By special acts of legislation in 1787 both the above-men 
 tioned wills were made effective (Journal of the House of Dele 
 gates, 1786, p. 23. Cited as House Journal). 
 
 "2 Call, 270; Brock, p. 17. 
 
 "Charles et al. v. Hunnicutt, 5 Call, 311, 312. 
 
58 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 evil of that practice and inconsistency with our Christian 
 profession." 58 The few members who clung to their slaves 
 did so at the price of being disowned by their society. 59 
 The growing body of Methodists likewise showed them 
 selves the friends of the negro, and many of them, like the 
 Quakers, refused to own or sell slaves. In the Methodist 
 annual conference held at Baltimore in 1780 this question 
 was put to the conference : " Does this Conference acknowl 
 edge that slavery is contrary to the laws of God, man, and 
 nature, and hurtful to society; contrary to the dictates of 
 conscience and pure religion, and doing that which we would 
 not others should do to us and ours? Do we pass our dis 
 approbation on all our friends who keep slaves, and advise 
 their freedom?" The answer was, " Yes." 60 Philip Gatch, 
 a slave-owning Methodist of Powhatan County, was one 
 among many of these people who acted according to the 
 advice of their society in a very short time after it was 
 given. 61 The Methodists as well as the Friends exerted an 
 influence upon legislation by memorials to the legislature 
 reiterating their opposition to slavery. 62 
 
 Probably these two societies, the Friends and the Metho 
 dists, deserve to rank first in the work of advancing the 
 cause of manumission from genuine altruistic motives. 
 They sought to make manumission lawful because they were 
 willing to take the negro within the scope of the doctrine 
 of equal rights and natural freedom. But the Baptists 
 and Presbyterians were then striving to gain for the whites 
 freedom of religion and freedom of conscience; hence 
 they too were consistent advocates of the measure by 
 
 68 MS. Minutes of Fairfax Monthly Meeting, 1776-1802; MS. 
 Minutes of Warrenton and Fairfax Quarterly Meeting, 1776-1787, 
 passim; S. B. Weeks, Southern Quakers and Slavery, p. 211 et seq. 
 
 09 MS. Minutes of Hopewell Monthly Meeting, 1777-1791, p. 184; 
 MS. Minutes of Fairfax Monthly Meeting, 1777-1791, pp. 42, 65. 
 
 60 W. W. Bennett, Memorials of Methodism in Virginia, p. 131. 
 
 * Ibid. 
 
 62 Letters and Other Writings of James Madison, vol. iii, p. 124 ; 
 cited as Madison s Writings. See Weeks on the prominence of 
 Quakers and Methodists among the eighty members of the Vir 
 ginia Abolition Society in 1791 (Southern Quakers and Slavery, 
 P- 213). 
 
MANUMISSION 59 
 
 which restraints were to be removed from the will and con 
 science of a slave-owner who felt moved to set free his 
 slave for conscience sake. Furthermore, without regard to 
 church affiliations, there was a class of young men who, ac 
 cording to a distinguished French traveller, "were almost 
 all educated in principles of sound philosophy and regarded 
 nothing but justice and humanity." 63 To this younger set 
 of men, who represented the liberal ideas of the English and 
 French thought of that time, and prominent among whom 
 was Thomas Jefferson, is due much of the credit for the 
 support in the legislature of the proposition which was en 
 acted into law in May, 1782, bearing the title, "An act to 
 authorize the manumission of slaves." 64 
 
 To a certain class of those persons who demanded a re 
 vision of the laws respecting the negroes the law of 1782 
 was only a partial victory. The object sought by persons 
 of that class was the freedom of the negro and not the 
 greater freedom of the white master ; hence they were now* 
 as ready to support a plan of general emancipation as they 
 had been to promote the progress of manumission. In 1785 
 a petition was presented to the legislature asserting it to 
 be the firm conviction of the petitioners that slavery is con 
 trary to the principles of the Christian religion and an ex 
 press violation of the principles upon which our government 
 was founded. 65 Several months later seventeen citizens of 
 Frederick County petitioned for the gradual emancipation 
 
 63 F. J. Chastellux, Travels in North America in the years 1780-82, 
 vol. ii, pp. 196, 197. 
 
 M " Be it enacted That it shall hereafter be lawful for any person 
 by his or her last will and testament, or by any other instrument in 
 writing, under his or her hand and seal attested and proved in the 
 county court by two witnesses, or acknowledged by the party in 
 the court of the county where he or she resides, to emancipate and 
 set free his or her slaves, or any of them, who shall thereupon . . . 
 enjoy as full freedom as if they had been particularly named and 
 freed by this act" (Hening, vol. xi, pp. 39, 40). 
 
 65 House Journal, November 8, 1785, p. 27. This petition urged 
 not only emancipation, but also " the strengthening of our govern 
 ment by attaching to its support by ties of interest and gratitude " 
 the freedmen. Apparently, enfranchisement of the freedmen was v < 
 within its scope. 
 
6O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 of slaves, reasoning that " liberty is the birthright of man 
 kind, the right of every rational creature." 66 
 
 These propositions met with very strong protest from 
 those who had opposed the passage of the manumission act 
 and who were already preparing to make a fight for its re 
 peal. Counter petitions and remonstrances were received 
 by the Assembly as soon as were the petitions. 67 In addi 
 tion to remonstrating against proposed plans of emancipa 
 tion, the petitioners urged the repeal of the law authorizing 
 manumission. 68 
 
 In the issue thus joined the balance of power was held 
 by the class of persons who had supported the passage of 
 the law of 1782 with the view to removing restraints upon 
 the will of the master for the sake of the master s freedom. 
 Neither the proposition for emancipation nor the project 
 for the repeal of the law authorizing manumission could 
 command their support. Persons of this class were as 
 much opposed to hampering the property rights of the mas 
 ter by denying to him the right to dispose of slaves at will 
 as they were to compelling him to relinquish his title to 
 slaves. The emancipation schemes and the projects to pro 
 hibit again the manumission of slaves failed of enactment. 
 Hence, on compromise ground between two extreme views, 
 the act authorizing manumission remained on the statute 
 book, and represented the policy to which the State re 
 mained for many years firmly committed. 69 
 
 66 MS. Petitions, Frederick County, 1786, A 6340. Madison, in 
 a letter to Jefferson of January 22, 1786, says that " several petitions 
 (from Methodists, chiefly) appeared in favor of a gradual abolition 
 of slavery" (Madison s Writings, vol. i, p. 217). 
 
 67 MS. Petitions, Brunswick County, 1785, A 2901 ; House Journal, 
 1785, p. 30; Madison to Washington, November n, 1785, in Madi 
 son s Writings, vol. i, p. 200. 
 
 68 Petitions of this kind were received by the legislature from the 
 counties of Brunswick, Amelia, Mecklenburg, Halifax, and Pittsyl- 
 vania (House Journal, 1785, p. 91; MS. Petitions, A 2901). A 
 petition from Hanover County, signed by one hundred and forty- 
 four citizens, and one from Henrico, signed by one hundred and 
 twenty citizens, praying for the repeal of the act of 1/82, were sent 
 to the legislature in 1784 (MS. Petitions, Hanover County, A 8124; 
 Henrico County, A 8971). 
 
 60 House Journal, 1785, p. 91. The vote against repeal was 53 to 
 35- 
 
MANUMISSION 6 1 
 
 The removal in 1782 of restraints upon manumission was 
 like the sudden destruction of a dam before the increasing 
 impetus of a swollen stream. The free negro population in 
 the State at that time probably less than 3000, but the 
 product of a century and a quarter s growth was more than 
 doubled in the space of two years. Instances of manumis 
 sion, often of large numbers of slaves, became frequent. 70 
 In eight years after the act became effective the number of 
 free colored persons rose from less than 3000 to I2,866. 71 
 By 1800 the number had increased to 20,000; and according 
 to the census of 1810 it was over 30,000. 
 
 The principles of natural rights and the consent of the 
 governed had only a year before the passage of the enabling 
 act received a triumph in the victory of the American and 
 French armies at Yorktown, and many a slave-master now 
 seized the opportunity to follow those principles to their 
 logical conclusion by manumitting every slave in his pos 
 session, whether one or one hundred. In 1782 William 
 Binford and Robert Pleasants, of Henrico County, manu 
 mitted respectively twelve and ninety slaves. Most of them 
 were of an age to be very valuable, but young and old were 
 set free because of a "conviction and persuasion that free 
 dom is a natural right." 72 Joseph Hill, of Isle of Wight 
 County, gave expression to his views in his will of March 
 6, 1783, as follows: "I ... after full and deliberate con 
 sideration, and agreeable to our Bill of Rights, am fully per 
 suaded that freedom is the natural life of all mankind . . . 
 
 70 Cf . Brock, p. 19. 
 
 71 In 1835 William Jay wrote as follows : " In 1782, Virginia re 
 pealed her restraining law and in nine years 10,000 slaves were man 
 umitted " (Slavery in America, p. 101). In 1796 St. George Tucker 
 called attention to the fact that " there are more free negroes and 
 mulattoes in Virginia alone than are to be found in the four New 
 England states and Vermont in addition to them. The prog 
 ress of emancipation in this state is, therefore, much greater than 
 our Eastern brethren may at first suppose. There are only 1087 free 
 negroes and mulattoes in the states of New York, New Jersey, and 
 Pennsylvania more than in Virginia" (A Dissertation on Slavery, 
 p. 72 n.). 
 
 72 MS. Deeds of Henrico County, no. I, p. 42. 
 
62 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 do hereby emancipate and set free all and every of the 
 above-named slaves." 73 
 
 Every negro who fought or served as a free man in the 
 late war was given in 1783 a legislative pledge of the utmost 
 protection of the State in the enjoyment of the freedom he 
 had helped to gain ; 74 and a slave who could prove any hon 
 orable service rendered by him to the American cause was 
 freed by special act and at the expense of the State. 75 Aber 
 deen, a slave who had helped forward the cause of liberty 
 "by his long and meritorious service in the lead mines," 76 
 and " Caesar, who entered very early into the service of his 
 country and continued to pilot the armed vessels of the state 
 during the late War," 77 were set free at public expense. 
 Slave-owning Quakers who were reluctant to manumit their 
 slaves were urged by their society to extinguish their titles 
 in human chattels. 78 The labor supply being abundant from 
 1782 to the end of the century, mercenary masters were 
 
 73 MS. Deeds of Isle of Wight County, no. 15, p. 122. Quoted 
 from B. B. Munford, Virginia s Attitude toward Slavery and Se 
 cession, p. 105. $ In 1797 Richard Randolph, jr., of Prince Edward 
 County, manumitted his slaves "in whom my countrymen by their 
 iniquitous laws in contradiction of their own Declaration of Rights 
 have vested me with absolute property" (MS. Wills of Prince Ed 
 ward County, 1797; H. A. Garland, The Life of John Randolph, of 
 Roanoke, vol. i, p. 67). 
 
 7 * Hening, vol. xi, p. 308 ; St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, 
 p. 20. Compare below, pp. no, in, in n. 
 
 75 William Boush and Jack Knight, and Saul, " who avoided the 
 rocks upon which so many negroes wrecked when the trumpet call 
 pronounced his freedom if he would turn upon his master," were 
 all set at liberty by the State because of their services in the 
 cause of liberty (Hening, vol. xiii, pp. 103, 619). The slave James, 
 a spy or secret agent of Marquis Lafayette in his Virginia cam 
 paign, received favorable consideration by the Assembly (MS. Peti 
 tions, New Kent County, 1786, 64051). 
 
 76 Hening, vol. xi, p. 309 (1783). 
 "Ibid., vol. xiii, p. 102 (1789). 
 
 78 In 1788 it was inserted in the Friends Discipline " that none 
 amongst us be concerned in importing, buying, selling, holding, or 
 overseeing slaves, and that all bear a faithful testimony against the 
 practice." In 1785 the following query was put before the dele 
 gates to the Upper Quarterly Meeting : " Do any Friends hold slaves 
 and do all bear a faithful testimony against the practice?" In 1796 
 it was reported at a meeting that there was no longer complaint of 
 Friends holding slaves when they could be lawfully liberated 
 (Weeks, Southern Quakers and Slavery, pp. 212, 214). 
 
MANUMISSION 63 
 
 often easily induced by the slaves themselves, or by a phil 
 anthropic person in behalf of the slaves, to grant deeds of 
 manumission in consideration of a money payment. This 
 period from 1782 to 1806 was the time when manumission 
 was most popular in Virginia, and is unique in the history 
 of slavery in the State as being the only period when manu 
 mission went on at a rapid rate without legal restraint. 
 
 Public opinion, however, was by no means unanimous as 
 to the wisdom of manumission or as to the expediency of 
 permitting the practice to go on without some legal restric 
 tion. Very soon after the act of 1782 took effect, lessons 
 learned from experience with a free negro element began 
 to cast a tremendous weight in the balances on the side of 
 the reactionaries, who lost no opportunity to point out the 
 evil results of manumission. 79 Almost a hundred years pre 
 viously, manumission was for the first time restricted by 
 law, because free negroes were unproductive and because 
 they incited slaves to steal and to rebel. 80 Throughout the 
 long period which intervened between that experience and 
 the close of the Revolutionary War the free negro was 
 almost a negligible social factor, and afforded little reminder 
 of the real character of a large and growing free negro ele- 
 ment in a population constituted as was that of Virginia. 
 With the old restraints upon manumission removed, two 
 years trial of the freedmen was sufficient to convince many 
 persons that " free negroes are agents, factors and carriers 
 to the neighboring towns for slaves, of property by them 
 stolen from their masters and others." 81 Three years later 
 the opponents of manumission declared it to be " a very 
 
 "MS. Petitions, 1784, A 8124; A 8971; A 2901. A petition from 
 Accomac County, in June, 1782, signed by forty-five persons, assigned 
 four reasons why the slaves of persons who had made their wills 
 before 1782 should not be set free: (i) Manumitted slaves had 
 helped unmanumitted slaves to join the British; (2) It would 
 depreciate the value of slave property and thus lessen revenue; (3) 
 Manumission should be preserved solely as a means of rewarding 
 slaves for good conduct; (4) Free negroes easily become charges 
 upon the public (MS. Petitions, Accomac County, 1785, A 11). 
 
 80 See above, p. 51. 
 
 81 MS. Petitions, Hanover County, 1784, A 8124; Henrico County, 
 1784, A 8971. 
 
64 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 great and growing evil," and, failing to get a prohibitive 
 measure passed, they proposed the plan of compelling every 
 negro to leave the State within twelve months after the date 
 of his manumission. 82 The plan was not adopted, but free 
 negroes were forbidden by an act of 1793 to come into the 
 State. 83 
 
 Much difficulty was soon experienced in discriminating 
 between slaves fraudulently passing as free negroes and 
 negroes actually free. The right of free negroes to go and 
 come and to pass to and fro in a community without hin 
 drance or question proved to be a cloak behind which run 
 away slaves escaped detection. 84 An attempt to regulate 
 the evil by strict registration requirements only augmented 
 it ; 85 free negroes treated their registers or " free papers " 
 as if they were transferable, and escaping slaves used them 
 to conceal their identity. 86 Enterprising slaves even forged 
 such papers, or secured them from white persons who made 
 a practice of forging freedom certificates and supplying 
 slaves with the means of escape. 87 
 
 All these things had been operating to effect a change in 
 sentiment adverse to manumission when an attempted insur 
 rection of slaves in Richmond, led by a slave named 
 
 82 K. M. Rowland, The Life of George Mason, vol. ii, p. 201. For 
 failure to leave they were to be sold at public auction. The propo 
 sition followed closely the law passed in 1691. Unlike that law, 
 however, it contained no provision for requiring the master to pay 
 the expenses of transporting the manumitted slave. 
 
 83 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 239. Any citizen might arrest a violator 
 of this law and take him before a justice, who was empowered "to 
 remove every such free negro or mulatto . . . into that state or island 
 from whence it shall appear he or she last came." 
 
 84 Virginia Gazette and the American Advertizer, July 5, I7&3- 
 " Reward : Ran away from the subscriber a mulatto man slave 
 named Jack a crafty fellow ... he has a forged pass to pass for a 
 free man" (ibid., October 16, 1784). 
 
 85 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 238. 
 
 86 Ibid., vol. xv, p. 78. 
 
 87 Ibid., vol. xiv, p. 365. Any person " aiding or abetting in forgery 
 of writings whereby a slave or servant of another may go free" 
 was liable to a penalty of two hundred dollars and one year s im 
 prisonment. Ishmael Lawrence was indicted, found guilty, and 
 fined only ten dollars by a Henrico County court in 1795 for " forg 
 ing uttering and distributing freedom papers or Deeds of emancipa 
 tion to runaway slaves" (MS. Orders, no. 6, p. 514)- 
 
MANUMISSION 65 
 
 Gabriel, set the white people of the State to thinking on the 
 dangers from a partial subjection of a servile race. 88 While 
 the evidence showed but little direct or criminal connection 
 of free negroes with the plot, 89 it revealed the fact that bar- 
 bacues, fish- feasts, and "preachings," at which the free 
 negro was known to be a prominent figure, had furnished 
 the occasion for arranging the plot. This fact and testi 
 mony that Methodists, Quakers, and Frenchmen, all of 
 whom had been favorable to manumission, were to be 
 spared by the insurgents 90 were convincing that the mere 
 presence in a community of a manumitted negro was a 
 source of danger. 
 
 On December 31, 1800, the year of the Gabriel insurrec 
 tion, the legislature, behind closed doors, passed the follow 
 ing resolution: "That the Governor be requested to corre 
 spond with the president of the United States on the subject 
 of purchasing lands without the limits of the United States 
 whither persons obnoxious to the laws or dangerous to the 
 peace of society may be removed." 91 
 
 The obnoxious and dangerous persons described here 
 were not criminals or seditious aliens, as might be supposed, 
 but " free negroes and mulattoes including those who may 
 hereafter be emancipated/ 92 At the time this resolution 
 was passed there were upwards of twenty thousand persons 
 in Virginia included within its scope; hence persons who 
 viewed the growth of the free negro population with alarm 
 
 88 This attempt to massacre the white inhabitants of Richmond 
 was called the Gabriel Insurrection. See The Richmond Recorder, 
 April 6, 9, 1803; R. R. Howison, A History of Virginia, vol. ii, pp. 
 390, 391- 
 
 "A man named Samuel Bird, a free mulatto of Hanover town 
 was arrested on suspicion of being concerned in the conspiracy of 
 the negroes; he ... was finally discharged for want of evidence, 
 it being decided that people of his own color, in slavery, could not 
 give testimony against him. His son, a slave, was condemned and 
 executed yesterday" (Writings of James Monroe, ed. by Hamilton, 
 vol. iii, p. 215). 
 
 90 Richmond Recorder, April 9, 1803. 
 
 91 Documents of the House of Delegates, no. 10, 1847-1848, cited 
 as House Documents; A. Alexander, A History of Colonization on 
 the Western Coast of Africa, p. 63. 
 
 93 Writings of Monroe, vol. iii, p. 20. 
 
 5 
 
66 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 began to realize that restrictions upon the manumission of 
 slaves could not now afford complete relief from the menace 
 of the free negro. The resolution of the legislature was the 
 starting-point of the colonization movement in Virginia and, 
 in fact, in the United States. Governor Monroe, acting 
 upon the request made of him by the resolution, promptly 
 communicated with President Jefferson, and in a lengthy 
 correspondence which followed, opinions were given and 
 received of the comparative value of the southwestern fron 
 tier, the West Indies, and Africa as a place for a colony of 
 these persons who were obnoxious to the laws and the 
 peace. 93 
 
 While colonization ideas were being born, new and un 
 usually stringent measures for keeping watch over and con 
 trolling the actions of free negroes were enacted. They 
 were forbidden to move from one county or town to an 
 other on penalty of being arrested and imprisoned as va 
 grants. 9 * The laws concerning the migration of free negroes 
 into the Commonwealth were declared defective and in need 
 of revision, and more exacting registration requirements 
 were enacted. 95 The laws of evidence were changed so that 
 a slave was a good witness in pleas of the Commonwealth 
 against a free negro. 96 A strong public guard to be sta 
 tioned at Richmond was considered by the Assembly to be 
 expedient for the public safety "in the present crisis of 
 affairs/ 97 
 
 The prospect of removing the free negroes was, however, 
 not yet deemed so promising as to cause persons to lose 
 sight of the necessity of reducing the enormous rate of in 
 crease in the free negro population by closing the avenue 
 of escape from slavery to freedom. In the legislative ses 
 sion of 1804-1805 the state of public opinion upon the sub- 
 
 w Writings of Monroe, vol. iii, pp. 201-217, 292; The Writings of 
 Thomas Jefferson, ed. by Ford, vol. iv, pp. 410-422; House Docu 
 ments, no. 10, 1847-1848. 
 
 M Hening, vol. xv, p. 301 (1801). 
 
 86 Ibid., vol. xv, p. 301. 
 
 86 Ibid., vol. xv, p. 300. 
 
 " Ibid., vol. xv, pp. 295, 296 ; Howison, vol. ii, pp. 388-393 ; House 
 Journal, 1800-1809, pp. 47, 48. 
 
MANUMISSION 6/ 
 
 y 
 
 ject of manumission was reflected in a vigorous debate on 
 the floor of the House on the merits of a proposition to 
 abolish the right of private manumission altogether. 98 The 
 speakers who favored a restriction of the privilege seemed 
 to recognize the difficult task before them of overcoming a 
 strong presumption against legislative interference with anj) 
 individual right enjoyed since the close of the Revolution. 
 " It is not the natural rights of individuals," they asserted, 
 " to dispose of his own property in every case. ... It is a 
 moral maxim that no man can appropriate his property to 
 any purposes which may injure the interest of others. . . . 
 Whoever emancipates a slave may be inflicting the deadliest 
 injury upon his neighbor. He may be furnishing some ac 
 tive chieftain of a formidable conspiracy." Vivid illustra 
 tion of and support for the argument were freely taken from 
 the recent insurrections in Santo Domingo as well as from 
 those in the State." An additional " power of combining," 
 it was said, was placed in the hands of slaves by giving to 
 them the " right of locomotion." " What should we say of 
 a man who having his mortal foe bound at his feet sets him 
 at liberty and plants a stiletto in his hand ? " 
 
 A second ground of attack was occupied by matching 
 against the property-rights defense of manumission an argu 
 ment for economizing revenue by checking a reckless de 
 struction of property in slaves. The members of the House 
 were asked to consider the loss to the State in revenue in 
 curred by the manumission of twenty thousand slaves since 
 1782. A third argument was in refutation of the strongly 
 entrenched opinion that the proposed measure would violate 
 "the rights of conscience." "What respect is due," asked 
 Smyth, of Wythe County, "to the conscience of that man 
 who, after having made all the use he could of his slaves 
 does not hesitate to deprive his wife and children of their 
 labor?" 
 
 98 Richmond Enquirer, January 15, 1805. 
 
 "A speaker in debate before the House read portions of the his 
 tory of the insurrection of Santo Domingo (Richmond Enquirer, 
 January 15, 1805). 
 
68 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 With equal skill the defenders of the privilege of manu 
 mission matched arguments with the opposition. They 
 affirmed that the loss in revenue incurred by manumission 
 was smaller than would be the loss of a single day occupied 
 by the legislature in considering the mass of petitions which 
 would pour in upon that body, as they poured in upon the 
 legislatures before the act of 1782, should the restrictive 
 measure carry. They emphasized also the fact that there 
 was " a vast number of people who labor under scruples of 
 conscience and think it wrong to keep their fellow creatures 
 in slavery. . . . These men consider their religion as the 
 law of God; and if we pass this bill we shall place them 
 between two contrary and conflicting laws." 
 
 Moreover, the proposed measure, they said, would not 
 only be unwise policy, but would also be in violation of the 
 constitution. "The first clause says that all men are by 
 nature equal and independent. Already we have violated 
 this declaration, but the present measure will do so still 
 more ; for . . . the last clause declares that conscience ought 
 to be free." 
 
 Finally, what better safeguard against insurrection could 
 there be than the power in the hands of every slave-master 
 to reward with freedom his faithful and loyal slaves ? " What 
 reward is more seductive than the acquisition of freedom? 
 . . . Suppose a servant knows that some harm is to happen 
 to his master, can he have a stronger incitement to inform 
 him of it and put him upon his guard than the prospect of 
 emancipation?" 100 
 
 When the vote which determined the fate of the bill was 
 taken, it stood 77 against and 70 in favor of its becoming 
 law. The editor of the Enquirer avowed his disappoint 
 ment that the measure, " in spite of the imperious policy 
 which dictated its adoption was rejected," and expressed a 
 hope " that some future Legislature will have the prudence 
 to administer the suitable remedy." 101 
 
 90 Richmond Enquirer, January 15, 1805. 
 
MANUMISSION 69 
 
 In the next annual session of the legislature there were 
 not lacking those who shared the views of the editor on the 
 matter of reopening the question in another effort to admin 
 ister a remedy. Fears were expressed by some members 
 that free and open discussion was dangerous, but in spite 
 of these warnings a bill for taking from masters the right 
 to free slaves was introduced and debated with much zest. 102 
 The events connected with the Gabriel attempt at insurrec 
 tion were again recalled and associated with the idle and 
 vicious habits of free negroes. A friend of the bill declared 
 that " these blacks who are free obtain a knowledge of facts 
 by passing from place to place in society; they can thus 
 organize insurrection. ... It may be proven that it is the 
 free blacks who instil into the slaves ideas hostile to our 
 peace." 103 Principles of policy and considerations of safety 
 were no longer to be brushed aside by arguments based 
 upon the rights of man. 104 
 
 When the division came, the bill was lost by a vote of 75 
 to 73. 105 But the full strength of the party in favor of re 
 stricting manumission was not shown in this vote, which 
 was a test only upon the question of abolishing the right 
 altogether. There was apparent agreement that drastic 
 police measures were necessary, and but very little objection 
 to placing free negroes under any surveillance and restric 
 tion that seemed to be necessary for the safety of society; 
 but a majority was held intact against abolishing the right 
 of manumission only because it believed that the measure 
 infringed the rights of private property and " that the con 
 science of a dying man ought not to be deprived of the 
 momentary comfort emancipation of his slaves would pro 
 duce." 106 The objectionable features could, however, be 
 avoided by approaching the question from its other side, 
 
 03 Virginia Argus, January 17, 1806. 
 
 103 Ibid. 
 
 104 A speaker affirmed that he was not less friendly to " the rights 
 of man" than others who opposed the bill, but that he advocated it 
 from policy (Virginia Argus, January 17, 1806). 
 
 5 House Journal, 1805-1806, pp. 68, 77. 
 06 Virginia Argus, January 17, 1806. 
 
7O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 that is, by leaving unrestrained the will of the master and 
 restraining the will of the slave with an imposition of such 
 conditions upon freedmen as would make liberty undesir 
 able. Such a plan had been adopted in 1691, and had been 
 proposed in 1787. The device met with the approval of 
 this Assembly, and an act was passed by which all slaves 
 manumitted after May I, 1806, were required to leave the 
 State within twelve months from the time their freedom 
 accrued, or, if under age, from the time they reached their 
 majority. 107 
 
 In 1784 a vote taken in the House of Delegates showed 
 that only one third of the members of that House were then 
 in favor of the absolute prohibition of the manumission of 
 slaves. By 1806 this minority had made such gains that an 
 accession of only two votes would have transformed it into 
 a majority. It is a significant fact that when the opponents 
 of the policy of permitting private manumissions seemed so 
 near to victory, almost all concerted efforts to repeal the law 
 of 1782 came to an end. The law of 1806 was the last im 
 portant change in the policy of the State respecting the 
 slave-owner s right to free a slave. The absence after 1806 
 of a strong demand to curb the power of a master to convert 
 his slave into a free negro was due chiefly to two causes. 
 
 In the first place, the act of 1806 prescribing banishment 
 for any slave thereafter set free was regarded as an indirect 
 restriction upon the will of the master ; hence it afforded to 
 those who had been urging the repeal of the act of 1782 a 
 measure of satisfaction. It promised to bring about the 
 results which the opponents of manumission desired without 
 
 07 The act, being a restriction in disguise upon manumission, was 
 included as section 10 in an act concerning slaves. It declared that 
 " if any slave hereafter emancipated shall remain within this Com 
 monwealth more than twelve months after his or her right to free 
 dom shall have accrued he or she shall forfeit all such right and 
 may be apprehended and sold by the overseers of the poor for any 
 county or corporation in which he or she shall be found for the 
 benefit of the poor of such county or corporation" (Hening, vol. 
 xvi, p. 252). Section 10 was a Senate amendment to the act con 
 cerning slaves, and was agreed to by the House by a vote of 94 to 65 
 (House Journal, 1805-1806, p. 77). 
 
MANUMISSION /I 
 
 a direct interference with jealously guarded property rights 
 and without hindrance to freedom of conscience. 108 
 
 In the second place, the act of 1806 represented a new 
 idea that of removing free negroes from the State. As 
 the free negro population increased, a prohibition upon 
 manumission was seen to be of diminishing importance as 
 a means of coping with the problem. From 1782 to 1806 
 strenuous efforts were made to limit the power of masters 
 to recruit the free negro population from the slave class. 
 After 1806 the strength of the opposition to the growth of 
 the free colored class was directed mainly to removing or 
 colonizing that class of the population. The question of 
 colonization, as we have seen, assumed an aspect of im 
 portance as a consequence of a resolution of the state leg 
 islature in 1800. The act of 1806 was the first actual law 
 of a long succession of laws enacted with a view to realizing 
 the ideas set forth in the House resolutions of the first 
 years of the century. 
 
 A fundamental defect in the law of 1806 was its failure 
 to provide any definite place to which the freed slaves might 
 go. As an immediate consequence of spasmodic attempts 
 to enforce the law and of fears on the part of manumitted 
 slaves that the law would be enforced against them, a notice 
 able egress of negroes took place from Virginia to the 
 Northern States and to the States bordering on Virginia on 
 all sides. Citizens of Maryland soon began to make loud 
 complaint to their legislature. " Virginia," they said, " has 
 passed a law [expelling certain free negroes] and many of 
 her beggarly blacks have been vomited upon us." 109 Within 
 
 108 " That Government would be justly chargeable with the ex 
 treme of despotism that should attempt, without necessity, to in 
 terfere with the kind and generous feelings of the human heart," 
 asserted a committee of the House of Delegates in its report in 
 1829 favorable to the expediency of continuing the policy of remov 
 ing free negroes and of permitting masters to manumit slaves 
 (African Repository and Colonial Journal, vol. iii, p. 54- Cited as 
 African Repository). 
 
 109 MS. Petitions to House of Delegates, in Maryland Historical 
 Society, portfolio 7, no. 28; J. R. Brackett, The Negro in Maryland, 
 pp. 176, 177. 
 
72 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 a year after the Virginia act was passed the legislatures of 
 three different States Maryland, 110 Kentucky, 111 and Dela 
 ware 112 had passed countervailing acts forbidding free ne 
 groes to come in from other States to take up permanent 
 residence. Other States followed the lead of the three 
 already named, and passed laws excluding free negroes or 
 imposing upon their admission such rigid requirements as 
 to render their coming impracticable. Ohio, 113 Indiana, 114 
 Illinois, 115 Missouri, 116 North Carolina, 117 and Tennessee 118 
 had passed some such law within twenty-five years after the 
 Virginia act of 1806. The people of Mercer County, Ohio, 
 refused to allow John Randolph s three hundred and eighty- 
 five negroes, who left Virginia in compliance with the laws, 
 to remain even for three days upon land purchased for them 
 in that county, although these negroes could comply with 
 Ohio s law requiring of emigrant free negroes bond for 
 good behavior. 119 In no State was a cordial welcome held 
 out to Virginia s expatriated negroes. A refugee slave was 
 far more likely to meet with hospitality in the Northern 
 States than was a free negro. 120 
 
 When that portion of the population of Virginia which 
 viewed the residence of the free blacks among them as " an 
 intolerable burden " 121 saw that the removal laws were being 
 
 110 Laws of Maryland, 1806, ch. 56; 1823, ch. 161 ; Brackett, p. 176. 
 
 111 Acts of Kentucky Legislature, 1807-1808, sec. 3; J. C. Hurd, 
 The Law of Freedom and Bondage in the United States, vol. ii, 
 pp. 15, 18; MS. Petitions, Cumberland County, 1815, A 4728. 
 
 112 4 Delaware Laws, 108 ; Hurd, vol. ii, p. 77. 
 
 113 Ohio Sessions Laws, ch. 8; Hurd, vol. ii, p. 117. 
 
 114 Hurd, vol. ii, p. 130. 
 
 115 Ibid., vol. ii, p. 135. 
 118 Ibid., vol. ii, p. 170. 
 
 117 Revised Code of North Carolina, 107, sec. 54-58, 75-77 ; J. S. 
 Bassett, Slavery in the State of North Carolina, in J. H. U. Studies, 
 ser. xvii, nos. 7-8. 
 
 118 Hurd, vol. ii, p. 92. See also The Richmond Enquirer, Febru 
 ary 19, 1832, speech of Mr. Goode. 
 
 ^ The Liberator, August 7, 21, 1846. 
 
 120 "If there is one fact established by steadily accumulating evi 
 dence it is that the free negro cannot find a congenial home in the 
 United States. He is an exotic among us" (quoted in De Bow s 
 Commercial Review, vol. xxvii, p. 731, from Philadelphia North 
 American). 
 
 121 MS. Petitions, Prince William County, 1838. 
 
MANUMISSION 73 
 
 " frustrated by the action of sister states " 122 as well as by 
 the inactivity of local officials in enforcing the banishment 
 provisions, efforts were made to seek a place beyond the 
 United States where free negroes could be colonized. On 
 December 14, 1816, a resolution was adopted in the House 
 of Delegates which strongly urged the importance of colo 
 nization, and requested the governor to " correspond with 
 the President of the United States for the purpose of ob 
 taining a territory upon the shores of the North Pacific, or 
 some other place not within any of the States or territorial 
 governments of the United States to serve as an asylum for 
 such persons of color as are now free and may desire the 
 same and for those who may be hereafter emancipated 
 within this Commonwealth." 123 Within a short while after 
 the adoption of this resolution there was organized in Wash 
 ington the American Colonization Society, and throughout 
 the counties and cities of Eastern Virginia auxiliary organi 
 zations sprang up. 124 A state colonization society had head 
 quarters at Richmond in 1831, and had various branches 
 throughout the State. 125 The two most important duties of 
 these societies and their agents were to procure, first, funds 
 for the transportation of free negroes 126 to Africa, and, sec 
 ondly, free negroes who were willing to be transported 
 there. 127 
 
 From 1820 to 1860 these societies were very active in 
 propagating the colonization ideas. In 1833 tnev procured 
 from the legislature an annual appropriation of eighteen 
 
 22 MS. Petitions, Dinwiddie County, 1838, A 5090. 
 
 123 House Journal, 1816-1817, p. 90. 
 
 124 Address of the Rockbridge Colonization Society, in African 
 Repository, vol. iii, p. 274; Report of Managers of the Lynchburg 
 Auxiliary Colonization Society, in ibid., vol. iii, p. 202; Memorial of 
 the Richmond and Manchester Auxiliary Colonization Society, in 
 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1825, A 9358. 
 
 m Petition of the Colonization Society of Virginia, in MS. Peti 
 tions, Henrico County, 1831, A 9431. 
 
 128 African Repository, vol. iii, pp. 280, 281. 
 
 " Difficulty has been apprehended in obtaining a sufficient num 
 ber of emigrants. . . . Many of the free people are either ignorant 
 of the scheme or prejudiced against it. They are suspicious of 
 white men " (Address of Rockbridge Colonization Society, in Afri 
 can Repository, vol. iii, p. 279). 
 
74 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 I thousand dollars for five years to be used in colonizing free 
 negroes in Africa. From this time on for a quarter of a 
 century the state legislature was committed to the plan of 
 colonization as a solution of the free negro problem; and 
 although that plan resulted in repeated failure, it was suffi 
 ciently promising to absorb the greater part of the interest 
 of nearly all who wished to check the growth of the free 
 colored class. 128 Between 1836 and 1856, propositions for 
 limiting the power of masters to manumit their slaves were 
 pressed forward with some energy, but were uniformly de 
 feated. 12& The constitutional convention of 1850 evaded 
 the question of limiting manumission by granting to the 
 legislature the power to " impose such restrictions and con 
 ditions it shall deem proper upon the power of slave-owners 
 to emancipate their slaves," a power which the legislature 
 had always been understood to have. 130 The law of 1806 
 was reenacted at various times after its first enactment, with 
 such changes as were deemed necessary to improve its 
 effectiveness, and in 1850 it was embodied in the new con 
 stitution and remained a part of the constitutional law of 
 the State till the overthrow of the slavery regime. 
 
 The adoption in 1806 of a new policy respecting manu- 
 
 128 Acts, 1832-1833, p. 14. Large appropriations ($30,000) were 
 made by the legislature in 1850 and 1853 for the purpose of coloniz 
 ing the free colored population (ibid., 1840-1850, p. 7; 1852-1853, p. 
 58). But so few were the numbers of Virginia negroes actually 
 colonized in comparison with the entire free negro population of the 
 State that Virginia colonization may be said to have been an abso 
 lute failure. During the three years in which the law of 1850 was in 
 operation only 419 free blacks and slaves were sent from Virginia to 
 Africa, and of the $90,000 available for colonization purposes only 
 $5410 was used. Prior to 1854 only 2800 colored persons in all had 
 been sent from Virginia to Africa. After 1853 the annual appro 
 priation of $30,000 was never consumed upon the transportation of 
 emigrants. For the fiscal year ending October I, 1858, only $2100 
 was expended by the colonization board and only 42 negroes were 
 sent out (Message of Governor Johnson, in House Journal, 1853- 
 1854, p. 15; House Documents, 1859-1860, no. 5, p. 407). 
 
 129 House Journal, 1839, p. 247 ; 1842-1843, p. 28 ; 1852-1853, p. 83 ; 
 1855-1856, pp. 112, 436; 1857-1858, p. 262; Journals of the Senate 
 of the Commonwealth of Virginia, 1857-1858, p. 668, cited as Senate 
 Journal. 
 
 130 Journal, Acts and Proceedings of the Convention of 1850, p. 
 327; Constitution of 1850, sec. 3 on Slaves and Free Negroes. 
 
MANUMISSION 75 
 
 mitted slaves should be considered as the point of division 
 between two stages in the progress of manumission in Vir 
 ginia. The actual operation of the law was, however, only 
 one of several causes of the decline which occurred about 
 that time in the frequency of manumissions. First among 
 the causes which resulted in a decreased disintegration of 
 slavery early in the century was the growth of an anti- free- 
 negro sentiment which acted as powerfully to determine the 
 action of individual slave-owners as it did to determine leg 
 islation. Not a few of these persons were becoming con 
 verted to the opinion expressed in the editorial columns of 
 the Richmond Recorder that "there never was a madder 
 method of sinking property, a method more hostile to the 
 safety of society than the freak of emancipating negroes." 131 
 Even from the point of view of the slave s welfare, honest 
 reflection upon the hard conditions economic, social, and 
 legal of free negroes, whether they remained in the State 
 or attempted to emigrate, caused masters of benevolent in 
 tentions to hesitate long before surrendering a slave to his 
 own care. The feeling of this class of slave-owners was 
 well expressed by Thomas Jefferson in 1814: "Men of this 
 color are by their habits, rendered as incapable as children 
 of taking care of themselves and are promptly extinguished 
 whenever industry is necessary for raising the young. In 
 the meantime they are pests in society by their idleness and 
 the depredations to which this leads them." 132 
 
 In the second place, among the causes of the decline in 
 the frequency of manumissions must be reckoned the re 
 straining effect of the law annexing banishment as an 
 attendant condition. "This law," wrote the Powhatan 
 Colonization Society, "has restrained many masters from 
 giving freedom to their slaves and has thereby contributed 
 
 131 Richmond Recorder, November 10, 1802. This issue contains 
 a lengthy and animated discussion of the vicious character of the 
 free negro and the dangers of manumission. 
 
 tsa Randall, Life of Jefferson, vol. iii, p. 644. Compare also John 
 Burk s statement in 1804 that "the first loss to be sustained by an 
 emancipation is not the greater bar to this desirable end" (The 
 History of Virginia, vol. i, p. 212 n.). 
 
76 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 to check the growth of an evil already too great and formid 
 able." 133 Richard Hildreth, writing in 1856, asserts that 
 under the act of 1782 manumissions were very numerous, 
 "and but for the subsequent re-enactment [in 1806] of re 
 strictions upon it, the free colored population of Virginia 
 might now exceed the slaves." 134 A petition to the legisla 
 ture from the Richmond Colonization Society attributed 
 entirely to this law the decline of four thousand in the de 
 cennial increase in the free negro population from the first 
 to the second decade of the century. 135 
 
 The Virginia slaves felt keenly their dependence upon 
 those by whom they were reared and for whom they labored. 
 Many of them preferred to continue as slaves in their mas 
 ter s household rather than incur the risk of being sent 
 homeless into a strange land. Lucinda, a negro woman 
 manumitted about 1812 by the last will of Mary Mathews, 
 refused to be moved to Tennessee with other negroes set 
 free by the same will, deliberately remaining in the State 
 long enough to forfeit her freedom and petitioning the leg 
 islature to vest the title to her in William H. Hose. 136 Sam, 
 a negro petitioner, declared to the legislature in 1808 that 
 he preferred slavery to being forced to leave his wife and 
 family, all of whom were slaves. 137 There were many slave 
 owners who considered the question of manumission solely 
 from the standpoint of the welfare of their slaves, and who 
 were therefore temporarily or permanently prevented from 
 conferring upon them a freedom which would deprive them 
 of their only hope of a lawful support. John Randolph of 
 Roanoke, writing in his will in 1819 concerning his slaves, 
 said, " It has a long time been a matter of deepest regret to 
 me that . . . the obstacles thrown in the way by the laws 
 
 133 Memorial to Virginia Legislature, in MS. Petitions, Powhatan 
 County, 182(5?), uncatalogued. 
 
 34 The History of the United States, vol. iii, p. 392. 
 135 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1825, A 9358. 
 138 MS. Petitions, King George County, 1813, 61109. 
 137 MS. Petitions, Essex County, 1808, A 5385. 
 
MANUMISSION 77 
 
 of the land have prevented my emancipating them in my 
 life-time." 138 
 
 Furthermore, many free negroes who owned as slaves in 
 a legal sense their wives and children or their brothers, sis 
 ters, and other relatives were after 1806 deterred from set 
 ting them free when they contemplated the prospect of see 
 ing their dearest friends banished from the State by an 
 enforcement against them of the limited residence law. For 
 example, a colored man named Frank, who resided in Amelia 
 County, had purchased his wife and three children, and, 
 according to the statement of his white neighbors, had " al 
 ways intended that they should be virtually free, although 
 the law prohibited him from making them actually so with 
 out subjecting them to removal from the state." 139 Bowling 
 Clark, a free negro of Campbell County, purchased his wife 
 a few years after the act of 1806 went into operation; but 
 both were declining in years, and both preferred the existing 
 arrangement to one which would have given the wife free 
 dom at the cost of parting husband and wife or of sending 
 both from their home together. 140 Numerous instances could 
 be cited to show that the law annexing banishment as a con 
 dition of manumission exerted a powerful effect in restrain 
 ing the will of black slave-owners. 141 
 
 The third of the causes which deserve notice here in con 
 nection with the general decline in the frequency of manu 
 missions in the nineteenth century is a noteworthy change 
 in the economic aspects of slaveholding. The invention of 
 
 38 The last will and testament of John Randolph of Roanoke set 
 free about three hundred and eighty-five slaves. The document is 
 printed in Garland, vol. ii, p. 150. 
 
 139 In 1809 Frank died, and the only means that remained of sav 
 ing " Patience, the wife, and Philemon, Elizabeth and Henry, the 
 children of the free black man" from sale into slavery was leg 
 islative intervention by private act. The legislature intervened in 
 this case because the purchase by Frank of his family took place 
 before the enactment of the law of 1806. Legislative action was re 
 fused in many similar cases of later date (MS. Petitions, Amelia 
 County, 1809, A 768; Acts, 1809-1810, p. 54). 
 
 140 MS. Petitions, Campbell County, 1815, A 3412. 
 
 141 See MS. Petitions, Fauquier County, 1837, A 5859; and below, 
 pp. 92, 93. The imperfect enforcement of the act of 1806, a subject 
 treated elsewhere in this monograph, did not relieve negroes of the 
 fear of the consequences following violation of it. 
 
/8 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 the cotton gin in 1793 made possible the expansion of the 
 cotton industry in the South. The result of this industrial 
 expansion created a demand for slaves to work in the cotton 
 fields. The abolition of the foreign slave trade in 1808 pro 
 duced the final condition for the rapid growth of a domestic 
 slave trade which eventually resulted in a rise in prices of 
 Virginia slaves. About 1790, "when slave prices reached 
 the bottom of a twenty years decline," 142 the maximum fre 
 quency of manumissions was attained, with the exception 
 of the first few months after the manumission act took 
 effect. Conditions in 1794 were such as to lead Washing 
 ton to say that he believed that slaves would be " found to 
 be a very troublesome species of property ere many years 
 pass over our heads." 143 Any slave-owner having a limited 
 number of acres for tillage might readily become overstocked 
 with slaves and be forced to the alternative of manumitting 
 or selling some of them. 144 In various ways household 
 slaves made demands upon or appeals to their owners for 
 freedom. In competition with these demands was the de 
 mand of the slave market. When the competition of the 
 market was weak, as it was in the last quarter of the eight 
 eenth century, the slave had a better opportunity to pur 
 chase, or to induce a friend to purchase, his freedom, or to 
 appeal with success to the charity of his owner, than when 
 attractive prices were being offered to owners for their sur 
 plus property. 145 
 
 141 U. B. Phillips, " The Economic Cost of Slaveholding in the 
 Cotton Belt," in Political Science Quarterly, vol. xx, p. 257. 
 
 143 Washington to Alexander Spottswood, November 23, 1794, in 
 New York Public Library Bulletin, vol. ii, pp. 14, 15. 
 
 144 Delegates representing slave-owning interests in the constitu 
 tional convention of 1829-1830 feared that delegates from western 
 Virginia desired to see slavery .taxed out of existence. If slaves 
 were to be taxed more heavily, thought Richard Morris, " Either the 
 master must run away from the slaves or the slave from the 
 master." Here we see a recognition of the relation between the 
 freeing of slaves and the paying character of slave property (Pro 
 ceedings and Debates of the Convention, p. 116). 
 
 148 In 1792 a negro man living in King William County died, leav 
 ing a will which directed that so much of his estate as was necessary 
 be used to purchase the freedom of his son, the property of Ben 
 jamin Temple. This illustrates a phase of manumission directly 
 affected by the market price of slaves (Hening, vol. xiii, p. 619). 
 
MANUMISSION 79 
 
 It is important, however, to keep in mind that the change 
 in economic conditions was not a sudden one, and that it was 
 not the sole cause of the decline in the frequency of manu 
 missions. John Fiske overrated the economic phase when he 
 wrote, "After the abolition of the slave-trade in 1808 had 
 increased the demand for Virginia-bred slaves in the states 
 further south the very idea of emancipation faded out of 
 memory." 146 This statement is erroneous both as to the 
 facts and as to the inference that the cause of the change 
 was wholly economic. The personal and human element in 
 the relations of the master and his slaves so often overshad 
 owed the property relation that the disposition which a 
 master would make of his slaves could not be foretold by 
 reference to economic laws. 
 
 The change in the economic value of slaveholding ascribed 
 by Fiske to the early part of the century was in fact more 
 potent in producing the second stage in the decline of manu 
 mission, which began about 1830, than it was in ushering in 
 the first period of decline in the first decade of the century. 
 No great rise in slave prices came about in Virginia before 
 1830 as a result of the growth of the cotton industry. 147 As 
 a result of the decided improvement in slavery as an eco 
 nomic system and of the increasing vehemence of attacks 
 made upon slavery by abolitionists, there arose soon after 
 the great slavery debate in the Virginia legislature in 1832 
 a new school of slavery apologists whose outspoken de 
 fenses of slavery as a beneficial economic and political insti 
 tution represented a new stage in the development of senti 
 ment adverse to manumitting. The man who may be called 
 the founder of this school of proslavery writers was Thomas 
 R. Dew, professor of history and metaphysics in William 
 and Mary College, who reviewed the slavery debate of 1832 
 and wrote an elaborate defense of slavery entitled " Essay 
 on Slavery." Other writers who followed Dew in defend- 
 
 149 Old Virginia and Her Neighbors, vol. ii, p. 191. 
 
 147 W. H. Collins, The Domestic Slave Trade of the Southern 
 States, p. 26 et seq. ; W. Jay, Miscellaneous Writings on Slavery, 
 pp. 266, 267. 
 
8O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 ing slavery upon its merits were George Fitzhugh, 148 Alfred 
 T. Bledsoe, professor of mathematics in the University of 
 Virginia/ 49 Rev. Dr. Thornton Stringfellow, 150 and Edmund 
 Ruffin. 151 
 
 The theory advanced by these writers was that the negro 
 occupied his true and proper economic and political sphere 
 in slavery, and that the correct solution of the race problem 
 was not a plan of gradual emancipation, as was urged by a 
 large minority in the legislature of 1832, but a reduction and 
 continued subjection of the members of the black race to 
 slavery. This view differentiates the part of the nineteenth 
 century before 1832 from the part which came between 1832 
 and 1860, and serves to show by contrast how considerable 
 was the freedom sentiment in Virginia up to 1832. The 
 increase of the free negro population during the decade of 
 1820-1830 was 10,474. From 1830 to 1840 the increase in 
 that class of the population was only 2500. Prior to the 
 Southampton insurrection and the consequent discussion of 
 the slavery question, prevailing opinion regarded slavery as 
 an evil system to be removed as soon as a feasible method 
 could be devised. It was hoped that by manumission the 
 problem of drawing off a certain part of the colored class 
 for colonization would be solved, and that this plan would 
 finally remove the negroes to Africa. A stronger and more 
 general antislavery sentiment existed in Virginia prior to 
 1832 than some writers are disposed to admit. The earnest 
 ness of the debate and the closeness of the vote on an 
 emancipation project in the legislature in 1832 is wrongly 
 regarded by Edward Ingle 152 as a sort of wild expression of 
 fear created by the Southampton insurrection, and not as 
 an expression of normal sentiment. It is true that the in 
 surrection furnished the occasion for the debate of 1832, 
 but the antislavery sentiments expressed fairly represented 
 
 148 " Sociology for the South," and " What Shall be done with 
 the Free Negroes?" 
 149 " Liberty and Slavery." 
 130 " The Bible Argument." 
 
 151 "African Colonization Unveiled." 
 
 152 Southern Sidelights, pp. 265, 266. 
 
MANUMISSION 8 1 
 
 honest views which had persisted up to that time. Anti- 
 slavery sentiments had been uttered in the constitutional 
 convention of 1829-1830 by such men as James Monroe. 163 
 In 1821 Madison declared that the free negroes were " in 
 creasing rapidly from manumissions and from offsprings." 154 
 Again in 1826 he wrote to La Fayette that "manumissions 
 more than keep pace with the outlets provided and that the 
 increase of them is only checked by their [the freedmen] 
 remaining in the country. 155 This obstacle removed and all 
 others would yield to the emancipating disposition." In 
 Madison s opinion, "the tendency was favorable to the cause 
 of universal emancipation." 
 
 In contrast with this view expressed by Madison, which 
 is representative of an attitude toward the slavery question 
 quite extensively held before 1832, we may consider the 
 opinion of a pamphlet writer of the decade of the fifties as 
 indicative of the change in sentiment since 1832. Speak 
 ing of the mistaken philanthropy of the slave-owners of the 
 period of the Commonwealth prior to 1832, he declared that 
 the soil was then especially favorable to the growth of 
 manumission sentiment. " For slavery had come to be gen 
 erally considered as an economical and political evil by a 
 large portion of the intelligent slaveholders in Virginia. It 
 was not until after abolition fanaticism of the Northern 
 people had become both active and malignant, and that Pro 
 fessor Dew s excellent Essay on Slavery (the first impor 
 tant defense of the system off ered in modern days) had been 
 published that the revulsion began. At the present time, 
 there are few intelligent and well informed persons in all 
 Virginia who do not deem negro slavery to be in every 
 respect a beneficial institution." 156 
 
 158 Debates of the Convention, p. 172; Richmond Enquirer, Novem 
 ber 5, 1829. 
 
 54 Madison s Writings, vol. iii, p. 240. 
 
 IM Madison s Writings, vol. iii, pp. 275, 540. For petitions signed 
 by ^ large numbers of citizens pleading, in 1827, in the interest 
 of "citizens who may feel disposed to emancipate their slaves," see 
 MS. Petitions, Frederick, Jefferson, and Berkeley Counties, 1827, 
 A 6495. 
 
 158 "Calx," pp. 4, 5. 
 6 
 
82 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 From what has already been said it should appear clear 
 that the periods in the history of manumission from 1782 to 
 1865 were marked rather by changes in sentiment than by 
 changes in laws. The act of 1782 authorizing manumission 
 by the will or other instrument of writing remained in full 
 force to the close of the Civil War. 157 By way of compar 
 ing the three stages in manumission sentiment under the act 
 of 1782 it may with tolerable accuracy be stated that the 
 chances of manumission of a slave living in Virginia through 
 the generation preceding 1800 were about ten in a hundred; 
 of one living through the period from 1800 to 1832, about 
 four or five in a hundred; and of one living after 1832, 
 about two in a hundred. 
 
 On a basis of sentiment or of the frequency with which 
 manumissions occurred there may be said to be three stages 
 in the progress of manumissions during the period of the 
 Commonwealth, but from the standpoint of legal processes 
 and regulations of manumission the period from 1782 to 
 1865 is but one period. 
 
 The act of 1782 imposed upon slave-owners who manu 
 mitted slaves over forty-five years of age the duty of pro 
 viding for their maintenance, in order that they might not 
 become charges upon the public. 158 In 1792 a revision of 
 the act of 1782 was deemed necessary to the proper protec 
 tion of creditors. A qualifying clause was appended to the 
 provisions of the original act which made any manumitted 
 slave liable to be taken by execution to satisfy the debts 
 contracted by his former master previous to the date of 
 manumission. 159 In several important cases the supreme 
 
 UT It seems an inexcusable error on the part of Henry Wilson that 
 he should have asserted in his History of the Rise and Fall of the 
 Slave Power that the act of 1782 remained in force for only ten 
 years, and that after its provisions were repealed, "that source of 
 just and humane individual action being forcibly stopped, gradually 
 dried up and ceased to flow" (vol. i, p. 20). See Code (1849), 459 
 n., for a statement by the compiler that " the right to emancipate 
 has continued ever since [1782] ; and the validity and effect of in 
 struments of emancipation have been passed upon in many cases." 
 
 168 See deed executed by Samuel Tinsley, 1792, in MS. Deeds of 
 Henrico County, no. 4, p. 212. 
 
 159 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 128. 
 
MANUMISSION 83 
 
 court of appeals held that "the right to emancipate slaves 
 is subordinate to the obligation to pay debts previously con 
 tracted by express will of the statute." 100 In 1805 certain 
 negroes set free by a deed of gift from their owner were, in 
 pursuance of a decision of the supreme court of appeals, 
 taken in execution for the satisfaction of the debts of the 
 slave-owner s wife, notwithstanding the fact that the ne 
 groes belonged to their owner before he married the wife 
 for whose debts the negroes were held. 161 All other forms 
 of property, personal or real, had to be applied to the pay 
 ment of debts before execution could be made upon liber 
 ated slaves; and if the amount of indebtedness remaining 
 could be paid by hiring out the liberated negroes of the debtor, 
 they were deprived of freedom only as long as was nec 
 essary to raise the required amount. No statute of limita 
 tions could be appealed to by negroes who had been in peace 
 ful possession of their freedom for five, ten, or apparently 
 any number of years to stop an execution upon them for 
 the debts of their owner contracted before the liberation. 162 
 Under the provisions of the act of 1782 and of every later 
 revision of that act, manumissions could be made by last 
 will and testament or by other instrument of writing prop 
 erly attested and proved. Written instruments of manu 
 mission other than wills were generally called " deeds of 
 manumission " or " deeds of emancipation." Strictly speak 
 ing, such instruments were not deeds, because they imported 
 no transfer of property from one to another, but they bore 
 a close analogy to deeds. Referring to this analogy, a judge 
 of the supreme court of appeals in Thrift v. Hannah said: 
 "A deed is a writing sealed and delivered. Proof or ac 
 knowledgment in court is to an instrument of emancipation 
 what delivery is to a deed at common law." 163 In imitation 
 
 160 Dunn v. Amey, I Leigh, 465 (1829); Jincey et al. v. Winfield 
 Administrators, 9 Grattan, 708 (1853). 
 
 161 Woodley v. Abby, 5 Call, 336. See also Patty v. Colin, i Hen- 
 ing and Munford, 519 (1807). 
 
 162 Woodley v. Abby, 5 Call, 336; Patty v. Colin, i Hening and 
 Munford, 519 (1807). 
 
 163 Thrift v. Hannah, 2 Leigh, 330. 
 
84 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 of deeds or indentures conveying property from one to 
 another, such instruments of manumission usually stipulated 
 a pecuniary consideration. Even when the act of the master 
 was purely an act of benevolence, it was the practice to 
 stipulate some such nominal consideration as five shillings, 16 * 
 one dollar, 165 or five dollars. 166 Deeds of manumission were 
 in frequent use between 1782 and 1800 by persons of very 
 decided antislavery views, 167 as, for example, the Quakers. 
 Though of less frequent occurrence in the deed-books of 
 the nineteenth century, deeds of emancipation were used by 
 free negroes who purchased and set free their relatives and 
 friends, or by masters who agreed with their slaves to set 
 them free upon payment of a certain sum of money. 
 
 The most common type of deeds of emancipation is ex 
 emplified by the following instrument, taken from the court 
 records of Henrico County: 
 
 To all whom these presents may come know ye, that I Peter 
 Hawkins a free black man of the City of Richmond having pur 
 chased my wife Rose, a slave about twenty-two years of age and 
 by her have had a child called Mary now about 18 mo. old, for the 
 love I bear toward my wife and child have thought proper to eman 
 cipate them and for the further consideration of five shillings to me 
 in hand paid ... I emancipate and set free the said Rose and Mary 
 . . . and relinquish all my right title and interest and claim whatso 
 ever as slaves to the said Rose and Mary. 
 
 PETER HAWKINS (Seal) 168 
 
 From the standpoint of proslavery men of the nineteenth 
 century, manumission by last will and testament was the 
 method most likely to be abused. It was certainly the 
 method which remained in most common use throughout 
 the entire period of the Commonwealth. When a slave 
 owner recognized that he was approaching the end of life, 
 
 64 MS. Deeds of Henrico County, no. 2, pp. 569, 574; no. 6, p. 274. 
 
 165 Ibid., no. 7, p. 205. 
 
 166 Ibid., no. 7, p. 454. 
 
 167 Betsey Barlow, who from benevolent motives freed her slaves 
 by deed in 1789, gave them not only freedom but new names : " I 
 set free Jacob and Sarah to whom I give the names Jacob Holland 
 and Sarah Marnick" (MS. Deeds of Northampton County, 1785- 
 1794, P- 291). Manumitted slaves often assumed the surnames of 
 their former owner. 
 
 168 MS. Deeds of Henrico County, 1800, no. 6, p. 78. 
 
MANUMISSION 85 
 
 he was likely to give serious consideration to his duty to 
 his own slaves, regardless of his views respecting slavery in 
 general. There remained to him only one appropriate way 
 of acknowledging his debt of gratitude for the long, patient, 
 and faithful service of the slaves of his household. Con 
 fronted with the alternative of dying ingrate or bequeathing 
 to their servants freedom from bondage, many masters 
 chose the latter course, and down to the Civil War the wills 
 of slave-owners frequently contained such a clause as, " I 
 give unto my negro her freedom on account of her faithful 
 ness of service." 169 Giles Fitzhugh, a descendant of a long 
 line of slave-owners, freed all his slaves by his last will in 
 J^SS- 170 A will of manumission sometimes represented a 
 tardy effort or last resort to ease a goaded conscience. John 
 Randolph of Roanoke wrote in his last will, " I give to my 
 slaves their freedom to which my conscience tells me they 
 are justly entitled." 171 Edmund Ruffin, lamenting in 1859 
 the abuse of testamentary manumissions by slave-owners of 
 " sensitive or feeble minds, or morbidly tender consciences 
 . . . especially of wealthy old men and old women," saw in 
 the motives of such slave-owners a resemblance to the mo 
 tives appealed to by priests in the dark ages " when inducing 
 rich sinners to smooth and pay their future pass to Heaven. 
 
 168 MS. Wills of Norfolk County, 1836-1868, p. 66. The will of 
 J. A. Schwartz, of Nottoway County, affords a striking illustration 
 of the way in which the reflections of slave-masters in their last ill 
 ness often impelled them to acknowledge their debt of gratitude to 
 their slaves while theie was opportunity. With his slaves standing 
 around him as he lay upon his death-bed, Schwartz questioned them 
 separately before dictating orally what was intended for his will in 
 respect to them. 
 
 " Bob, do you wish to be freed? " 
 
 " I am willing to serve you, but I had rather be freed than have 
 another master," said Bob. 
 
 " He should be free," answered the master. 
 
 When a similar conversation had taken place between Frank and 
 the dying man with a like result, Polly enquired : " What are you 
 going to do for poor me?" "Polly and her children," said he, 
 "should be free" (3 Leigh, 142). 
 
 170 A. Crozier, Virginia County Records, vol. vii, p. no. 
 
 171 Garland, vol. ii, p. 150. This last act of Randolph, liberating 
 about three hundred and eighty-five slaves, was referred to by oppo 
 nents of testamentary manumission as " the shocking example of 
 John Randolph" (Ingle, p. 266). 
 
86 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 Such emancipations have been made in great amount and in 
 many cases, and not only by the unquestionably benevolent 
 and pious . . . but also by persons whose lives and actions, 
 both as men and as masters, had indicated anything but piety, 
 benevolence, or even a just and good treatment of their 
 slaves/ 172 
 
 The last will and testament was naturally the legal instru 
 ment selected by a slave-owner of moderate antislavery 
 views who wished to retain the services of his negroes during 
 his life, but desired at the same time to guarantee them, by 
 providing for their freedom at his death, against being sold 
 with his estate or separated from their homes and each 
 other. The testamentary method served equally well the 
 master who wished to " lend " his slaves to his heirs for a 
 fixed period during the lifetime of the heirs or until the 
 slaves should arrive at a certain age. 173 " Manumission in 
 future " was the term applied to the act of a master whose 
 will provided for the freedom of his slaves at a specified 
 time after his death. 
 
 Slave-owners making wills of manumission in future 
 often attempted to affix conditions to the possession of free 
 dom by their slaves. A condition precedent to the manu 
 mission was held by the courts to be valid, that is to say, a 
 master by his will could make the freedom of a slave depend 
 upon some act or condition of the slave or upon some event, 
 if such act, condition, or event was to be determined before 
 the slave s freedom began. A condition subsequent was 
 invalid. If a master manumitted his slave upon condition 
 that the slave serve him for hire or otherwise after acquir 
 ing freedom or that the negro s children be slaves, the manu- 
 
 172 E. Ruffin, African Colonization Unveiled, p. 9. 
 
 173 James Johnson, of Louisa County, made his will in 1785, be 
 queathing to his wife all his negroes during her lifetime. After her 
 death the negroes were to be set free upon attaining the age of 
 twenty-one years (10 Leigh, 277). John E. Taylor in his last will 
 said : " I lend my slaves Margaret, Bridget, Ben, George, John and 
 Sandy to my wife Keziah and my daughter Margaret during their 
 natural lives, but in the event of the death of my said wife and 
 daughter, I do hereby emancipate them and their issue forever" 
 (MS. Wills of Norfolk County, 1836-1868, p. 25). 
 
MANUMISSION 8/ 
 
 mission was valid, but the conditions stipulated were of no 
 effect or force. 174 Any effort to control or direct the con 
 duct of a negro after manumission or to put him in a status 
 intermediate between slavery and freedom was futile. 175 
 Some wills conditioned the freedom of slaves upon the 
 choice or election of the slaves when they arrived at certain 
 ages or when certain conditions were fulfilled. Until 1858 
 such wills were treated by the courts as valid. 176 In the 
 case of Baily et al. v. Poindexter the supreme court of ap 
 peals, contrary to the sentiment of the legal profession, ruled 
 that slaves had no legal capacity even to choose to be free, 
 and that allowing them such choice did not manumit them 
 or provide for their manumission. 177 
 
 m Minor, vol. i, p. 167. John Fitzgerald of Petersburg bequeathed 
 freedom to a female slave with the reservation that her children 
 should be slaves. When the instrument came for construction by 
 appeal to the supreme court in 1827, it was held that the children 
 of the woman set free were free and in no way under the control 
 of their mother s former owner (Fulton v. Shaw, 4 Randall, 597). 
 It was different in the case of children born of a slave-woman at 
 any time before she had a right, according to the provisions of 
 the will, to her freedom. Such children were slaves (Maria et al. 
 v. Surbough, 2 Randall, 228). 
 
 175 A will recorded in 1847, reading " I bequeath my negro girl 
 Eliza to daughter Jimmey after the decease of my wife, not as a 
 bond slave, but to be under her care and tuition" was held to be 
 void of effect even to manumit the slave girl (2 Grattan, 227). 
 
 176 Pleasants v. Pleasants, 2 Call, 319; Elder v Elder s Executor, 
 4 Leigh, 252 ; Dawson v. Dawson s Executor, 10 Leigh, 602. 
 
 177 14 Grattan, 132. See also Williamson v. Coalter s Executors, 
 14 Grattan, 394. Minor, vol. i, p. 160. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 The legal status of free individuals is involved in the 
 usual two-fold relation of persons to the state, that of 
 receiver of protection and security from the government, 
 and that of active participant in its affairs. Considering 
 the status of the free negro in this double relation, the ques 
 tion which first demands an answer is, What protection was 
 afforded him in rights of property and in the enjoyment of 
 life and liberty? 
 
 The common-law right to own and to alienate property 
 was at an early date recognized as belonging to free negroes, 
 and it suffered fewer limitations in their possession than any 
 other of the rights generally regarded as fundamental to a 
 free status. In the " order-book " of the county court of 
 Accomac for 1632-1640 is an order "that Francis the negare 
 shall have his chist wch he clameth now being in the house 
 of John Foster in case there be noe lawful reason shown to 
 the contrary betwine this and the next courte alledged." 1 
 Contracts involving the recognition of full rights of free 
 negroes to personal property were recorded in the county 
 courts as early as 1645. 2 Among the early Virginia land 
 patents are a number representing grants to negroes of from 
 fifty to five hundred acres to be held in fee simple. The 
 first of such grants made to a negro of which we have any 
 record was one of two hundred and fifty acres to Anthony 
 Johnson of Northampton County in 1651 as "head-rights" 
 on the importation of five persons into the colony. 3 Other 
 examples in this and other counties could be cited. 4 Among 
 
 1 Transcribed copy in the Virginia State Library, p. 152. 
 8 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1645-1651, pp. 83, 
 131; above, pp. 27, 28 n. 
 
 3 MS. Land Patents of Virginia, 1643-1651, p. 326. 
 4 See above, p. 38. 
 
 88 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 89 
 
 the deeds of York County for the year 1664 is one convey 
 ing a tract of land 5 from a white man to a negro. The 
 county court of the same county held in 1660 that a free 
 negro was capable of receiving property by bequest. 6 
 
 The right of free negroes to property, personal and real, 
 thus amply recognized in the seventeenth century, was pre 
 served by the courts throughout the entire period under re 
 view. In the case of Parks v. Hewlett, 7 decided in 1838, 
 the supreme court of appeals says: "He [the free negro] is 
 at once entitled to acquire and enjoy property. His person 
 is under the protection of the laws, and he has a right to 
 sue for injuries done to person or to property. He may 
 even acquire lands and hold slaves and will transmit them 
 by inheritance to his children." In 1858, when the laws no 
 longer allowed free negroes to acquire slaves except by de 
 scent, the courts still upheld the property rights of free 
 negroes by holding that when a bequest of slaves was made 
 to persons in trust for free negroes, the slaves must be sold 
 or exchanged for a kind of property which free negroes 
 could lawfully possess, and that the proceeds of the sale 
 must be distributed among the free negroes according to the 
 provisions of the will. 8 
 
 Free negroes owning property transferred it by deed or 
 transmitted it by will just as did white persons. 9 Courts of 
 record and probate were open to them for recording legal 
 evidences of sale or transfer of property, 10 and upon the 
 
 5 MS. Court Records of York County, 1664-1672, p. 327, in Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
 " Itt is ordered yt John Negro servant to Thomas Whitehead 
 Dec d be and is hereby declared Free and that he have his cattle 
 & other things belonging to him delivered (to him) according to ye 
 Dec d Will & Costs" (MS. Court Records of York County, 1657- 
 1662, pp. 211, 217, in Virginia State Library). 
 
 7 9 Leigh, 511. 
 
 8 14 Grattan, 251. 
 
 9 Hening, vol. xiii, p. 619. 
 
 10 In 1829 William Yates, a free negro, died leaving a will by 
 which he gave his " estate real and personal," after payment of his 
 debts, to Henry Edloe and Robert McCandlish in trust for his wife 
 Maria, who was his slave, to be paid over to her as soon as she 
 could be freed and be allowed to remain in the State. The will was 
 admitted to probate, and an administrator was appointed to carry 
 out its provisions (3 Grattan, 330). 
 
90 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 courts devolved the duty of seeing that estates of intestates 
 were lawfully administered for the benefit of the rightful 
 heirs. In the case of Hepburn v. Dundas, 11 by the authority 
 of the highest court of the State the rights of collateral heirs 
 to the estate of a free negro who died intestate and without 
 children were fully asserted. The agency of the courts, 
 either of common law or equity, was resorted to with no 
 unusual difficulties by free negroes in the enforcement of 
 bequests of property to them. 12 
 
 The inviolability of the property rights of free negroes 
 was an effective argument against the frequent proposals 
 to remove the entire free negro population from the State. 
 In the legislature of 1832 General Brodnax affirmed that the 
 free negroes, in the event of deportation, could easily dis 
 pose of their small holdings. But Marshall, who opposed 
 forcible deportation, declared that there are those "who have 
 property which they must dispose of before leaving the 
 country. Will you force them to bring their property into 
 market all at once to be sacrificed by one precipitate sale ? " 1S 
 The argument prevailed against those who favored the 
 measure, and the bill was lost. 
 
 In order that certain individuals might have time to dis 
 pose of property left them by their deceased masters, nu 
 merous private acts were passed by the legislature granting 
 them permission to remain in the State contrary to the law 
 of i8o6. 14 In 1842 a House of Delegates bill to prohibit 
 free negroes from acquiring real estate met with but slight 
 consideration. 15 
 
 The most remarkable property right possessed by free ne 
 groes was the right to acquire, own, and alienate slaves. 
 Indeed, for more than twenty years from the time when 
 free negroes first appear in the courts there was no legal 
 
 11 13 Grattan, 219. 
 
 12 Dunlap v. Harrison, 14 Grattan, 251. 
 
 "Richmond Enquirer, February 14, 1832. 
 
 "Acts, 1821-1822, p. 85; 1828-1829, p. 157; 1829-1830, p. 134; 
 1830-1831, p. 306; 1832-1833, pp. 198, 199. The law of 1806 here 
 referred to required slaves manumitted after May I, 1806, to leave 
 the State within twelve months. See above, p. 45, 45 n. 
 
 15 House Journals, 1841-1842, pp. 66, 114, 162. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 9! 
 
 restriction upon their right to own indentured white ser 
 vants. Such a reversal of the usual order may have been 
 in a few cases actually attempted, for in 1670 a law was 
 enacted which declared that " noe negro or Indian though 
 baptized and enjoyned their own ffreedome shall be capable 
 of any purchase of Christians, but yet not debarred from 
 buying any of their owne nation." 18 There is on record in 
 the Northampton County court-house a clear case of the 
 ownership by a free negro of a negro servant as early as 
 
 i655- 17 
 
 Not before 1832 were free negroes forbidden to own ne 
 gro slaves. That this right was quite commonly exercised, 
 notably in the nineteenth century, is a fact well supported 
 by evidence. It was not unusual among the free colored 
 people for one member of the family to hold one or more 
 of the other members in legal bondage. The following in 
 denture of 1795 illustrates this form of slavery: 
 
 Know all men of these presents that I, James Radford of the 
 county of Henrico for and in consideration of the sum of thirty- 
 three pounds current money of Virginia to me in hand paid by 
 George Radford (a black freeman) of the city of Richmond . . . 
 hath bargained and sold unto George Radford one negro woman 
 aggy, To have and to hold the said negro slave aggy unto the said 
 George Radford his heirs and assigns forever. 
 
 JAMES RADFORD (Seal) 18 
 
 Equally instructive is the following " Deed of sale of 
 slaves to a freeman " of the same date : 
 
 Know all men of these presence that I David A. Jones of Amelia 
 County of the one part have for and in consideration of the sum 
 of five hundred dollars granted unto Frank Gromes a black man 
 of the other part a negro woman named Patience and two children 
 by name Phil & Betsy to have and to hold & to hold the above 
 
 19 Hening, vol. ii, p. 280. The act of 1748 concerning servants and 
 slaves declared "that no negroe, mulatto, or Indian although a 
 Christian or any Jew, Moor, Mohametan or other infidel shall at any 
 time purchase any Christian servants nor any other except their 
 own complexion, or such as by this act are declared slaves: and 
 if any of the persons aforesaid shall nevertheless presume to pur 
 chase a Christian white servant, such servant shall immediately be 
 come free, and be held deemed and taken" (ibid., vol. v, p. 550). 
 
 1T MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 226; 
 above, pp. 32, 33. 
 
 18 MS. Deeds of Henrico County, no. 5, p. 585. 
 
92 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 named negroes to the only proper use, behalf and benefit of him 
 and his heirs forever. 
 
 DAVID JONES (Seal) 19 
 
 Free negro men often thus purchased their slave wives, 
 and, fearful of residence prohibitions upon manumitted ne 
 groes, held their wives and children as their bond slaves. 20 
 Free negro women sometimes purchased their slave hus 
 bands to subject them to a more agreeable bondage, them 
 selves becoming in an unusual sense their mistresses and 
 owners. 21 Daughters were sometimes the property of their 
 mothers, as in the case of Janette Wood, of Richmond, who 
 in the year 1795 was emancipated by her mother " for and 
 in consideration of natural love." 22 John Sabb of Rich 
 mond in the year 1801 purchased his aged father-in-law, 
 Julius, and manumitted him for the nominal sum of five 
 shillings. 23 
 
 Prior to 1806 the purchase of one member of a family 
 by another was usually soon followed by a deed of manu 
 mission, but after an act 24 of that year had made illegal the 
 continued residence of negroes manumitted after May I, 
 1806, the relation of master and slave within free negro 
 
 19 MS. Petitions, Amelia County, A 768. 
 
 20 A free negro of Prince William County, Daniel Webster by 
 name, being sixty years of age and expecting soon to die, petitioned 
 the legislature to permit his wife and children to remain in Virginia 
 contrary to the law of 1806, which required slaves manumitted there 
 after to leave the State within twelve months. During his life he 
 had avoided the evil consequences of this law to the members of his 
 family by continuing to own them as his slaves; but at his death 
 the danger of their being sold by an administrator was more threat 
 ening than the danger of removal from the State, and he wished 
 to manumit them (MS. Petitions, Prince William County, 1812). 
 
 21 In 1828 Phil Cooper and his wife, free people of color, petitioned 
 the legislature for a law permitting the husband to reside in Vir 
 ginia. His wife owned him as her slave, but wished to manumit 
 him provided that he might live in the State (MS. Petitions, Glou 
 cester County, A 6987). See also Lower Norfolk County Virginia 
 Antiquary, vol. iv, p. 177, for statement concerning Betsy Fuller, a 
 free negro huckstress of Norfolk, who owned her husband. Upon 
 the approach and outbreak of the Civil War the slave husband was 
 loud in the expression of southern views, and evidently was indiffer 
 ent as to his emancipation. 
 
 22 MS. Deeds of Henrico County, no. 4, p. 692. 
 29 Ibid., no. 6, p. 274. 
 
 ^Hening, vol. xvi, p. 252. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 93 
 
 families became quite common. A petition of a slave wo 
 man, Ermana, to the legislature of 1839 stated that her 
 husband had been a free man of color, that he had died 
 intestate, and that she, her children, and her property had 
 escheated to the literary fund. She prayed that the right of 
 the fund to her and to her property be relinquished. 25 Sally 
 Dabney, a slave of her husband, was bequeathed property 
 by his will as if she had been free. The testator died 
 without heirs. The wife, being a slave, was not competent 
 to receive the bequest; hence the property escheated to the 
 literary fund. The question arose as to whether the wife 
 also should not be sold for the benefit of the fund, and an 
 act of the legislature was passed to release the claims of the 
 State to her. 26 ,^J*. V 
 
 In the exercise of their legal right to own slaves black 
 masters did not always confine themselves to the purchase 
 of their kindred for beneficent purposes. Some negroes 
 purchased and held slaves with the same considerations of 
 profit in view as governed the actions of white owners of 
 slaves. An example in the seventeenth century is that of 
 John Casor, a negro, who was by order of a county court re 
 manded to the service of Anthony Johnson, a negro free 
 holder. 27 Judith Angus, a well-to-do free negress of Peters 
 burg, owned two slave girls as her personal servants. At 
 her death she left a will, dated 1832, by which she disposed 
 in regard to these two girls as follows : " My servants Jimmy 
 and Docy shall work until they obtain money enough to 
 enable them to leave the state and thereby secure their free 
 dom according to the laws of Virginia. In the event of 
 their remaining here, they shall belong to my son Moses." 28 
 Against a free negro who held another negro in slavery 
 could be used only such legal remedies as could be used 
 
 23 It is probable that all the relatives of the deceased man were 
 slaves; hence his property escheated to the State (House Journal, 
 1839, p. 21). 
 
 28 Acts, 1834-1835, p. 242. 
 
 27 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, p. 226; 
 above, pp. 32, 33. 
 
 28 MS. Petitions, Dinwiddie County, 1833, A 5123. 
 
94 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 against a white master. Mary Quickley, a free black wo 
 man of Richmond, held as her slave a woman named Sarah. 
 Suit was granted in the hustings court to Sarah against her 
 black mistress only after appointed counsel had inquired 
 into the claims of Sarah based upon her own free status. 
 Suit was granted at the same time to Sarah s children, who 
 were held by white persons. 29 
 
 Complete as were the free negro s rights in property law 
 fully possessed, he was nevertheless limited in a few re 
 spects as to the kinds of property he could acquire. The 
 limitations imposed were police regulations, and were ap 
 parently not discriminations against the free negro as such. 
 In the ownership of slaves, dogs, firelocks, poisonous drugs, 
 and intoxicants, free negroes were subject to limitations 
 which did not apply to white persons. 
 
 As early as 1670 free negroes were forbidden to own 
 white servants. 30 By an act of 1832 they were declared in 
 capable of purchasing or otherwise acquiring permanent 
 ownership, except by descent, of any slaves other than hus 
 band, wife, and children; contracts for any such purchase 
 were declared void. 31 By the Code of 1849 the limitation 
 was the same, except that parents were included among the 
 persons whom free negroes could acquire. 32 An amend 
 ment of this section, made March 31, 1858, changed the law 
 to read : " No free negro shall be capable of acquiring, ex 
 cept by descent, any slave." 33 There is evidence, however, 
 
 29 " On a petition of Sarah alledging herself illegally detained in 
 slavery by Mary Quickley a free black woman of this city . . . [and 
 on a similar petition of Sarah s children] for leave to sue their 
 owners for freedom in forma pauperis, Ordered that James Rind 
 Gent, be requested to certify his opinion to this court respecting the 
 probable claims of the petitioners . . . which he having done, It is 
 further ordered that they be allowed to sue for their freedom" 
 (Orders of Hustings Court of Richmond, vol. 5> P- 4 1 )- 
 
 30 Hening, vol ii, p. 280. 
 
 31 Acts, 1831-1832, p. 20. The vote by which this bill was passed in 
 the Senate was 15 to 14 (Senate Journal, 1832, p. 176). 
 
 32 Code (1849), P. 458. 
 
 33 Acts, 1857-1858; Code (1860), p. 510. "The object of this law 
 is probably to keep slaves as far as possible under the control of 
 white men only, and prevent free negroes from holding persons of 
 their own race and color in personal subjection to themselves. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 95 
 
 that these laws prohibiting the purchase and sale of slaves 
 by free negroes were not enforced, and that free negroes 
 continued after 1832 to go into the market to purchase 
 slaves for profit. Had it not been so, there would have been 
 no occasion for the repeated propositions made and the laws 
 passed after 1832 to prevent the practice. Moreover, there 
 are persons living who affirm from observation that down 
 to the Civil War some free negroes owned slaves merely 
 in order to profit by them. 34 
 
 Another limitation upon the right of free negroes to own 
 property was that in respect to firearms or other weapons, 
 with which they might themselves do injury, or, by placing 
 them in the hands of slaves, menace the safety of society. 
 An act of 1680 declared that "no negro or other slave" 
 could own or carry a " club, staffe, gunn or any other weapon 
 of defense or offense." 35 In the revision of the laws in 
 1705 the word "negro" was omitted, so that slaves only 
 were forbidden to keep arms. 36 In 1723 free negroes, mu- 
 lattoes, and Indians were forbidden to "keep or carry any 
 gun, powder or shot or any club or other weapon what 
 soever offensive or defensive." Free negro housekeepers 
 and those enrolled in the militia were, however, excepted. 
 
 Perhaps also it is intended to evince the distinctive superiority of 
 the white race" (Opinion of Judge Lee in Dunlop v. Harrison s 
 Executors, 14 Grattan, 260). 
 
 ** Reuben West, a free negro barber who lived in Richmond during 
 the last three decades before the Civil War and paid taxes on real 
 property valued at $4420 (City Tax Books, 1856, 1859), is said 
 by William Mundin, a mulatto barber now living in Richmond, 
 who was born free in 1837, to have purchased a slave house servant. 
 According to the statement of Mundin, who was at that time serv 
 ing an apprenticeship to Reuben West, this woman slave showed 
 toward her black master a spirit of insubordination, and was there 
 fore soon sold by him. James H. Hill, another colored contem 
 porary of Reuben West, asserts that West owned two slaves, and 
 that one of them was a mulatto barber. As far as the statements 
 made by these men in lengthy interviews with the author could be 
 verified in authentic records, they were found to be trustworthy. 
 See also Lower Norfolk County Virginia Antiquary, vol. iv, pp. 
 174-182, for negro slave-owners enumerated in a list, prepared by 
 the commissioners of the revenue, of all slave-owners of Princess 
 Anne County in 1840. 
 5 Hening, vol. ii, p. 481. 
 
 38 Ibid., vol. iii, p. 459. 
 
96 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 Such as lived on frontier plantations could upon application 
 be granted licenses to keep and use one gun. 37 
 
 The acts regulating the enlistment of free negroes in 
 the militia in the eighteenth century show the distrust which 
 was felt of negroes in possession of firearms. The militia 
 act of 1748 declared that "all such free mulattoes, negroes 
 or Indians, as are or shall be listed, as aforesaid, shall ap 
 pear without arms." 38 The substance of this provision was 
 repeated in I755 39 and in I757- 40 The provision was 
 dropped during the Revolution, manifestly for the purpose 
 of permitting free colored men to become soldiers. 41 With 
 the increase of the free negro class and following the dis 
 covery of a negro plot in 1800, the feeling of danger from 
 free negroes in possession of firearms became more intense ; 
 and a law of 1806 forbade any free negro or mulatto, house 
 keeper or otherwise, to " keep or carry any fire-lock of any 
 kind, any military weapon or any powder or lead " without 
 first obtaining a license from the county or corporation 
 court. 42 A free negro caught with a gun or other weapon 
 in violation of this act forfeited the weapon to the informer, 
 and received thirty-nine lashes at the whipping-post. 43 
 
 More rigid still was the law dealing with this subject 
 which was passed in the first session of the legislature after 
 the Southampton insurrection. 44 So much of former acts 
 as permitted justices to grant licenses to free negroes or 
 
 37 Hening, vol. iv, p. 131. 
 88 Ibid., vol. v, p. 17. 
 
 39 Ibid., vol. vi, p. 33. 
 
 40 Ibid., vol. vii, p. 95. 
 
 41 Ibid., vol. ix, p. 27 (1775); vol. ix, p. 268 (1777) ; see below, 
 p. no. 
 
 42 A Norfolk County court in 1820 made the following order: 
 " Upon the application of James Cuffie, a free man of colour, re 
 siding in this county, a license is granted him to keep a gun with 
 ammunition for the protection of his property" (MS. Orders, 
 1819-1820, circa p. 280). Note also the following: "Ordered that 
 the order of this court made the 9th day of August last granting 
 permission to James Harris a free man of colour to carry and use a 
 gun be rescinded" (MS. Minutes of Henrico County, no. 27, p. 516). 
 
 43 Hening, vol. xvi, p. 274. 
 "Acts, 1831-1832, p. 20. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 9/ 
 
 mulattoes to keep or carry a firelock or any powder or lead 
 were by this law repealed. This absolute denial to free 
 negroes of the use of firearms imposed a serious disability 
 upon the farming element of this class. In 1839 Thomas 
 Beasley, a free negro of Giles County, remonstrated to the 
 legislature against this prohibition, saying that the moun 
 tainous frontier country where he lived was infested with 
 wild beasts, and that the law prohibiting free negroes to use 
 firelocks subjected him and his class to a great hardship in 
 that they had no means of protecting their domestic animals 
 and crops. 45 A similar petition, endorsed with the signa 
 tures of eighty white citizens, was presented in 1840 by James 
 and Joseph Viney, free negroes of Giles County. 46 In 
 spite of remonstrances against this law, it remained in force 
 until the Civil War. 47 In 1839 patrols in search of arms 
 unlawfully held were granted authority to force open the 
 doors of such free negroes as were suspected of violating 
 these laws. 48 
 
 The ownership by free negroes of dogs, as of firearms, 
 was objectionable, and for similar reasons. Prowling free 
 negroes accompanied by dogs became a menace, particularly 
 to the sheep-raising industry, 49 and efforts were made in 
 several counties to prevent free negroes from keeping dogs. 
 In 1848 an act forbade free negroes in Mathews County to 
 own dogs. 50 In 1858 a similar law was passed for the coun 
 ties of Essex, King and Queen, James City, and New Kent. 61 
 For passing through or going about in any of these last 
 named counties with a dog a free negro was liable to pun 
 ishment by stripes, not exceeding thirty-nine, and a fine of 
 five dollars. A bill to make general the prohibition through- 
 
 45 MS. Petitions, Giles County, 1839, A 6812. 
 
 " Ibid., 1840, A 6821. 
 
 47 Code (1849), P- 754; Code (1860), p. 816. 
 
 * Acts, 1839, P- 24. 
 
 See a petition to the legislature which represents that both free 
 negroes and dogs kill sheep as they prowl through the neighbor 
 hood (MS. Petitions, Chesterfield County, 1854, A 4321). 
 
 60 Acts, 1847-1848; House Journal, 1847-1848, p. 436. 
 
 51 Acts, 1857-1858, p. 152. 
 
98 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 out the State passed the House of Delegates in 1848, but 
 failed to receive the approval of the Senate. 52 
 
 The laws of Virginia extended their protection not only, 
 as we have already seen, to the property of the free negro, 
 but, as we shall now see, to his life and liberty. In any 
 case in which the freedom of a negro was disputed the bur 
 den of proof was upon the negro to show that he was free. 
 Unlike the recognized principle of English law which de 
 mands that every man be regarded as innocent till his guilt 
 is established by evidence, a free negro taken up and de 
 prived of his liberty as being a slave had, in order to procure 
 his release, to produce evidence that he was not a slave. In 
 1806 George Wythe, chancellor of the State of Virginia, 
 gave as grounds for decreeing the freedom of three persons 
 claimed as slaves that freedom is the birthright of every 
 human being. He laid it down as a general proposition that 
 whenever one person claims to hold another in slavery, the 
 onus probandi lies on the claimant. This application of the 
 Declaration of Independence was completely repudiated by 
 the supreme court of appeals when the case came up for 
 final review. 53 Judge Tucker, who spoke for a unanimous 
 court, asserted that the burden of proof is not upon the 
 claimant, but upon the negro to show that he is free ; whereas 
 with a white man or an Indian held in slavery the burden is 
 with the claimant. 5 * Again, in Fulton s Executors v. Gracey 
 
 "House Journal, 1847-1848, p. 436. In the act incorporating the 
 town of Manchester authority was given to the trustees to prohibit 
 slaves, free negroes, and mulattoes from raising hogs and dogs 
 (Acts, 1843-1844, p. 96). 
 
 Although free negroes were not forbidden to possess poisonous 
 drugs and intoxicating liquors, the sale of these articles to them 
 was a matter of rigid regulation or absolute prohibition (Acts, 
 1855-1856, p. 45; 1857-1858, p. 51). Complaint came to the legisla 
 ture in 1836 that free^negroes were acting as agents for slaves in 
 purchasing ardent spirits from the venders (MS. Petitions, North 
 umberland County, 1836, B 4969). 
 
 "Hudgins v. Wright, I Hening and Munford, 133. 
 
 M In the argument Judge Tucker supposes that " three persons, a 
 black or mulatto man or woman with a flat nose and woolly head; 
 a copper-colored person with long jetty black or straight hair; 
 and one with fair complexion, brown hair, not woolly, nor inclined 
 thereto, with a prominent Roman nose, were brought together before 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 99 
 
 the court declared that " in the case of a person visibly ap 
 pearing to be a white man or Indian the presumption is that 
 he is free, but in the case of a person visibly appearing to 
 be a negro, the presumption is that he is a slave. . . . The 
 plaintiff in a suit for freedom must make out his title 
 against all the world." 55 
 
 The presumption being thus against the freedom of ne 
 groes, there was always a temptation to " divers ill-disposed 
 persons" to force free negroes into slavery by theft, cap 
 ture, or collusion, especially those free negroes whose occu 
 pations were already servile. 56 A law of 1765, designed to 
 prevent this practice, fixed at 70 the penalty for selling as 
 a slave a colored person who was only a servant. 57 In 1788, 
 when the precious character and value of liberty was re 
 ceiving unusual emphasis, a law was enacted which fixed 
 upon persons guilty of stealing or selling as a slave any free 
 negro or mulatto the extreme penalty of death without ben 
 efit of clergy. 58 By the enactments of 1792 the penalty re 
 mained the same, but in the codification of 1819 it was 
 changed from death 59 to imprisonment in the penitentiary 
 for at least two years. 60 An act of 1848 raised the mini 
 mum term to three years, and after that no further change 
 was made in the penalty for this offense. 61 
 
 Far from becoming empty verbiage in our criminal code, 
 these laws received general and often rigorous enforce 
 ment. 62 In the opinion of the general court in Common- 
 
 a judge upon a suit of habeas corpus. . . . How must the Judge act 
 in this ^ase? . . . If the whole case be left with the judge, he must 
 deliver the [white man and the Indian] out of custody, and permit 
 the negro to remain in slavery, until he could produce proof of his 
 freedom." Cf. case of Aron Jackson, in MS. Minutes of Henrico 
 County, no. 27, p. 142. 
 
 55 15 Grattan, 323. 
 
 68 For examples, see Calendar of Virginia State Papers, vol. i, 
 p. 10; ii Leigh, 633; MS. Minutes of Henrico County, no. 27, p. 129. 
 
 67 Hening, vol. viii, p. 133. 
 1 Ibid., vol. xii, p. 531. 
 
 68 Ibid., vol. xiv, p. 127. 
 80 1 Revised Code, 427. 
 
 "Acts, 1847-1848, p. 97; Code (1860), p. 785. 
 62 MS. Minutes of Henrico County, no. 27, p. 129; Commonwealth 
 v. Nix, ii Leigh, 636. 
 
IOO THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 wealth v. Mercer they were not to be construed as a pro 
 tection for a white man who might become the victim of 
 fraud if a free negro should be sold to him as a slave, but 
 their purpose and use was the protection of free negroes in 
 their freedom. 63 In Davenport v. Commonwealth 64 the 
 supreme court of appeals held that kidnapping a free negro 
 without the actual sale constituted the crime against which 
 the law was directed, and, further, that stealing a free negro 
 with felonious intent to appropriate him was criminal, 
 whether the person knew him to be free or not. The ac 
 tivity and interest manifested in the prosecution of viola 
 tors of this law is shown by the proclamation of Governor 
 Lee issued July 8, 1794: 
 
 Whereas I have received information that some wicked and evil- 
 disposed persons . . . did on the night of the 20th of June last 
 feloniously steal and take away two children of Peggy Howell, a 
 free Mulatto living in the county of Charlotte, with a design as is 
 supposed to sell them in some of the neighboring states as slaves, 
 the name and description of which children are contained in the Hue 
 and Cry subjoined, and whereas the rights of humanity are deeply 
 interested in the restoration of the children to their parents, and 
 the good order of society is involved in the punishment of the 
 offenders, I do by and with the advice of the Council of State issue 
 this Proclamation offering a reward of Fifty Dollars for the re 
 covery of each of the said children and the further sum of one 
 hundred dollars for apprehending and securing in the public jail of 
 Charlotte County the offender or offenders. 
 
 HENRY LEE. W 
 
 Against the easy abuse of the principle of presuming 
 slavery from color the liberty of the free negro was further 
 safeguarded by remedial laws of procedure and by a general 
 liberality in the courts in consideration of all claims to free 
 dom. A legally certified register, called by the free negroes 
 
 ^Abram Hirer, a free negro, entered into an agreement with a 
 white man named Mercer to allow himself to be sold as a slave. 
 Hiter, it was planned, would later assert his freedom and share 
 with Mercer the proceeds of the sale. Mercer s act of defrauding 
 the purchaser was not punishable under the law, inasmuch as it in 
 volved no fraud upon the negro (2 Va. Cases, 144). 
 
 64 1 Leigh, 588. 
 
 65 MS. Proclamation Book, p. 53; Calendar of Virginia State 
 Papers, vol. viii, p. 231. See MS. Court Records of Charlotte 
 County, 1794, for proceedings of a court held for the purpose of 
 taking depositions in this case. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO IOI 
 
 " free papers," was sufficient to repel the presumption and 
 to shift the burden of proof to the person denying freedom 
 to its possessor. " To suppose," said the court in Delacy 
 v. Antoine, "that a free negro in possession of regular free 
 papers may be falsely imprisoned without redress is indeed 
 to attribute a gross and lamentable omission to the law. To 
 confine that redress to a suit in forma pauperis to establish 
 his freedom when he already has the conclusive proof of it 
 in his hands would be a mockery. A free negro as well as a 
 free white man must be entitled to the habeas corpus act." 66 
 After 1793 every free negro was required to register in 
 the county or corporation court, and for twenty-five cents 
 was entitled to a copy of the register with the seal of the 
 court annexed, which copy was prima facie evidence of 
 freedom. 67 In the absence of immediate evidence of free 
 dom, a free negro detained as a slave could bring suit in 
 forma pauperis, in which he had the benefit of assigned 
 counsel and which was conducted without cost to the plain 
 tiff. 68 He was protected by the laws against intimidation 
 in his suit from the person claiming to be his master. 69 
 Courts of equity were open to him. 70 Liberal rules of evi 
 dence in suits either in law or equity where freedom was 
 involved were applied. If he had lost his free papers, he 
 could offer evidence that he had once had them. 71 Hear 
 say and reputation were received as evidence of the status 
 of one s ancestors in an effort to establish free birth. 72 An 
 
 66 7 Leigh, 438; cf. 15 Grattan, 256, 323. 
 
 67 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 238; I Revised Code, 440. 
 
 68 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 363; I Revised Code, 481. "On petition of 
 Sarah [and her children] ... It is ordered that they be allowed to 
 sue for their freedom in this court in forma pauperis and James 
 Rind Gent is assigned their counsel to prosecute the said suits and 
 that their owners do not presume to remove, beat or misuse them 
 upon this account, but suffer them to come to the Clerk s office of 
 this court for subpoenas for their witnesses and to attend their ex 
 aminations " (Orders of Hustings Court of Richmond, no. 5, p. 41). 
 
 ^Orders of Hustings Court of Richmond, no. 5, p. 41. 
 
 70 Sam v. Blakemore, 4 Randall, 466; I Hening and Munford, 133. 
 
 71 MS. Minutes of Henrico County, no. 27, p. 503. 
 
 72 In Pegram v. Isabell, a suit for freedom, a witness for the negro 
 testified that he had heard a very old man say that he believed a 
 certain ancestor of Isabell was free. The supreme court of appeals 
 
IO2 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 oft repeated doctrine of the supreme court of appeals was 
 that the laws should be construed as far as possible in favor 
 of freedom. "I will remark," said Judge Campbell, "that 
 this court has often declared that the same strictness as to 
 form will not be required in actions for freedom as in other 
 cases." 73 Judge Roane, speaking for the court in Patty v. 
 Colin in 1807, said : " The spirit of the decisions of this court 
 in relation to suits for freedom, while it neither abandons 
 the rules of evidence nor the rules of law, applying to prop 
 erty, with a becoming liberality, respects the merit of the 
 claim. . . . On this ground it is that parties suing for free 
 dom are not confined to the rigid rules of proceeding and 
 that their claims are not repudiated by the Court as long as 
 a possible chance exists that they can meet with a successful 
 issue." 74 
 
 These special rules of procedure were needed, however, 
 only in cases in which the question of freedom was being 
 tried. " Where there is no contest about that right, but the 
 litigation arises out of other matters it would be absurd to 
 send the petitioner [a free negro] to sue in forma pauperis," 
 said Judge Tucker, in a case before the court in 1836; "the 
 remedy of habeas corpus must of course prevail." 75 A trial 
 upon a writ of habeas corpus could not be denied a free 
 negro if detained or deprived of his liberty by any person 
 not claiming to be his master, 76 as, for example, by a creditor 
 
 held that such evidence was admissible (2 Hening and Munford, 210; 
 cf. Gregory v. Baugh, 2 Leigh, 665, and Hudgins v. Wrights, I Hen- 
 ing and Munford, 134). In 15 Grattan, 314, the supreme court says: 
 " Evidence of her having acted and been generally reputed as a 
 free person is certainly admissible evidence of her freedom." In 
 Fulton s Executors v. Gracey the court held that "any legal evi 
 dence tending to show that the plaintiffs are free tends to repel 
 the presumption arising from color that they are slaves, and is, 
 therefore, admissible" (15 Grattan, 323). 
 
 73 McMichens v. Amos, 4 Randall, 134. 
 
 74 1 Hening and Munford, 519. 
 
 75 7 Leigh, 538. 
 
 "Delacy v. Antoine et al., 7 Leigh, 443 (1836); Rudler s Execu 
 tors v. Ben, 10 Leigh, 467; Shue v. Turk, 15 Grattan, 256; Minor, 
 vol. i, p. 169. In the case of Peter et al. v. Hargrave (5 Grattan, 
 14), tried in 1848, Judge Baldwin said concerning the rights of a 
 free negro, " Against continued force he may invoke the high and 
 summary remedy by writ of habeas corpus." 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 1 03 
 
 of himself or of his former owner ; nor was he handicapped 
 in such cases with the burden of proof or a presumption of 
 guilt against him. Against persons doing him injury or for 
 the enforcement of contracts he could bring suit in any court 
 that was open to any other freeman. 77 In case the decisions 
 of the lower courts were adverse, he could appeal even to 
 the highest court of the State. 78 He could, and often did, 
 petition the legislature when his grievances were such as 
 could not be redressed by the courts. 79 
 
 Prior to 1832, trial by jury was the method of determin 
 ing the guilt or innocence of free negroes charged with 
 crimes. They were regularly indicted or presented by a 
 grand jury, and were entitled to a hearing upon the indict 
 ment before a petit jury. 80 Being indicted, they were al 
 lowed to go at liberty when they could furnish a satisfactory 
 bond to secure their appearance in answer to the indict 
 ment. 81 They were entitled to counsel, could make excep 
 tions in arrest of judgment, and the unanimous consent of 
 
 77 " William Palmer appeared to answer the complaint of Peter 
 Robinson (a free black man) against him for breach of the peace." 
 Palmer was bound under penalty of forfeiture of one hundred 
 dollars " to keep the peace and be of good behavior . . . and par 
 ticularly toward Peter Robinson" (Orders of Hustings Court of 
 Richmond, no. 5, p. 132). The Norfolk County court records (1718- 
 J/JQ) P- *) contain the following entry: "Robert Richards and the 
 rest of the free negroes agst. Lewis Corner Meritt in an action for 
 debt not being prosecuted is dismissed." See also, MS. Orders of 
 Henrico County, no. 6, p. 4, for the case of " David Cowper, a free 
 negro, Pit. against Beltaes Dorish Deft. Suit abated by death of 
 Deft." Also MS. Court Orders of Norfolk County, 1768-1771, 
 p. 257: "Frank (a free negro) against Jane Miller;" and Jeffer 
 son s Reports, go. 
 
 78 Ex parte Morris, n Grattan, 292 (1854), was a case in which a 
 free negro appealed from a corporation court to a circuit court and 
 finally to the supreme court of appeals. Winn s Administrators v. 
 Jones was a case taken on appeal in 1835 by a negro to the supreme 
 court of appeals ; this court sustained his challenge of free negro 
 witnesses used against him in the lower court (6 Leigh, 74). 
 
 "See Calendar of Virginia State Papers, vol. i, p. 10 (1665); 
 Journal of the House of Burgesses, 1760-1769, p. 198: "a petition 
 of the people called mulattoes and free negroes ;" MS. Petitions, 
 Henrico County, 1838, and below, pp. 142-144, for examples of peti 
 tions of free negroes to the state legislature. 
 
 80 John Aldridge v. the Commonwealth, 2 Va. Cases, 447; St. G. 
 Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, pp. 56-58. 
 
 81 Orders of Hustings Court of Richmond, no. n, p. 153- 
 
IO4 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 the jurymen was necessary for conviction. Prior to 1832, 
 in the method of trial for crimes free negroes were on the 
 same footing as white men. 82 
 
 In the first session of the legislature following the South 
 ampton insurrection in 1831, free negroes were denied by 
 statute the right of trial by jury, except for offenses punish 
 able with death. Thereafter they were tried by courts of 
 oyer and terminer, 83 which had been in use since 1692 for 
 the " speedy prosecution of slaves . . . without the sollem- 
 nitie of jury." 84 No fewer than five justices of the county 
 or corporation could sit as a court, and a unanimous decision 
 was necessary for conviction. The decisions of the court, 
 comprehending both the law and the fact, were final. 85 The 
 trial took place within ten days after commitment of the 
 prisoners to jail, and conviction was followed by a speedy 
 execution of the sentence. 88 The substitution of this sum 
 mary method of trial for the former method of trial by jury 
 is indicative of the disfavor into which the free negro had 
 fallen, and represents no small change in his legal status. 
 
 For minor offenses and misdemeanors free negroes suf 
 fered penalties similar to those inflicted upon slaves for 
 similar violations. Throughout the entire period whipping, 
 "not exceeding thirty-nine lashes on the bare back, well 
 laid on," was not an unusual penalty for free negroes as 
 
 83 St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, pp. 56, 57 ; Peter v. 
 Hargrave, 5 Grattan, 12. See Hening, vol. xv, p. 77, on " due course 
 of law" to be pursued in convicting free negroes of conspiracy 
 with slaves. 
 
 88 Acts, 1831-1832, ch. 22, sec. 9; Code (1860), ch. ccxii. An 
 amendment to strike out of the law the clause denying to free 
 negroes jury trial was lost in the Senate by a vote of 9 to 20 (Senate 
 Journal, 1832, p. 177). The act provided that free negroes should 
 be tried by the slave courts " in all cases where the punishment 
 shall be death." Disputes at once arose as to whether this meant 
 offenses for which slaves had suffered death or offenses capital 
 when committed by free negroes. The courts prevented the severity 
 of the law relating to the punishment of slaves from passing to the 
 free negroes by determining that the act changed the method of trial 
 but not the method of punishment (4 Leigh, 652, 658, 661). 
 
 84 Hening, vol. iii, p. 102; vol. iv, p. 127. 
 
 85 1 Revised Code, 428-430 ; Supplement to Revised Code, 248 ; 
 Anderson (Free negro) v. Commonwealth, 5 Leigh, 740. 
 86 1 Revised Code, 428. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO IO5 
 
 well as for slaves. Corporal chastisement was prescribed 
 as a punishment for free negroes in many cases which, had 
 the offender been a white man, would have merited the 
 penalty of a fine. For instance, for importing a free negro 
 a white man was to be imprisoned from six to twelve 
 months and fined not less than five hundred dollars, whereas 
 a free negro for the same offense was to receive not less 
 than twenty nor more than thirty-nine lashes at the public 
 whipping-post. 87 For unlawful destruction of oysters in 
 the tidewater section a white man would under the law be 
 fined fifty dollars, while a free negro would be fined twenty 
 dollars and given thirty-nine lashes on the bare back. 88 For 
 unlawfully harboring a slave a white man and a free negro 
 alike forfeited ten dollars, but if the negro was unable to 
 pay the fine, he was given thirty-nine lashes instead. 89 In 
 many such instances the law openly discriminated against the 
 free negro, making his punishments more severe than those 
 inflicted upon white freemen, while the shield given to slaves 
 in their misdemeanors by the disciplinary authority of the 
 master rendered the liability to public punishments of the 
 slave less than that of the free negro. The free negro 
 was the individual for whom the laws seem to have been 
 intended, and to him they were applied with peculiar rigor. 
 For the more serious offenses, that is, for grand larceny 
 and other felonies, the punishments to be administered to 
 free negroes and whites were for the most part the same. 
 A notable discrimination was introduced in 1823 when 
 crime among the free negroes was believed to be rapidly 
 increasing, and the penitentiary system was receiving blame 
 for a lack of restraint on and moral improvement of this 
 class of the population. 90 The legislature enacted that free 
 negroes previously punishable with imprisonment in the 
 
 87 Acts, 1833-1834, p. 78. 
 
 " Ibid., 1836-1837, P. 56. 
 
 89 Hening, vol. xv, p. 77. "They are subjected to restraints and 
 surveillance in points beyond number" (Howison, vol. ii, p. 460). 
 
 90 Report of the Superintendent of Penitentiary, in Documents of 
 the House of Delegates, 1848-1849, no. 15, cited as House Docu 
 ments. 
 
IO6 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 penitentiary for terms of more than two years were there 
 after to be whipped, transported, and sold into slavery be 
 yond the limits of the United States. 91 This act was con 
 strued to mean that any free negro found guilty of a crime 
 for which the maximum penalty prescribed was more than 
 two years, even though the minimum might be only six 
 months, should be whipped and sold as a slave. Thus con 
 strued, the act included within its scope almost every crime, 
 except petty larceny, committed by free negroes. Public 
 sentiment disapproved of this inhuman law, and forced its 
 repeal, although thirty-five negroes were transported and 
 sold into slavery during the four years that it remained in 
 force. 92 In 1828 imprisonment in the penitentiary was 
 again resorted to as a punishment for free negroes, but five 
 years was made the shortest term for which a free negro 
 could be sentenced, whereas two years was the minimum 
 for white persons. 93 In 1833 proposals to make more severe 
 the penalties upon free negroes were voted down in the 
 House of Delegates as inexpedient. 94 The penal code of 
 1848 made uniform for all free persons the penalties for 
 most criminal offences. 95 A final discrimination was intro 
 duced in 1860 by an act which provided that free negroes 
 convicted of crimes punishable by sentence to the peni 
 tentiary could at the discretion of the court be sold into per 
 petual slavery. 96 
 
 The right to go from place to place without hindrance 
 might well be regarded as a right fundamental to real free 
 dom, yet in few other respects was the liberty of free ne- 
 
 91 Acts, 1822-1823, p. 36. The constitutionality of this act was 
 passed upon and maintained by the general court of the State in 
 the case of John Aldridge (free negro) v. the Commonwealth, 2 
 Va. Cases, 447. 
 
 92 Reports of the Superintendent of Penitentiary, in House Docu 
 ments, no. 15, 1848-1849, and no. 4, 1853-1854, p. 45; W. B. Giles, 
 comp., Political Miscellanies: Letters to La Fayette; opinions of 
 Dade and Parker in John Aldridge v. Commonwealth, 2 Va. Cases, 
 452, 457- 
 
 93 Acts, 1827-1828, p. 29. 
 
 94 House Journal, 1832-1833, p. 208. 
 
 95 Acts, 1847-1848, p. 99; Code (1849), p. 728 et seq. 
 98 Acts, 1859-1860, p. 163. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO IO/ 
 
 groes restricted so much as in this. In the colonial period 
 there was little regulation of their movements ; but from the 
 time that their number reached several thousand on to the 
 Civil War their liberty to move about in the State and to go 
 out and return was very much restricted. In 1793 free ne 
 groes were forbidden to come into the State from any source 
 to take up permanent residence. 97 The penalty upon a 
 "master of a vessel or other person" for bringing in any 
 free negro or mulatto was 100. A free negro living within 
 the State could not go from one town or county to another 
 to seek employment without a copy of his register, which 
 was kept in the court of his county or corporation. Vio 
 lators of this law were often committed to jail until they 
 made proof of their freedom and paid the jailer s fee. If 
 they were unable to pay this fee, they were hired out to the 
 highest bidder for a time sufficient to pay the charges. 98 By 
 an act of 1801 any free negro who, even though in posses 
 sion of " free papers," removed into another county or cor 
 poration was declared an intruder, and made liable to arrest 
 as a vagrant. 99 By a later act they were denied the right to 
 change their residence from one county or town to another 
 without permission from the court of the county or corpora 
 tion to which they wished to go. 100 After 1848 no free 
 negro could leave the State for the purpose of education, 
 or go for any purpose to a non-slave-holding State and re- 
 
 97 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 239. Free negroes travelling as servants 
 to white persons or working on vessels were excepted; but if such 
 negro servant got away from his master or from the ship, the bur 
 den of proof was upon him to show why he should not be whipped 
 as an unlawful emigrant (Acts, 1833-1834, p. 79). 
 
 98 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 238 ; i Revised Code, 441 ; Code of Va. 
 (1849), 467. "Ordered that the Jailor discharge from his cus 
 tody Aron Jackson and Johnson who were committed to Jail for 
 want of free papers (it appearing to the satisfaction of the court 
 that they are free) upon their paying the Jailor s fees and the costs 
 of this order" (MS. Minutes of Henrico County, no. 27, 1830). 
 
 99 Hening, vol. xv, p. 301 ; I Revised Code, 441. By the vagrancy 
 laws of this time, " persons within the true description of a vagrant" 
 were committed to a public workhouse for a term not exceeding 
 three months, or were hired out by the overseers of the poor (2 
 Revised Code, 275, 276). 
 
 100 House Journal, 1815-1816, p. 94, for grant of a petition to re 
 move from one county to another; Code (1849), 468> (1860) 522. 
 
IO8 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 turn. 101 Although these laws restricting the movements of 
 the free negro were not enforced with equal thoroughness 
 throughout the State, they were nevertheless enforced suffi 
 ciently to render precarious the condition of any violator. 
 
 Possibly the most extraordinary legal right possessed by 
 free negroes at any time during the continuation of slavery 
 was the right to choose a master and to go into voluntary 
 bondage. Liberty to become a slave was one variety of 
 liberty which a white man could not have exercised had he 
 wished to do so. One might surmise that this right pos 
 sessed for a while by free negroes was of a higher class of 
 rights than the fundamental, inherent rights spoken of by 
 the constitutional fathers ; for a free negress who exercised 
 it deprived and divested her posterity of liberty, and sub 
 jected both herself and it to perpetual tyranny. 
 
 Regardless of what may be said of the nature of this very 
 unusual right, it is a fact that free negroes did not possess 
 it until near the end of the slavery regime. Before 1856 a 
 special act was deemed necessary to render legal the slavery 
 of a free negro who of his own will selected a master. A 
 number of such private acts, making it lawful for certain 
 free negroes, whose names were mentioned in the acts, " to 
 select a master or mistress," were passed in the first half of 
 the decade of the fifties. 102 In 1856 a general act was passed 
 making it lawful for any free colored man over twenty-one 
 and any free colored woman over eighteen years of age to 
 select a master or a mistress. 103 A free negro desiring so 
 to alter his status could file a signed petition with the circuit 
 judge stating the name of the proposed master or mistress. 
 The petition would be posted for one month at the door of 
 the court-house; if the judge was satisfied that there was 
 no fraud, he would grant the request and fix a value on the 
 petitioner. When one half of the designated price was paid 
 into the public treasury, the petitioner became as much the 
 
 101 Acts, 1847-1848, p. 119. 
 
 102 Ibid., 1853-1854, P- 131 ; 1855-1856, p. 278. 
 
 103 Ibid., 1855-1856, p. 37 et seq. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO IOQ 
 
 absolute property of his chosen master as if he had been 
 born a slave. The rule that the status of a child followed 
 the status of the mother at the time of the birth of the child 
 was applicable to the offspring of free colored females who 
 elected to be slaves. 
 
 Hard as was the lot of some free negroes in Virginia be 
 tween 1856 and 1861, the courts had not many petitioners 
 seeking the refuge of slavery. The reports of the auditor 
 who took account of the receipts of the treasury from this 
 source show that not more than a score of free negroes took 
 advantage of their opportunities under the act of 1856. For 
 the year ending September 30, 1859, $2308.91 was received 
 into the treasury as receipts of the sale by the local courts 
 of four free negroes. 104 The report for the fiscal year end 
 ing September 30, 1860, shows that three negroes went into 
 voluntary bondage, and that $902.50 was received by the 
 State from their purchasers. 105 
 
 Thus far in this chapter attention has been confined to 
 the question of the extent and degree of protection over 
 property and liberty enjoyed by the free negro under the 
 laws of Virginia. A question no less essential to a full 
 treatment of the free negro s legal status is the extent of 
 his participation in the affairs of the government. In what 
 capacities could he, and did he, lend support to that govern 
 ment which afforded him the measure of benefits already 
 described ? 
 
 From a very early date in the history of the colony up 
 to the close of the Civil War military service was required 
 of the free negro. As early as 1723 there were some free 
 negroes enlisted in the state militia, and they were, for that 
 reason, permitted to keep one gun, powder, and shot. 108 
 During the last war between the English and the French for 
 supremacy in America free negroes were employed in the 
 Virginia service as "drummers, trumpeters, or pioneers or 
 
 1M House Documents, 1859-1860, no. 5, p. 423. 
 105 Ibid., 1861, no. 5, P- 652. 
 108 Hening, vol. iv, p. 131. 
 
I IO THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1661-1865 
 
 in such other servile labour as they shall be directed to 
 perform." 107 
 
 In the War of Independence the free negro in Virginia 
 performed a worthy and useful service. 108 The recruiting 
 laws made eligible for service " all male persons, hired ser 
 vants and apprentices above the age of sixteen and under 
 fifty," 109 but did not permit the enlistment of slaves or of 
 servants bound to serve till thirty-one years of age. 110 That 
 free negroes were enlisted under these laws there is no 
 room for doubt. A letter written April 24, 1783, to the 
 governor by William Reynolds, commissary of military 
 stores, states that James Day had been accused of " trans 
 gressing in defrauding a black soldier and through a hasty 
 & rather unfair hearing was ordered to prison where he now 
 lies punishing." 111 In 1777 an act of Assembly designated 
 drumming, fifing, and pioneering for the employment of 
 the free mulattoes of the company. 112 Runaway slaves pre- 
 
 10T Hening, vol. v, p. 17 (1748) ; vol. vi, p. 533 (1755) ; vol. vii, p. 95 
 (1757). 
 
 108 Cf. G. H. Moore, Historical Notes on the Employment of 
 Negroes in the American Army of the Revolution, p. 16. 
 
 109 Proceedings of Convention of Delegates for the Counties and 
 Corporations of the Colony of Virginia, 1775, p. 36. 
 
 uo Hening, vol. ix, pp. 81, 346, 592; MS. Petitions, Prince Wil 
 liam County. The enforcement of this act excluding servants gave 
 rise to the following statement of certain officials in a petition to 
 the legislature: "Jesse Kelly, a mulatto man bound agreeably to 
 act of assembly to Lewis Lee until the said Kelly should arrive at 
 the age of thirty-one years . . . was enlisted as your petitioners 
 believe they had a right to do by act of May session, 1777." By 
 the act referred to, " Apprentices and servants could be enlisted " 
 (Hening, vol. ix, p. 275). Strictness was shown also in enforcing 
 the law against the enlistment of slaves. A court martial was held 
 in Goochland County, March 19, 1781, to try Colonel Jolly Parrish 
 on the accusation of having " enlisted a slave as a substitute for his 
 division knowing him to be so." Parrish pleaded that he believed 
 the negro to be a free man; but the evidence showed the contrary, 
 and Parrish was cashiered (Calendar of Virginia State Papers, vol. 
 i, P. 582). 
 
 1U Calendar of Virginia State Papers, vol. iii, p. 472. 
 
 The following advertisement appeared in the Virginia Gazette for 
 March 7, 1775 : " Deserted the following recruits from King William 
 County : Copeland a white man & William Holmes a mulatto about 
 45 yrs of age is about 6 ft high. A Guinea reward for the white 
 man as a Pistole for Holmes." (A bound volume of the Virginia 
 Gazette in the Library of the Johns Hopkins University.) 
 
 113 Hening, vol. ix, p. 268. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO III 
 
 tending to be free were accepted for enlistment to an extent 
 that demanded in 1777 an act which required of every negro 
 a certificate from a justice of the peace that he was a free 
 man before he could be admitted into the army. 113 Some 
 white slave-owners preferred to offer their slaves as sub 
 stitutes rather than render personal service in the army. 
 In order to induce the negroes to enlist and to get them 
 accepted they were presented for substitutes as if they were 
 free. When the war was over, a law was passed to make 
 good the promise of such masters by declaring free all ne 
 groes who had served in the war, and by further providing 
 that any such negro held as a slave could recover damages 
 by a suit at no expense to himself. 114 
 
 There were some free negroes in Virginia who took part 
 in the War of 1812. For example, Lewis Bowlagh, a Vir 
 ginia free negro, served for a time in the United States 
 army, and was transferred to the squadron of Commodore 
 John Shaw, where he served until the close of the war. 115 
 A good many were drafted into the Confederate service in 
 the War of Secession. All male free negroes between the 
 ages of eighteen and fifty years were held "liable to per- 
 
 118 Hening, vol. ix, p. 280. The Virginia Gazette for April 14, 1783, 
 contained an advertisement over the name of Henry Skipwith which 
 offered a " handsome reward " for the apprehension of a mulatto 
 slave who had run away from his master and had been received as 
 a substitute in the continental army. He " reenlisted for the war 
 last fall," says the notice, " went with the troops to Winchester 
 from whence he deserted. . . . Since his desertion he has cut off his 
 forefinger of his right hand in order to marry a free woman near 
 Pine Creek Mill in Powhatan County, who had determined never 
 to have a husband in the continental army, and supposed this mutila 
 tion would procure him a discharge." 
 
 U4 Hening, vol. xi, p. 308 (1783). It should be observed that the 
 law held these negroes to be free from the time they enlisted, and 
 that it was passed to protect them in their right to freedom and not 
 in any sense to confer freedom upon them. The few slaves that, 
 contrary to law, were enlisted as slaves were unaffected by this act. 
 To receive freedom for their services in the cause of independence, 
 slaves had to obtain the passage of special acts (ibid., vol. xiii, pp. 
 103, 619; Virginia Historical Collections, vol. iv, p. 309). See the 
 petition of Saul, a slave who served in the American army both as a 
 soldier and as a spy among the British (MS. Petitions, Norfolk 
 County, 64314). Compare also Petition 64051, New Kent County; 
 B 314, Norfolk County. 
 
 115 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1816, A 9353- 
 
112 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 form any labor or discharge any duties with the army or in 
 any connection with the military defenses, producing and 
 preparing materials for war, building roads, etc." 118 Such 
 free negroes as were engaged in the public service were 
 subject to the military rules, which were explained especially 
 for their benefit by the officers of the army. In both the 
 Confederate and the United States navies service was per 
 formed by Virginia free negroes. 117 The positions they 
 filled were doubtless of the lowest rank, and the services 
 performed of a menial or routine nature, as indeed was most 
 of their military service throughout the entire period under 
 consideration. 
 
 In the matter of taxation, also, the free negro stood in 
 relation to the government as its supporter. Far from being 
 exempt from taxation, he was usually required to pay a 
 higher poll-tax than the free white man. As early as 1668 
 a question arose as to whether free negro women should be 
 exempted from capitation taxes as English women were. 
 The legislature declared in an act that they ought not " in 
 all respects to be admitted to full fruition of the exemptions 
 of the English," and that they were still liable to payment 
 of taxes. 118 In 1769 a petition signed by free negroes and 
 
 " Acts, 1861-1862; Senate Bill no. 129, among pamphlets relating 
 to the Confederate government, in Virginia State Library. 
 
 Joseph Tinsley, a freeborn negro of Hanover County, was drafted 
 into the Confederate service, and was at first assigned to the duty 
 of keeping the telegraph lines in repair. He was later pu: to driv 
 ing a government wagon. An aged antebellum free negro living 
 (1910) at 208 Broad Street, Richmond, says that his father was 
 drafted for service in the Confederacy. 
 
 UT MS. Petitions, A 9353 ; cf. Hening, vol. xiii, p. 103. John Miller, 
 at one time a colored statesman of the reconstruction period, and 
 in 1910 overseer of laborers in the United States Navy-yard at 
 Portsmouth, gave the following account of his life : Born of free 
 parents in Portsmouth, Virginia, August 15, 1839; worked on a 
 farm when a boy ; served for one year W. W. Davis, a groceryman ; 
 went into the service of the United States Navy in 1858; was on 
 board the Cumberland when it was attacked by the Merrimac; was 
 discharged at the expiration of his time; went to Boston, reen- 
 listed, and served to the close of the war. He soon got a position 
 in the navy-yard, where he has since remained in the service of the 
 United States Government. 
 
 118 Hening, vol. ii, p. 267 ; vol. iv, p. 133. Only white women and 
 children under sixteen years of age were exempted from the pay- 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 113 
 
 mulattoes was presented to the legislature praying that the 
 wives and daughters of the petitioners might be exempt 
 from taxation. 119 It met with a ready response in the law- 
 making body, and an act was passed which, after declaring 
 that the former law was very burdensome to such negroes, 
 mulattoes, and Indians and derogatory to the rights of free- 
 born subjects, exempted " from the payment of any public, 
 county, or parish levies all free negro, mulatto, and Indian 
 women and all wives other than slaves of free negroes, 
 mulattoes and Indians." 120 
 
 Male free negroes were of course still subject to the pay 
 ment of taxes on the same basis as were white males. It 
 appears that collecting from them offered unusual difficul 
 ties, which the legislature endeavored to meet in 1782 by a 
 law providing that any free negro who failed to pay the 
 levies should be hired out by the sheriff upon the order of a 
 county court for a time sufficient to pay all back taxes, pro 
 vided he had not sufficient property upon which distress 
 could be made for the amount. 121 In 1787 capitation taxes 
 were abolished. 122 The burden of the revenue was placed 
 upon property, and this burden was borne by free negroes 
 just in proportion as they were property owners. It does 
 not appear that there was ever any legal discrimination 
 against free negroes in the taxation of their property. They 
 paid the same rate on their possessions as did white prop 
 erty owners. 123 
 
 ment of poll-taxes, with the exception of a few individuals who 
 were exempted by special act (ibid., vol. ii, p. 84; vol. iii, p. 259). 
 In the seventeenth century the taxes were principally polls assessed 
 upon " every master of a family and every freeman." The taxes 
 upon servants were paid by the master or owner (ibid., vol. i, p. 143). 
 
 In 1666, when the entire colored population in Virginia was be 
 tween one and two thousand, there were as many as nine negroes 
 in Northampton County who paid their own taxes (Virginia Mag 
 azine of History, vol. x, pp. 194, 254). 
 
 139 Journal of the House of Burgesses, vol. v, p. 198. 
 9 Hening, vol. viii, p. 393. 
 
 l ^Ibid., vol. xi, p. 40. 
 
 122 Ibid., vol. xii, p. 431. 
 
 123 Land books of the various counties of Virginia, in the keeping 
 of the state auditor of public accounts, Richmond. For the year 
 1856 Reuben West, a free colored man of Richmond, paid $17.62 on 
 
 8 
 
114 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 In 1813, however, discriminations in capitation taxes were 
 again renewed by laying a special poll-tax of $1.50 upon 
 all male free negroes above sixteen years of age, except 
 such as were bound as apprentices. 124 This rate was con 
 tinued till 1815, when it was raised to $2.50 per poll and 
 applied to all male free negroes between the ages of sixteen 
 and forty-five. 125 The occasion for levying this poll-tax 
 was the need for an increased revenue brought about by 
 the War of 1812. The reason for levying it upon free ne 
 groes only may have been a widespread desire and purpose, 
 strong at this time, to get rid of them. A tax of $2.50 
 assessed upon the most active, and therefore the most ob 
 jectionable, free negroes was supposed to operate to induce 
 some to leave the State, and to reduce others, who refused 
 to pay, to a state of servitude. 126 Rigid enforcement pro 
 visions were made which authorized the sheriff to hire out 
 any free colored tax delinquent till the required amount plus 
 five per cent commission should be raised. 127 Although 
 some free negroes allowed unpaid assessments to reduce 
 them to servitude, these capitation taxes were collected with 
 remarkable success. In 1814 $8322 was paid into the treas 
 ury by 5547 free negroes, or about ninety per cent of the 
 male free negroes within the taxable age. In 1815, when 
 the rate was $2.50 instead of $1.50, as in the two preceding 
 years, and only such as were between the ages of sixteen 
 and forty-five were taxable, 4023 free negroes paid their 
 assessments, which amounted to $10,057.50, or a sum 
 
 real estate, the assessed valuation of which was $4420. Scott Cle- 
 menze, free colored, paid $22.72 on property valued at $5680. The 
 free colored population of Richmond paid in this year $286.81 on 
 property assessed at $71,702.50. 
 m Acts, 1812-1813, p. 20. 
 
 125 Ibid., 1814-1815, p. 8. 
 
 126 House Journal, 1816-1817, p. 90; Alexander, p. 63; House 
 Journal, 1804, December 3. 
 
 127 Acts, 1814-1815, p. 61. If the free negro failing to pay the tax 
 had property, distress was made upon that before hiring him out 
 (i Revised Code, 431). By the Code of 1860 the minimum price 
 per day at which a free negro could be hired to raise back taxes was 
 fixed at ten cents, and five years was made the limit of time for 
 their collection (p. 522). 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO I I 5 
 
 which was equal to the amount received into the treasury 
 from lawyers licenses or from the tax on carriages, and was 
 one and a half per cent of the total revenue of the State. 128 
 During the three years when free colored men were paying 
 a high poll-tax the white inhabitants were paying none. 
 
 The capitation tax on free negroes was dropped in 1816, 
 after which for twenty years the assessments made on their 
 small property holdings were the sum of their contributions 
 to the public revenue. 129 In 1850 a tax of one dollar was 
 levied annually upon all male free negroes between the ages 
 of twenty-one and fifty-five. 130 According to the provisions 
 of this law and one of 1853, this tax was to have been used 
 for colonizing free negroes in Liberia, but it seems that 
 only small amounts were ever paid out for that purpose. 
 The disbursements of the treasury for the fiscal year ending 
 October, 1858, show that $2100 was the amount spent in 
 colonization. Between 1850 and 1853 less than $2000 per 
 annum was expended for the purpose. The balance of the 
 funds arising from the taxation of free negroes remained in 
 the treasury for public purposes. 131 This levy continued in 
 force for ten years, and was regularly collected from the 
 free colored taxables with about the same success that simi 
 lar assessments were collected from white taxpayers. 132 
 
 In 1860 a capitation tax of eighty cents was levied upon 
 all free male persons, white and colored, above the age of 
 twenty-one years. The former levy of one dollar per head 
 on free negroes had not been repealed, and when a question 
 
 ^Auditor s Report for 1815-1816; Acts, 1815-1816, p. 88. 
 
 129 In the constitutional convention of 1829-1830 Leigh remarked 
 that free negroes were included as taxpayers, " though it is well 
 known that they contribute little or nothing to the treasury. They 
 should be excluded from the lists of taxpayers" (Proceedings and 
 Debates, 1829-1830, p. 152). Joynes, of Accomac County, said 
 " Instead of contributing to the revenue they are a perfect nuisance " 
 (ibid., p. 211). 
 
 130 Acts, 1849-1850, p. 7. 
 
 131 Auditor s Report for 1859-1860, p. 407; Message of Governor 
 Johnson, in House Documents, 1853-1854, no. I. 
 
 132 The average amount contributed to the public treasury from 
 1850 to 1860 by free negroes varied between $9000 and $13.000 
 (Auditor s Report for 1854-1855, p. 6; for 1861, no. 5, pp. 653, 669; 
 for 1859-1860, p. 401 et seq.). 
 
Il6 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 arose as to whether one or the other or both of these taxes 
 should be collected, it was decided in favor of collecting 
 both assessments. The collections at $1.80 per head on free 
 negroes for 1860 amounted to $13,065.22. 133 The revenue 
 act of 1861 declared that no more collections should be 
 made under the law of 1853, thus leaving the tax on male 
 free negroes over twenty-one years of age at eighty cents 
 per poll. 134 The war revenue acts raised the rate rapidly. 
 In 1862 adult male free negroes were paying $1.25 per 
 capita, and the following year $2. At the latter rate they 
 contributed in 1863 $11,554 to the public treasury. 135 After 
 1860 the poll-tax assessments were uniform for whites and 
 free blacks. 
 
 The services of the free negro in official capacities were 
 not demanded or accepted in Virginia. In the seventeenth 
 century a few seem to have been entrusted with minor 
 offices. The justices of Lancaster County appointed as 
 beadle a negro whose duty it was to inflict punishment by 
 stripes upon those whom the court adjudged deserving of 
 corporal punishment. 136 In 1660 a testator nominated as 
 executor of his will and as guardian of his foster daughter 
 a negro whose freedom was stipulated in the will. 137 The 
 court, however, did not confirm the nomination. In at least 
 one instance in the last decade of the seventeenth century a 
 negro acted as surety. 138 All office-holding by free negroes 
 was stopped by an act of Assembly of 1705 declaring that 
 "no negro, mulatto or Indian shall presume to take upon 
 him, act in or exercise any office, ecclesiastic, civil or mili 
 tary." 139 The penalty for violation was 500. Even the 
 ability of a free negro to become a legal witness was lim- 
 
 133 Auditor s Report for 1861, no. 5; Code (1860), p. 243 n. 
 
 134 Acts, 1861, p. 4. 
 
 135 Auditor s Report for 1863; Acts, 1862-1863. 
 
 138 MS. Court Records of Lancaster County, 1652-1657, p. 213, cited 
 in P. A. Bruce, Economic History, vol. ii, p. 128. 
 
 137 MS. Court Records of York County, 1657-1662, pp. 211, 217, 
 in Virginia State Library. 
 
 138 Ibid., 1689-1698, p. 58; P. A. Bruce, Economic History, vol. ii, p. 
 127. 
 
 139 Hening, vol. iii, p. 251. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO I I / 
 
 ited. 140 By this law of 1705, negroes were forbidden to be 
 witnesses in any case whatsoever ; but it was found that this 
 disability afforded a shield for dishonest free negroes who 
 avoided the payment of their just debts for the reason that 
 other free negroes were not admitted as witnesses. There 
 fore, in 1744 the law was amended so that " any free negro, 
 mulatto or Indian being a Christian " should be admitted as 
 a witness in both civil and criminal suits against any negro, 
 mulatto, or Indian, slave or free. 141 But to allow free ne 
 groes to be witnesses even in civil suits to which a white 
 man was plaintiff against a negro defendant was discon 
 tinued in 1785 ; after that time they were competent wit 
 nesses in pleas of the Commonwealth for or against negroes 
 or in civil pleas where free negroes alone were parties, and 
 in no other cases whatsoever. 142 
 
 Before any negro could become a witness in any case he 
 had to receive the following extraordinary charge: "You 
 are brought hither as a witness, and by the direction of the 
 law I am to tell you, before you give your evidence, that you 
 must tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
 truth ; and that, if it be found hereafter that you tell a lie, 
 and give false testimony in this matter, you must for so 
 doing have both your ears nailed to the pillory and cut off, 
 and receive thirty-nine lashes on the bare back well laid on 
 at the common whipping-post." 143 Some time before 1849 
 this special injunction against lying was dropped. 
 
 Prior to 1723 there were no legal discriminations against 
 free negroes in the limitation or extension of the suffrage. 
 
 140 Andrew Burnaby mentions the exclusion of the evidence of 
 negroes as one of the laws " which make it almost impossible to 
 convict a planter or white man of the death of a negro or Indian " 
 (p. 54 n.). 
 
 1 Hening, vol. v, p. 245. 
 
 142 Ibid., vol. xii, p. 182; I Revised Code, 422; Code (1849), 663. 
 An interesting case arose in the circuit court of King William County 
 in 1835 in which a white man in an action for debt against J. Winn, 
 a free negro, used as witnesses two free negroes. Winn appealed 
 to the supreme court of appeals on the ground that free negroes were 
 not competent witnesses in the suit. The court sustained the negro s 
 claim (6 Leigh, 74). 
 
 143 Hening, vol. vi, p. 107; i Revised Code, 431. 
 
Il8 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 Elections in Virginia in the seventeenth century were con 
 ducted in a very democratic fashion, in this respect resem 
 bling mass-meetings more than modern elections in which 
 tickets and ballot-boxes figure so conspicuously. The sheriff 
 presided over or governed the voters assembled at a voting 
 precinct, and determined the choice of the electorate either 
 " by view " or by subscribing the names of the voters under 
 the name of the candidate for whom they openly declared 
 their preference. 144 It was the general feeling in Virginia 
 well up to the close of the seventeenth century that it was 
 "something hard and unagreeable to reason that any per 
 sons shall pay equal taxes and yet have no votes in elec 
 tions." 145 Hence all freemen, and servants " having served 
 their tyme," were permitted to take part in elections pro 
 vided they would " fairly give their votes by subscription 
 and not in a tumultuous way." 146 There is no reason or 
 evidence which would lead to a belief that the free negroes 
 in the colony were excluded from these " free elections " 147 
 to which freed servants were admitted. 
 
 In 1670, in accordance with the wishes of the representa 
 tives of the restored English monarch, but contrary to the 
 feelings of the masses, the principle and practice of uni 
 versal suffrage were abandoned. Voting privileges were re 
 stricted to freeholders and housekeepers of certain qualifi 
 cations, with the avowed purpose of disfranchising persons 
 recently freed from servitude; these were thought to have 
 little interest in the country, and " oftener make tumults at 
 the election to the disturbance of his majesty s peace than 
 provide for the conservation thereof by making choyce of 
 persons fitly qualified for the discharge of soe great a 
 trust." 148 The disfranchisement of a part of the rabble was 
 a cause of popular discontent, a fact evidenced by the repeal 
 of the restrictions by the Assembly, which was under the 
 
 144 Hening, vol. iii, p. 172. 
 
 145 Ibid., vol. i, p. 403. 
 
 148 Ibid., vol. i, p. 403 ; vol. ii, p. 280. 
 
 147 " Description of the Province of New Albion," in Force Tracts, 
 vol. ii, p. 30. 
 148 Hening, vol. ii, p. 280. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 119 
 
 influence or domination of the liberal leader, Nathaniel 
 Bacon. 149 When the conservative government regained con 
 trol, Bacon s laws were repealed, and a statute was enacted 
 which restricted the suffrage further than it had ever been 
 restricted. 150 Previously, freeholders and housekeepers could 
 vote, but now only freeholders could exercise that right. 
 
 From the date of this act, 1676, to 1723 the possession of 
 a freehold was a prerequisite to the exercise of the elective 
 franchise. Although the laws specifically stated that "no 
 woman, sole or covert, infants under the age of twenty-one 
 years, or recusant convicts, being freeholders," should be 
 allowed to vote, no discrimination was made against free 
 holders of color. 151 The restrictions would not have elimi 
 nated all free negroes, for some at that time were free 
 holders. A freeholder was defined as a person who had 
 " an estate real for his own life or the life of another, or any 
 estate of any great dignity," 152 which meant that the pos 
 session of almost any property entitled a man to voting 
 privileges. 
 
 It is almost certain that some free negroes exercised the 
 suffrage rights under these provisions, for in 1723 a law 
 was enacted which specifically denied to free negroes the 
 right to vote. The act declared that " no negro, mulatto, or 
 Indian shall hereafter have any vote at the elections of bur 
 gesses or any election whatsoever." 153 When this act was 
 referred by the Board of Trade to Richard West for the 
 consideration of its legal aspects, he remarked : " I cannot 
 see why one freeman should be used worse than another 
 merely because of his complexion. ... It cannot be right 
 to strip all free persons of black complexion from those 
 
 149 Hening, vol. ii, p. 356. 
 
 150 Ibid., vol. ii, p. 425. 
 
 151 Ibid., vol. iii, p. 172. 
 
 152 Ibid., vol. iii, p. 240. 
 
 153 Ibid., vol. iv, p. 133. As revised in 1762, the law provided that 
 any free negro or mulatto or other person not having the right to 
 vote, who should " presume to vote or poll at any such election, 
 shall forfeit and pay 500 pounds of tobacco" (ibid., vol. vii, p. 
 519). 
 
I2O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 rights which are so justly valuable to freemen." 154 His pro 
 test was overruled; but an order was passed by the Board 
 of Trade and Plantations directing " that a letter be wrote 
 to the Governor to know what effect the act ... by which 
 free negroes are deprived of voting in all elections had." 155 
 A draft of such a letter was presented to the board and 
 agreed to on December 10, 1735. Evidence is wanting as to 
 what effect the act had, but it marked the close of the period 
 prior to the adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment to the 
 Constitution of the United States when negroes could vote. 
 By the first three constitutions of the Commonwealth of 
 Virginia voting privileges were restricted to white males of 
 certain qualifications. 156 
 
 The question whether the free negro in Virginia was a 
 citizen either of the Commonwealth or of the United States 
 is one that can be answered only when it has been made 
 clear what is connoted by the word " citizen." The free 
 negro was always a person in the eyes of the law, and could 
 maintain at law certain rights of personal liberty and prop 
 erty. He was undoubtedly a national, a subject of Virginia 
 and of the United States. If by the word " citizen " is 
 meant a subject having full civil and political rights, the 
 free negro was not a citizen of the Commonwealth of Vir 
 ginia, for after 1723 he could not bear witness except in 
 cases in which negroes alone were parties ; he could not be 
 a juror or a judge ; he could not bear arms without special 
 permission, and even though he owned property and paid 
 taxes he could not vote or hold office.^ 
 
 If we attempt to answer the question by reference to the 
 statutes and constitutions, we are confronted by the use of 
 the word " citizen " in a variety of senses. In an act of 1779 
 it was declared that " all white persons born within this 
 
 164 E. D. Neill, Virginia Carolorum, p. 330; see S. B. Weeks, " The 
 History of Negro Suffrage in the South," in Political Science Quar 
 terly, vol. ix, p. 671. 
 
 155 Sainsbury Transcripts from the British Public Record Office, 
 vol. i, p. 158. 
 
 158 Constitution of 1776, art. 7; constitution of 1830; constitution 
 of 1850. 
 
LEGAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 121 
 
 Commonwealth and all who have resided therein two years 
 . . . shall be citizens of this Commonwealth." 157 This act 
 was repealed and supplanted by an act of 1783 which de 
 clared that " all free persons born within the territory of 
 this commonwealth shall be deemed citizens of this com 
 monwealth." 158 George Bancroft says that the treaty of 
 peace between the American Commonwealths and Great 
 Britain " as interpreted alike in America and England . . . 
 included free negroes among the citizens." 159 In 1785 the 
 General Assembly used the word in a sense which included 
 free negroes in the citizen body. A bill being before the 
 Assembly defining the part of the citizen body which should 
 have the right to vote, and attention being called to the neces 
 sity of excepting free negroes and mulattoes, the words 
 " every male citizen " were changed to read " every male 
 citizen other than free negroes or mulattoes." 160 Judge 
 Tucker observed in 1796 that " emancipation does not confer 
 the rights of citizenship on the person emancipated; on the 
 contrary, both he and his posterity of the same complexion 
 with himself must always labor under many civil inca 
 pacities." 161 
 
 If free negroes in Virginia were citizens in the meaning 
 of the clause of the Federal Constitution which provides 
 that " citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privileges 
 and immunities of citizens of the several States," the con 
 stitutional guaranty was of no practical value to the Vir 
 ginia free negroes against discriminatory action of state gov 
 ernments in whose domains they might attempt to travel or 
 reside. " Citizens of the United States," said Chief Justice 
 Taney in the Passenger Cases, 162 "must have the right to 
 pass and repass through every part of it without interrup 
 tion as freely as in [their] own States." In Crandall v. 
 
 157 Hening, vol. x, p. 129. 
 
 158 Ibid., vol. xi, p. 323 ; vol. xii, p. 263. 
 
 159 History of United States, author s last version, vol. v, p. 579. 
 - 80 House Journal, 1785, p. 96. 
 
 , 161 St. G. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, p. 75. 
 162 7 Howard, 492. 
 
122 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 Nevada 163 the Court sustained this view, holding that the 
 right to pass through a State by a citizen of the United 
 States is one guaranteed to him by the Constitution. But 
 throughout the first sixty-five years of the nineteenth cen 
 tury every branch of the government of Virginia partici 
 pated in making or enforcing restrictions upon the liberty 
 of free negroes to move from place to place or to go from 
 the State and return. When a bill was introduced in the 
 Virginia legislature providing for the deportation of free 
 negroes without their consent, the argument that it was un 
 constitutional was feebly made, but General Brodnax, a 
 leading member of the House, scoffing at the idea, asserted 
 that the Constitution was about to be worn threadbare. " In 
 truth," said he, " free negroes have many legal rights but no 
 constitutional ones." There is no doubt that the opinion of 
 the tribunals before whom the legal rights of free negroes 
 were to be tested and applied was in agreement with this 
 assertion. 
 
 168 6 Wallace, 35- 
 
CHAPTER V 
 THE SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 The three principal elements in the population of Virginia 
 to which the free negro had to adjust himself were the 
 whites, the native Indians, and the negro slaves. A discus 
 sion of the social relations of the free negro class with each 
 of these three other elements of the population of the State 
 in the order named may well occupy a place of first consid 
 eration in this chapter. 
 
 If prejudices did not exist in the minds of the white in 
 habitants of Virginia against persons of the black race be 
 fore the coming of the negro, they were not long in spring 
 ing up after the two races met on Virginia soil. From the 
 very first mention by whites of Africans in Virginia special 
 care was taken, in writing or in speaking of them, to des 
 ignate their race or color. In the earliest records of the 
 courts and the parishes they were carefully distinguished 
 from other persons by such words and phrases as " negroes," 
 " negro servants," and " a negro belonging to " such a one. 
 As early as 1630 the conduct of a white man who had vio 
 lated a rule of strict separation of the white and black races 
 was denounced as an " abuse to the dishonor of God and 
 shame of Christians," and in atonement for such conduct 
 the white man received a sound whipping and was required 
 to make a public apology. 1 In the case of a similar viola 
 tion of decency and standards of race purity in 1640 the 
 guilty white man was compelled to " do penance " in the 
 church, and the negro woman was whipped. 2 So prominent 
 and uncouth were the physiological characteristics and so 
 
 1 Hening, vol. i, p. 146. 
 
 2 Ibid., vol. i, p. 552. 
 
 123 
 
124 THE FR EE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 rude were the manners of the African emigrants that before 
 the end of the seventeenth century many of the white colo 
 nists came to regard them as not of the human kind. 3 
 
 This prejudice against the negro was not the result of his 
 servile station; for in that respect he was on a par with a 
 large part of the white population. Freedom, therefore, 
 was not sufficient to make a negro servant or a negro slave 
 the social equal of the whites. By the middle of the seven 
 teenth century there were negroes who were free from all 
 forms of legal servitude or slavery, but they were not ab 
 sorbed into the mass of free population. Their color ad 
 hered to them in freedom as in servitude, and the indelible 
 marks and characteristics of their race remained unchanged. 4 
 In 1668 the law-making body of the colony gave unmistak 
 able sanction to the exclusion of the free negroes from social 
 equality in a declaration that " negro women set free, . . . 
 although permitted to enjoy their freedom, yet ought not in 
 all respects to be admitted to full fruition of the exemptions 
 and impunities of the English." 5 
 
 Yet, in spite of strong racial antipathies, there were some 
 illicit relations between shameless white persons and ne 
 groes, by reason of which it was deemed necessary as early 
 as 1662 to enact legislation concerning the status of mulatto 
 children. In 1691 a law prescribed for "any white woman 
 marrying a negro or mulatto, bond or free," the extreme 
 penalty of perpetual banishment. 6 The strength of public 
 sentiment was soon tested in the matter of enforcing this 
 law in the case of Ann Wall, an English woman, who was 
 arraigned in the county court of Elizabeth City on the charge 
 of " keeping company with a negro under pretense of mar 
 riage." 7 Upon conviction, she and two of her mulatto chil- 
 
 3 M. Godwyn, Negro s and Indian s Advocate, suing for their Ad 
 mission into the Church, p. 23 et seq. 
 
 4 Compare G. Bancroft, History of the United States, ed. 1843, vol. 
 iii, p. 410. 
 
 5 Hening, vol. ii, p. 267. 
 
 6 Ibid., vol. iii, p. 87. 
 
 7 MS. Court Records of Elizabeth City County, 1684-1699, p. 27, 
 in Virginia State Library. In 1737 a negro who attempted to assault 
 a white girl was compelled to stand in a pillory for an hour, was 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 125 
 
 dren were bound for terms of service to a man living in 
 Norfolk County, and a court order was recorded to the 
 effect that in case she ever returned to Elizabeth City 
 County she should be banished to the Barbadoes. 8 Whether 
 the "abominable mixture or spurious issue," as the mulatto 
 was called, was of slave or free negro parentage, it was 
 equally detested by respectable white persons. 
 
 In the seventeenth century there were a few free negroes 
 of exceptional merit who were accorded, in all relations not 
 involving or leading to a blending of the races, social privi 
 leges about equal to those accorded to freed white servants. 
 A few were prosperous owners of personal and real prop 
 erty, respected by white persons, dealt with by white men 
 in business relations, and permitted to participate in elec 
 tions, facts which seem to indicate that for a while the 
 prejudices of the white inhabitants against the negroes went 
 only to the extent of preserving the Teutonic blood from 
 contamination, and did not at first deny to the African free 
 dom of opportunity to take such station in other relations 
 as his individual merit enabled him to assume. At that 
 time the theory that the negro was fit for nothing but slavery 
 or some servile capacity had not been so carefully elaborated 
 nor so generally applied as it was in the eighteenth and nine 
 teenth centuries. Although precluded from the possibility 
 of intermarrying with white persons, the negro freed from 
 servitude or slavery had about the same industrial or eco 
 nomic opportunities as the free white servant. But as 
 slavery advanced toward a more complete inclusion and sub 
 jection of the negro race in Virginia, the social and indus 
 trial privileges of the free negro were gradually curtailed. 
 The denial to him, by laws passed in 1723, of the right to 
 vote, the right to bear arms, and the right to bear witness 
 is proof of the fact that prejudice had extended beyond a 
 demand for race separation and race purity to an imposition 
 upon the negro of a low and servile station. 
 
 "pelted by the populace, and afterwards smartly whipped" (Vir 
 ginia Gazette, August 19-26, 1737; quoted in Virginia Magazine of 
 History, vol. xi, p. 424). 
 8 MS. Court Records of Elizabeth City County, 1684-1699, p. 83. 
 
126 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 From 1723 to the end of the colonial period the number 
 of the free negroes was, both absolutely and relative to the 
 other populations, so small that the social status of the class 
 would have been unimportant except for the fact that preju 
 dices accumulating in this period were handed down to the 
 time when the free colored class became numerically impor 
 tant. Except for natural procreation, the principal addi 
 tions or recruits to this class throughout this period were 
 the result of illegitimacy. There was no tendency to attrib 
 ute to a few free negroes and mulattoes of such low origin 
 any higher social standing than that occupied by more than 
 ninety-nine per cent of their race and color. Too small and 
 of too low an origin to preserve for itself, by the formation 
 of an exclusive caste, higher social rights than slaves, the 
 free colored class was nevertheless sufficiently large to pass 
 on to the larger free negro class of the period of the Com 
 monwealth all the disabilities and social disadvantages that 
 it had gathered to itself for a hundred years. The freedom 
 which masters were to be allowed to confer upon their slaves 
 under the act of 1782 was the freedom of the colonial free 
 negro and no more. Even those persons who professed a 
 desire to apply to the slaves the principles of natural and 
 equal rights had no intention or desire to exalt the manu 
 mitted slave to social equality with the whites. Chastellux, 
 travelling through Virginia in the early eighties of the eight 
 eenth century, noticed the inferior social status of the free 
 negroes, and wrote : " In the present case it is not only the 
 slave who is beneath his master, it is the negro who is be 
 neath the white man. No act of enfranchisement can efface 
 this unfortunate distinction." 9 
 
 The free negro population which came to be numbered 
 by tens of thousands in the nineteenth century was as remote 
 from a social plane upon which intermingling or intermar 
 riage with the white race was possible as were the slaves. 
 "A companion to slaves . . . forbidden to intermarry with 
 whites or to bear testimony against them ; forbidden to learn 
 
 9 Vol. ii, p. 99. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO I2/ 
 
 to read or to write, or to preach the word of God even to 
 his fellows, to bear arms or to resist assault in every rela 
 tion from the cradle to the grave he was never allowed to 
 forget that he was an inferior being." 10 Illegal marriages 
 or associations of whites with free negroes were so disrepu 
 table and disgraceful that they were entered into by the vilest 
 white persons at the peril of chastisement by privately or 
 ganized bands of white persons supported by community 
 sentiment. 11 The free mulatto class, which numbered 23,500 
 by 1860, was of course the result of illegal relations of white 
 persons with negroes ; but, excepting those born of mulatto 
 parents, most persons of the class were not born of free 
 negro or free white mothers, but of slave mothers, and were 
 set free because of their kinship to their master and owner. 12 
 
 When we come to consider the social contact and affilia 
 tion of the free negro with the native Indian, the barriers to 
 social affinity and intermixing of races on terms of equality 
 are seen to be less important than those between free negroes 
 and whites. No law forbade the intermarriage of free ne 
 groes and Indians, and there existed between them some 
 fundamental grounds of sympathy and mutual appreciation. 
 Both bore the marks of a savage race and had a colored 
 skin; hence they shared the racial antipathy of the whites, 
 although possibly to a different degree. Both were wanting 
 in experience and acquaintance with the manners of civilized 
 life, to which they were being introduced through the agency 
 of an alien race. Both enjoyed liberty to go and come at 
 will; but, unlike slaves, they were dependent upon their 
 own resources for subsistence. Both were, in a way, misfits 
 and discordant elements in a society organized as was that 
 of Virginia, on a basis of slavery, a society economically 
 and politically complete, with a governing white aristocracy 
 and a class of colored toilers living in a condition of com- 
 
 10 Message of Governor Smith, 1848-1849, in House Journal, p. 21. 
 " MS. Petitions, Amelia County, 1821, A 781. 
 
 12 MS. Petitions, King William County, 1825, BIIQI; Essex 
 County, 1825, A 5396; Halifax County, 1857, A 7724. 
 
128 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 plete subjection. While there existed dissimilarities be 
 tween free negroes and Indians, there was certainly a com 
 mon bond of union ; and it is significant that in the massacre 
 of 1622 not an African perished at the hands of the Indians, 
 although there were at the time of the massacre more than 
 twenty negroes scattered throughout the little colony. 13 
 
 Before 1724 there were in the colony some persons of 
 mixed blood, part negro and part Indian, called mustees or 
 mustizos. 14 A number of reservations of land, containing 
 from a few hundred to many thousand acres, were set apart in 
 the eastern section of Virginia in the seventeenth and eight 
 eenth centuries for the use and enjoyment of the Indians. 15 
 After a time, these reservations became the common homes 
 of free negroes and the tribesmen for whom they were in 
 tended, who associated on terms of social equality. It was 
 said in 1787 of the inhabitants of the Gingaskin reservation 16 
 that those who were not entirely black had at least "half 
 black blood in them." 17 The place was called Indian Town, 
 but many of the squaws had negroes for husbands, and 
 Indian braves lived with black wives. As a means of im 
 proving the social order in Indian Town, the white people 
 thereabouts proposed that no negroes, except the husbands 
 of female Indians, be allowed to remain in the tribe. The 
 town, they said, afforded " a Harbour and convenient asy 
 lum to an idle set of free negroes," and was a great nuisance 
 to the public. 18 
 
 In 1744 the Nottaway and kindred tribes possessed about 
 
 "McDonald Transcripts from the British Public Record Office, 
 vol. i, p. 46; Hotten, pp. 218-258; Colonial Records of Virginia, 
 Senate Document, 1874, Extra, p. 61. 
 
 " " Such as are born of an Indian and negro are called Mustees " 
 (H. Jones, The Present State of Virginia, p. 37). 
 
 19 Hening, vol. ii, p. 290; P. A. Bruce, Economic History, vol. i, 
 p. 492 et seq. ; vol. ii, p. 115. 
 
 16 See Hening, vol. viii, p. 414, for facts concerning this reservation 
 in Northampton County. In 1769 it contained six hundred acres. 
 The legislature then passed an ordinance providing for the sale of 
 two hundred acres of this land, the proceeds to be used by the par 
 ish to provide for such of the tribe as should become public charges. 
 Compare Hening, vol. ii, p. 13; vol. iii, p. 85. 
 
 "MS. Petitions, Norfolk County, 1787, 64865. 
 
 18 Ibid., 1782, B 4865 ; 1782, B 4845. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 129 
 
 20,000 acres of land which they could not, according to law, 
 alienate. 19 In 1821 they still occupied 3370 acres. White 
 persons in the vicinity of this reservation affirmed in 1821 
 that "their [the Indians ] wives and husbands are free ne 
 groes," 20 and that they had neither prudence nor economy. 
 
 As late as 1843 tne Pamunkeys possessed sixteen hun 
 dred acres of land in King William County. One hundred 
 and forty-three citizens of the county petitioned the legisla 
 ture to have the lands divided, saying that all but a small 
 remnant of the old Indian tribe was extinct, and that in its 
 place were free mulattoes, all of whom were believed to have 
 one fourth negro blood, an amount sufficient under the 
 provisions of the code of 1819 to class them as mulattoes. 21 
 " They are so mingled with the negro race as to have oblit 
 erated all striking features of Indian extraction. It is the 
 general resort of free negroes from all parts of the country." 22 
 
 The association and intermarriage of free negroes with 
 Indians was not confined to areas given up to Indians. From 
 an early date mustees were a small constituent element of 
 the population, intermingling with the other inhabitants of 
 the colony. 23 John Dungie, an Indian of King William 
 County, was in 1824 legally married to Anne Littlepage, a 
 mulatto daughter of Edmund Littlepage, esq., a man of con 
 siderable wealth. "The husband was a sailor . . . con 
 stantly employed in the navigation of the Chesapeake Bay 
 and Rivers of Virginia." His free mulatto wife was heir 
 to a considerable annuity. 24 In a case before the supreme 
 
 19 Hening, vol v, p. 270. 
 
 20 MS. Petitions, York County, 1821. 
 
 Hening, vol. xiv, p. 123; i Revised Code, 423. 
 
 22 MS. Petitions, King William County, 1843, 61207. Petition 
 B 1208 is a counter-petition from the chief men of the tribe, who 
 wish to retain their lands. They admit that some persons not of 
 their tribe are within their boundaries, but claim that the inhabi 
 tants generally are of at least half Indian extraction. That mem 
 bers of the Pamunkey tribe to this day (1912) bear in their features 
 evidences of a mixture of the tribe with negroes may be stated 
 on the authority of a prominent citizen of Richmond who has 
 observed them. 
 
 23 Jones, p. 37. 
 
 24 MS. Petitions, King William County, 1825, B 1191. 
 
 9 
 
I3O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 court of appeals in 1831 we find an attorney making the 
 assertion as an historical fact that Indians had intermarried 
 with negroes. 25 
 
 The names " mustizo " or " mustee " and " mulatto " were 
 not always applied with discrimination, the latter being 
 often used where the former should have been applied. 26 In 
 the censuses no separate enumeration is made of the mus- 
 tees, but there is no doubt that a considerable element in 
 the free colored population of the nineteenth century was 
 of Indian extraction. 
 
 The most congenial companion pf the free negro outside 
 of his own class was found among his kinsmen in bondage. 
 The larger part of the free negro class met and mingled 
 with negro slaves on a plane of almost perfect social equal 
 ity. 27 Prior to 1782 the fact that the free colored persons 
 were few in number would have been sufficient to prevent 
 the formation of an exclusive caste had there been differ 
 ences between free and slave negroes so radical as to render 
 conditions favorable for such a development. Even when 
 their numbers became sufficiently large for the formation of 
 an exclusive caste, there were absent those differences in 
 economic and political station to make it desirable either for 
 the free negro or the slave class to exclude the other from 
 its social life, the freedom of the free negro being in most 
 lines of activity only nominal. There were lacking to the 
 free negro the better education, the higher standard of 
 wants, and the better opportunities for acquiring wealth and 
 position necessary to supply an actual basis of superiority 
 and to give him higher social rank than that occupied by 
 the slave. 
 
 25 Gregory v. Baugh, 2. Leigh, 665; cf. also Jenkins v. Tom, I 
 Hening and Munford, 123; T. Jefferson, Notes on the State of Vir 
 ginia, ed. 1801, p. 182. 
 
 26 Virginia Gazette, December i, 1782. A reward is offered for a 
 runaway slave who, according to the description, was the offspring 
 of an Indian and a negress; but he is called a mulatto. 
 
 "The free negroes continue to live with the negro slaves, and 
 never with the white man" (Chastellux, vol. ii, p. 199). 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 Had it been possible for the free negro to hold himself 
 aloof from the slaves, he might have borne a better reputa 
 tion among slave owners ; for, as will appear later, his con 
 nection and his relation with slaves rendered him the object 
 of much undeserved suspicion and criticism. To the slaves 
 themselves the free negro was a welcome visitor ; at feasts, 
 barbacues, dances, and negro meetings of every kind he was 
 present to participate on a plane of equality with his slave 
 neighbors. While very few would have exchanged this 
 condition for that of the slave, they rarely ever regarded 
 slavery as the badge of a rank inferior to their own. 
 
 It was very common in the nineteenth century and the 
 twenty years immediately preceding for free negroes to 
 marry slaves. Numerous instances can be cited of mar 
 riages of free negro women with slave men. A case oc 
 curred in Brock County in i826. 28 A free negress by the 
 name of Rachel married a slave in Alleghany County in 
 i828. 29 Dilly, a free negro woman of Giles County, was 
 married to a slave husband by whom she had two children. 30 
 Similar examples may be found in almost any county. 31 
 
 Since the status of the mother became the status of the 
 offspring, it might be supposed that free colored women 
 would have had less aversion to choosing slave husbands 
 than free colored men would have had to marrying slave 
 wives, but that does not appear to have been the case. 
 Numerous examples might be cited to show that the prospect 
 of having children who would be slaves did not deter free 
 negro men from marrying slave wives. Rice Stephens, a 
 freeborn negro, was living in Northampton County in 1843 
 with a slave wife and three children. 32 Samuel Johnson, a 
 
 28 MS. Petitions, Brock County, A 2684. 
 
 29 MS. Petitions, Alleghany County, A 651. 
 
 30 MS. Petitions, Giles County, 1829, A 6784. 
 
 31 MS. Petitions, Goochland County, 1840, A 7109. According to 
 the story of Mary Winston, a free negro woman of Hanover County 
 still living (1909), her grandmother and great-grandmother married 
 slaves. 
 
 32 MS. Petitions, Northampton County, 64905. 
 
u*. 
 
 132 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 free negro of Fauquier County, had a slave daughter who 
 became the wife of a free negro. 33 
 
 Indeed, it is apparent that there were not a few free ne 
 groes who preferred a slave to a free wife. Certainly there 
 was less responsibility upon a husband whose wife and chil 
 dren were slaves and were therefore supported by their 
 white owners than upon one whose wife and children had to 
 be provided for by himself. "A freeman," says a pro- 
 slavery editor in 1802, "as soon as he is his own master, 
 marries the female slave of some farmer. He cannot well 
 be prevented from residing with his wife. She feeds him 
 gratis."** This was the opinion also of a later pamphlet 
 writer who wrote under the pseudonym of " Calx." " Every 
 male free negro," he wrote, "prefers to have a slave wife, 
 and will be so provided, if permitted by too careless indul 
 gence. In this manner he will not only have his wife and 
 children supported by the owner, and a lodging provided for 
 himself, but much of his own food will be obtained from his 
 wife and, directly or indirectly, to the loss of her master." 35 
 
 In addition to the temptation to free colored men to select 
 wives who were sure of support, and who might even partly 
 support their husbands, there was after 1806 another reason 
 why some free negroes might have considered themselves 
 fortunate to be connected by marriage with a slave woman. 
 Such a family connection often prevented a free negro man 
 umitted after 1806 from having to leave the State, according 
 to law, within twelve months from the date of his manu 
 mission. If such a free negro husband comported himself 
 well and made a useful laborer in the community, he was 
 sure to have the good will of his wife s master, to whose 
 interest it was to keep his slaves contented in their place. 
 If the free husband stayed in the community, his presence 
 would not only be a guaranty against his slave family mak 
 ing trouble for their master by becoming runaways, but he 
 himself might also become a useful employee of his wife s 
 
 33 MS. Petitions, Fauquier County, 1837, A 5859. 
 
 34 Richmond Recorder, November 10, 1802. 
 
 35 " Calx," p. 5 et seq. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 133 
 
 master. If he was forced to leave, he immediately endan 
 gered the interest of the master by establishing himself in a 
 border State and inducing his wife and children to join him. 
 Many a free negro petitioning the legislature for permission 
 to remain in the State made a special point of the fact that 
 his wife and children were slaves. 36 Many slave-owners 
 endorsed their petitions, and joined in asking the legislature 
 to grant the privilege asked for. Particularly was it true 
 in counties bordering on Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and 
 Kentucky that the slave-owners realized and were frank to 
 admit that a free negro, though not desirable on his own 
 part, was more desirable in Virginia than in a border county 
 of an adjoining State. 37 
 
 There is, however, nothing in the facts above stated, nor 
 in truth in any authentic evidence thus far examined, to 
 give support to the contention frequently made by slavery 
 apologists in the nineteenth century, and to this day not in 
 frequently repeated, that slaves generally regarded free ne 
 groes as of inferior social rank. The negro " aristocracy," 
 if such there was, was not based on the superiority of slaves 
 over the free negroes, but on the superiority of the wealthy 
 planter s " servants " over the " poor man s nigger." 38 Thomas 
 Bruce, writing in 1891 concerning the happy state of slavery, 
 said : " As a class, happier beings never existed, and they 
 had a most unbounded contempt for a free negro . . . and 
 shunned him as they would a leper, and even to this day 
 that prejudice still exists in the minds of the negro who can 
 recall the days of slavery." 39 Ellen Glasgow, in her novel 
 entitled "The Battle-Ground," depicts Free Levi as a free 
 
 86 House Journal, 1832-1833, p. 201. 
 
 87 Writing to the legislature to ask that a certain free negro be 
 permitted to remain in the State, fifty-five slave-owners of Harrison 
 County say : " He will take up his residence in the nearest point in 
 Pennsylvania or Ohio and of course will make occasional visits to 
 his family, and from the clamor which is going on in those states 
 upon the subject of abolition we judge that we should have more 
 to fear from that source than from his being permitted to remain 
 among us" (MS. Petitions, Harrison County, 1839, A 8677; se$ also 
 MS. Petitions, Cumberland County, 1815, A 4728). 
 
 38 A. Bagby, King and Queen County, p. 283. 
 
 88 T. Bruce, Southwest Virginia and the Shenandoah Valley, p. 46. 
 
134 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 colored man " who shares alike the pity of his white neigh 
 bors and the withering contempt of his black ones." 40 If 
 there is a basis of truth which gave rise to this mistaken 
 belief here and elsewhere expressed, it is in the fact that 
 slave-owners disapproved of the association of their slaves 
 with free negroes, whom they suspected of scattering seeds 
 of discontent in slave quarters. The master of slaves did 
 indeed have a withering contempt for free negroes, but one 
 of the reasons for such a feeling was the realization that his 
 slaves might readily emulate the superior privileges of free 
 dom as exemplified in the free negro. The slaves, being 
 generally of a docile, tractable disposition, may have pre 
 tended to regard free negroes as their inferiors, but their 
 " unbounded contempt " was merely an echo. 41 
 
 From one source, however, there sprang up in slaves a 
 certain dislike of free negroes with whom they were required 
 to work, but the feeling was quite different from contempt. 
 When free negroes were employed to work for wages with 
 slaves, as they often were, 42 and to do no harder work than 
 the slaves, the slaves were sometimes envious of the free 
 negroes because of the superior privileges of the latter in 
 the way of recompense. Such dislike for the free negroes 
 on the part of slaves was envious dislike for a superior 
 rather than contemptuous dislike for an inferior. 43 
 
 40 P. 148. 
 
 "William Dunston, slave of John R. Dunston, of Accomac 
 County, married a free negress whose name was Jane Jubilee. In 
 this instance it required not a little determination and self-will for 
 the slave to follow his suit to victory; for he was constantly met 
 by his master s reproachful queries : " Bill, would you marry into 
 that family of Jubilees? They are free negroes." This incident, 
 related to the author by C. C. James, of Northampton County, illus 
 trates the way in which masters tried to create in their slaves a 
 dislike for free negroes. 
 
 42 " They [free negroes] are sometimes hired for field labour in 
 times of harvest and on other particular occasions" (Madison s 
 Writings, vol. iii, pp. 310-315). 
 
 43 William E. Waddy, esq., of Eastville, Virginia, born in 1827, and 
 familiar with the facts concerning the relation of free negroes and 
 slaves from his boyhood to the close of the Civil War, vividly re 
 calls that a distaste for working with free negro hired laborers was 
 often manifested by slaves. He was unaware, however, of the ex 
 istence among slaves owned or observed by him of a feeling of 
 social superiority over free negroes. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 135 
 
 The acknowledgment repeatedly made by the enemies of 
 the free negro is alone sufficient to controvert the traditional 
 belief that slaves considered themselves in a superior station 
 or social rank to that of the free negroes. The latter were 
 spoken of as "possible chieftains of formidable conspira 
 cies," and " leaders " in servile outbreaks. 44 Mr. Moore, 
 in the slavery debate of 1832, said, " I lay it down as a 
 maxim not to be disputed, that our slaves, like all the rest 
 of the human race, are now and will continue to be actuated 
 by a desire of liberty." 43 This assumption was constantly 
 made by both antislavery and proslavery advocates, and par 
 ticularly by that portion of the latter class who regarded the 
 presence of the free negroes as a source of danger to the 
 institution of slavery as well as a menace to the discipline 
 and control of slaves. Antebellum free negroes and their 
 descendants still living are very proud to relate facts con 
 cerning their free ancestry; and while the most reliable of 
 the survivors of this class admit that many free negroes 
 were on no higher plane than slaves, they hold to the view 
 that many of the better class of free negroes considered 
 themselves socially superior to any slave. This must indeed 
 have been true of the free negroes who owned considerable 
 property, or owned or hired negro slaves and servants, as 
 did a few in the seventeenth century and many in the nine 
 teenth. It was certainly true of some free mulattoes whb 
 because of their white connections had received special op 
 portunities for education and an independent support. 46 
 
 Whether a free negro was to be married to a free person 
 or to a slave, who was legally incapable of making a con- 
 
 44 Richmond Enquirer, January 18, 1805. 
 5 Ibid., January 19, 1832. 
 
 49 In 1857 eight quadroon children belonging to Craddock Vaughn 
 of Halifax County made petition to the legislature for permission 
 to reside in the State notwithstanding the law of 1806, which ap 
 plied to them. The petitioners affirmed that they had had every 
 care in bringing up, and that they were " beyond the sphere of the 
 free negro class so degraded" (MS. Petitions, Halifax County, 
 1857, A 7724). See also MS. Petitions, King William County, 1825, 
 B 1191; Alleghany County, 1828, A 651; Halifax County, 1783, A 
 7551- 
 
136 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 tract, 47 legal forms were adhered to, and the nuptial cere 
 monies observed by white persons were imitated. White 
 ministers officiated at weddings of all classes of colored per 
 sons. Free colored candidates for matrimony obtained li- 
 censes just as did white persons, and often procured the 
 parlor of a white family as a place for the ceremony. A 
 glance at the records of marriages by the ministers of Hen- 
 rico parish from 1823 to 1860 will reveal numerous instances 
 of marriages of free colored persons and a few of marriages 
 of free negroes with slaves. 48 Of six marriages solemnized 
 by Rev. Edward Peet in 1831 one was the union of free 
 colored persons ; and of sixteen persons married by the same 
 minister in 1832, four were free colored. In 1829 Rev. W. 
 F. Lee married eight white and two free colored persons; 
 in 1833 the record was the same as in 1829; in 1834 he 
 married ten white and two free colored couples ; and in 
 1846, four white couples and one free colored couple. 49 
 
 In the seventeenth century and the part of the eighteenth 
 when the free negro class was so small as to be numbered 
 in hundreds there were to be found examples of well regu 
 lated, orderly families, appreciative of the sanctity of the 
 family relations, in which both parents were free colored. 
 The Northampton County records show a few examples as 
 early as i655- 50 The parish registers of the eighteenth cen 
 tury contain numerous examples of free colored parents 
 
 "It is agreed that slaves have no power [of contract]. Hence 
 the marriages of slaves are void" (Minor, vol. i, p. 168). 
 
 48 L. W. Burton, Annals of Henrico Parish, pp. 236-248. For 
 instances of marriages of free with slave negroes, see p. 247 : 
 " Morris Harris a free colored man, to Patience, a servant to Mrs. 
 Mary E. Robinson, by Rev. H. S. Kepler, 1855." " Servant " in this 
 register was a euphonious designation for " slave." The entries con 
 cerning the marriage of a free colored man with a free colored 
 woman uniformly stated that both were free, as : " Ned lightfoot and 
 Sophy Buck, both free people of color. License bearing date as 
 above." By Rev. W. M. Hart : " Aug. 16, 1825, John Jarvis, a free 
 man of color, and Lucy Marble, a free woman of color. License 
 bearing date Henrico Court, Aug. 1825." For another example, see 
 p. 248. 
 
 49 Burton, pp. 236-244. 
 
 W MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1651-1654, pp. 28, 
 161. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 137 
 
 whose children were regularly baptized into the church. 51 
 When toward the latter part of the eighteenth century and on 
 to the end of the antebellum period the free colored popula 
 tion came to be numbered by tens of thousands, numerous 
 examples of respectable free colored families are to be 
 found. On a petition signed by ninety free colored persons 
 of Richmond in 1823 there were nineteen families repre 
 sented by the names of both husband and wife. 52 It was 
 thought that a rather large proportion of free colored fe 
 males, particularly free mulattoes, were unchaste. 53 How 
 ever this may have been, there is ample documentary evi 
 dence to show that in the nineteenth century there was a 
 certain large class of the free colored population the mem 
 bers of which were respectable and observant of decency 
 and regularity in their family relations. 54 
 
 Throughout the period of the colony when the number of 
 free negroes was comparatively small, and even in the 
 nineteenth century before the time of the active propagation 
 of antislavery doctrines, there existed little if any prejudice 
 against the education of free colored persons. In the third 
 quarter of the seventeenth century there was opposition to 
 offering baptism to negro slaves until it was determined by 
 law that the administration of the baptismal rite did not 
 bestow freedom. 55 This objection did not apply, however, 
 to the religious instruction of free negroes or negro appren 
 tices. Before the middle of the seventeenth century pro 
 vision was made by certain white persons for guaranteeing 
 religious instruction and education to negro servants who 
 would eventually become free. 56 In 1654, when Richard 
 
 51 Bruton Parish Register, p. 57 ff. Original copy, Bruton Church, 
 Williamsburg. 
 
 52 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1823, A 9335. 
 63 "Calx," pp. 5-11. 
 
 M Cf. MS. Petitions, Accomac County, A 42. 
 
 M Hening, vol. ii, p. 260; Godwyn, p. II ff. 
 
 66 General Court Records, printed in Virginia Magazine of His 
 tory, vol. xi, p. 281,; MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 
 1645-1651, p. 82. 
 
138 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 Vaughan freed his negroes, he provided in his will that they 
 should be taught to read and to make their own clothes, and 
 that they should be brought up in the fear of God. 57 
 
 In colonial times the Anglican church did a great deal to 
 provide for the religious instruction and baptism of the free 
 colored class. The reports made in 1724 to the English 
 bishop by the Virginia parish ministers are evidence that the 
 few free negroes in the parishes were permitted to be bap 
 tized, and were received into the church when they had been 
 taught the catechism. 58 It had been a practice of the seven 
 teenth century to stipulate in the indenture or contract by 
 which a free negro was apprenticed to a master that the 
 master, in return for the negro s service, must provide in 
 struction in the Christian religion in addition to sufficient 
 food, apparel, and lodging. 59 In 1691 the church became the 
 agency through which the laws of negro apprenticeship 
 were carried out. 60 Free mulatto children born of white 
 mothers and any free colored boy or girl without visible 
 means of support were bound by the churchwardens to serve 
 white men for a certain term of years. The custom of the 
 churchwardens of requiring these masters to provide some 
 degree of education for the colored apprentices remained in 
 vogue throughout the colonial period, as is shown by numer 
 ous orders of the vestry meetings and orders of the county 
 courts for binding out free colored children. For example, 
 in 1727 it was ordered that David James, a free negro boy, 
 be bound to Mr. James Isdel, " who is to teach him to read 
 ye bible distinctly also ye trade of a gunsmith that he carry 
 
 01 MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1654-1655, pp. 102, 
 103. 
 
 58 Papers Relating to the History of the Church: Westminster 
 parish, p. 261 ; Lawn s Creek parish, p. 289. 
 
 "The church is open to them all" (Report of the minister in 
 Isle of Wight County, in Papers Relating to the History of the 
 Church, p. 274). As a means of encouraging baptism of negro 
 children, a proposition was made to exempt from taxation for four 
 years any negro or mulatto child baptized (ibid., p. 344). 
 
 59 See an indenture to this effect executed by Francis Pott in 
 1646, in MS. Court Records of Northampton County, 1645-1651, p. 82. 
 
 60 Hening, vol. iii, p. 87. v 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 139 
 
 him to ye Clark s office & take Indenture to that purpose." 61 
 By the Warwick County court it was " ordered that Malacai, 
 a mulatto boy, son of mulatto Betty be, by the church war 
 dens of this Parish, bound to Thomas Hobday to learn the 
 art of a planter according to law." 62 By the order of the 
 Norfolk County court, about 1770, a free negro was bound 
 out " to learn the trade of a tanner." 03 After 1785 the duty 
 of binding out free colored children was placed upon the 
 overseers of the poor, who required of the masters, accord 
 ing to the laws and the custom, an agreement to teach the 
 apprentice reading, writing, and arithmetic. 64 
 
 In the period between the Revolutionary War and the be 
 ginning of the nineteenth century there were two religious 
 societies that were very active in teaching and offering reli 
 gious instruction to the free negroes, namely, the Quakers 
 and the Methodists. 65 The Quakers set free no inconsider 
 able part of the slaves manumitted in this period, and the 
 various meetings took official action to see that negroes set 
 free by their members were taught and Christianized. 66 It 
 was in accordance with the advice of the yearly and quarterly 
 meetings of Friends that the monthly meetings extended 
 "a watchful care over those negroes ... set free within 
 the verge of the monthly meeting, administering counsel and 
 advice particularly to those in their minority " and render 
 ing them temporal and spiritual assistance. 67 In 1781 a 
 
 61 From the court records of Princess Anne County, cited in Vir 
 ginia Magazine of History, vol. ii, p. 429. See also MS. Minutes of 
 Northampton County, 1754-1757, p. 100. 
 
 63 MS. Minutes of Warwick County, 1748-1762, p. 30, in Virginia 
 State Library. 
 
 63 MS. Orders of Norfolk County, 1768-1771, pp. 232-233. See 
 also ibid., pp. n, 91; Vestry Book of Saint Peter s Parish, p. 135: 
 an order, 1771; Register of St. Peter s Parish, p. 117. 
 
 "Herring, vol. viii, pp. 376-377; vol. xii, pp. 28, 29; vol. xvi, p. 124. 
 
 63 The friendship of the Quakers and the Methodists for the negro 
 was mentioned by Randolph in the Federal Convention at Philadel 
 phia, 1787 (Papers of James Madison, ed. by Gilpin, vol. iii, p. 1396). 
 
 c<i MS. Minutes of the Hopewell Monthly Meeting, 1777-1791, p. 
 190. 
 
 6T MS. Minutes of the Fairfax Monthly Meeting, 1776-1802, p. 
 105 (1776), pp. no, 243 (1/82) ; MS. Minutes and Proceedings of 
 Goose Creek Monthly Meeting, 1785-1818, p. 533. 
 
I4O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 committee of Friends appointed by the Warrenton and 
 Fairfax Quarterly Meeting " to have under their Care and 
 labour to promote the Education and religious Instruction 
 of such negroes as have been set free" reported that a a 
 good degree of care and labor had been extended, and that 
 there still remained other work along the same line that 
 must be done." 68 The Methodists were likewise mindful of 
 the spiritual welfare of the negroes, whether free or slave, 
 and were so active in the advocacy of the cause of freedom 
 that they were denied by many slave-owners the opportunity 
 of instructing slaves; 69 but they continued to offer private 
 instruction to free negroes, and to slaves when opportunity 
 was afforded. 70 Besides Quakers and Methodists, there 
 were smaller religious societies, such as Moravians, Har- 
 monites, and Shakers, who, besides giving the negroes reli 
 gious instruction, taught them many useful industries, and 
 even worked with them in creating a common property. 71 
 
 After the fears of the slave-owners were aroused by the 
 Gabriel insurrection in 1800 and by rumors of a general out 
 break, it was thought desirable to curtail the opportunities 
 of the free negroes for acquiring a knowledge of books 
 which might render them propagators of seditious anti- 
 slavery doctrines among the slaves ; hence the overseers of 
 the poor were commanded by legislative authority to cease 
 requiring the master or mistress to whom a free negro or 
 mulatto child was apprenticed to teach the child reading, 
 writing, and arithmetic, as had hitherto been the custom. 72 
 
 68 MS. Minutes of Warrenton and Fairfax Quarterly Meeting, 
 1776-1787, p. 123. 
 
 69 Journal of the Rev. Francis Asbury, vol. ii, p. 71 ; vol. iii, pp. 253, 
 257 ; Bennett, p. 547. 
 
 "What directions shall we give for the promotion of the spir 
 itual welfare of the colored people? 
 
 " We conjure all our ministers and preachers ... to leave nothing 
 undone for the spiritual benefit and salvation of them . . . and to 
 unite in Society those who appear to have a real desire of fleeing 
 from the wrath to come; to meet such in class and to exercise the 
 whole Methodist discipline among them" (Annual Minutes, 1787, 
 quoted from H. N. McTyeire, History of Methodism, p. 381). 
 
 71 Madison s Writings, vol. iii, pp. 495, 497. 
 
 72 Hening, vol. xvi, p. 124. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 A more rigorous enforcement of the laws against unlawful 
 assemblages of slaves further discouraged efforts to give 
 instruction to negroes, bond or free. Quakers were prose 
 cuted in court for assembling negroes for instruction in their 
 meeting-houses. 73 Probably owing to discouragement thus 
 received and to some relaxation of their former zeal due to 
 other causes, the Friends were not so active in behalf of the 
 negro in Virginia as they had been in the eighteenth century, 
 although they continued to hold a prominent place among 
 his sympathizers and helpers. In 1816 a committee ap 
 pointed by the Goose Creek Monthly Meeting to inquire 
 into the opportunities for education afforded African chil 
 dren in the homes of Friends reported that "only two in 
 stances were found of colored children suitably provided 
 for, and opportunity afforded them of acquiring useful 
 school learning." 74 
 
 In the nineteenth century the Baptist Church, by a less 
 bold assertion of views in opposition to slavery than those 
 advanced by Methodists, avoided the hostility of the slave 
 owners which fell to the share of the Methodists, and thus 
 gained the larger share of negro evangelization. 75 Even 
 when the laws discouraged negro education, the Baptists 
 did much toward instructing free negroes privately and in 
 Sunday schools, 78 and received them into their churches. 77 
 In churches where colored persons attended in considerable 
 numbers a section of the pews was set aside for their use, 
 and at all times a strict observance of the color line seems 
 to have prevailed. The condition of the free colored people 
 before 1831 as regards religious and educational advantages 
 is so well shown by a petition to the legislature in 1823 of 
 
 "See E. Woods, Albemarle County, in Virginia, p. in, for in 
 stances of indictments of Friends for unlawfully assembling slaves. 
 
 74 MS. Minutes of Goose Creek Monthly Meeting, 1785-1818, p. 
 534- 
 
 75 In 1835 Professor E. A. Andrews wrote a letter from Fredericks- 
 burg saying that the " religious instruction [of the free negroes] has 
 fallen, in a great measure into the hands of the Baptists, as in Balti 
 more it is conducted by the Methodists" (Slavery and the Domestic 
 Slave Trade in the United States, p. 162). 
 
 76 Cf The Liberator, July 4 1845. 
 
 "MS. Petitions, Floyd County, 1836, A 6081. 
 
142 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 ninety-one free negroes of Richmond that the document is 
 worth reproducing in full: 
 
 The petition of a number of persons of colour residing in the 
 City of Richmond, respectfully represents : that from the rapid in 
 crease of population in the City, the number of free persons of col 
 our and slaves has become very considerable and although few of 
 them can boast any knowledge of letters, yet that they are always 
 desirous of receiving such instruction from public and divine wor 
 ship as may be given by sensible and prudent Teachers of religion. 
 
 It has been the misfortune of your petitioners to be excluded from 
 the churches, meeting-houses and other places of public devotion 
 which are used by white persons in consequence of no appropriate 
 places being assigned for them, except in a few Houses, and they 
 have been compelled to look to private Houses, where they are 
 much crowded and where a portion of their Brothers are unable to 
 hear or to partake of the worship which is going on. Your Peti 
 tioners consisting of free persons and slaves, have been for some 
 time associated with the Baptist church. A list of their members 
 consisting of about 700 persons has been submitted for his inspec 
 tion to the Head of Police of this City and no objection has been 
 by him made to their moral characters. 
 
 Your Petitioners for these reasons humbly pray that your honour 
 able body will pass a law authorizing them to cause to be erected 
 within this city a house of public worship which may be called the 
 Baptist African Church. To such restrictions and restraints as are 
 consistent with the laws now existing or which may hereafter be 
 passed for the proper restraint of persons of colour and for the 
 preservation of the peace and good order of society . . . your peti 
 tioners are prepared most cheerfully to submit, and although it would 
 be pleasing to them to have a voice in the choice of their Teachers 
 yet would they be quite satisfied that any choice made by them should 
 be approved or rejected by the Mayor of this city, they ask not 
 for the privilege of continuing in office any preacher who shall in 
 any manner have rendered himself obnoxious to the Mayor, nor can 
 they reasonably expect to hold night meetings or assemblages for 
 Baptizing but with the consent of that officer. And your Petition 
 ers as in duty bound will ever pray. . . , 78 
 
 78 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1823, A 9335. Affixed to this 
 petition were the following names of free colored persons of Rich 
 mond and the mayor s certificate, as follows : 
 
 " I hereby certify that I have examined the list of signatures of 
 free persons of colour hereunto attached and believe them to be 
 respectable. 
 
 " I am of opinion that the prayers of their petition, if granted, may 
 be productive of benefit to themselves as well as to the white pop 
 ulation of Richmond and most sincerely wish them success. 
 
 JOHN ADAMS, 
 Mayor of the City of Richmond. 
 
 Free persons of colour of the City of Richmond of the Baptist 
 denomination : 
 
 Richard Dye, Hembrey Tompkins, 
 
 Teanah Dye, Mary Tompkins, 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 143 
 
 Although it appears that the bill introduced in the House 
 of Delegates granting the privileges asked for in this peti 
 tion was lost, the negroes were enabled by some means to 
 erect church houses for their use. There were three African 
 Baptist churches and two African Methodist churches in 
 Richmond in the decade before the Civil War. 79 
 
 When the agitation for the abolition of slavery became 
 acute and antislavery tracts and pamphlets were in wide cir 
 culation in the State, the friends of the institution of slavery 
 became apprehensive of the evil which might result from 
 the reading of such literature by free negroes, and in conse 
 quence brought about legislation to prevent free negroes 
 from acquiring a knowledge of books. 79 * The proximate 
 cause of legislative action was probably the discovery in 
 1830 by the mayor of Richmond of a copy of Walker s Ap 
 peal to the Colored Citizens of the World in the house of a 
 free negro after his death. 80 By an act of April 7, 1831, "all 
 
 William Caswell, Nancy Ellis, 
 
 Robert Dandridge, Phillip Robenson, 
 
 Martha Dandridge, Richard Vaughan, 
 
 Thomas Mondowney, Agness Vaughan, 
 
 Catherine Mondowney, John Harper, 
 
 Exland Henderson, Caesar Hawkins, 
 
 P. Wm. Reynolds, Fanny Hawkins, 
 
 Sarah Reynolds, James Greenhow, 
 
 Isaac Vines, Alice Greenhow, 
 
 Nicholaus Scott, Minis Hill, 
 
 Betsy Scott, Cas Hill, 
 
 Mary Barges, Isaac Reynals, 
 
 David Bowles, Billy Swann, 
 
 Susan Bowles, Aley Swann, 
 
 Joseph Bell, Edwd. Lightford, 
 
 John Peters, Edward Casey, 
 
 Agness Peters, Nanney Casey, 
 
 Douglass Tinsley, Wilson Morris, 
 
 John Green, Fanney Drummond, 
 
 Isham Ellis, Pleasants Price, 
 
 and 47 others, with certificates and endorsements by Joseph Price, 
 master of police, and seven other prominent white men of the city. 
 79 Richmond Directory, 1852, p. 165 ; 1856 passim. 
 9a In his message to the legislature Governor Floyd asserted that 
 the free negroes had helped to stir up revolt, and had " opened more 
 enlarged views," and that inasmuch as they were allowed to go at 
 liberty they could " distribute incendiary pamphlets and papers " 
 (House Journal, 1831-1832, p. 10). 
 
 * Richmond Enquirer, January 28, 1830. Cf . J. B. McMaster, 
 History of the People of the United States, vol. vi, p. 70. 
 
144 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 meetings of free negroes or mulattoes at any school-house 
 or other place for teaching them reading or writing, either 
 in the day or night, under whatever pretext," were declared 
 to be unlawful assemblies. Any justice either of his own 
 knowledge or on information of others could issue his war 
 rant to an officer authorizing him to enter the house and 
 arrest or disperse the offending free negroes and to inflict 
 upon them, at the discretion of a justice of the peace, cor 
 poral punishment not exceeding thirty-nine lashes. If a 
 white person attempted to teach free negroes for pay, he 
 was liable to a fine of fifty dollars and imprisonment. 81 
 After " Brother " Nat Turner s insurrection the ban was put 
 upon negro preachers and teachers by an act declaring it 
 unlawful for negroes, whether ordained or licensed or other 
 wise, to preach, exhort, or conduct any meeting for reli 
 gious or other purposes. 82 In the revision of this law in 
 1842 it was declared that "every assemblage of negroes for 
 the purpose of religious worship, when such worship is con 
 ducted by a negro, and every assemblage of negroes for 
 the purpose of instruction in reading and writing, or in the 
 night time for any purpose, shall be deemed an unlawful 
 assembly." 83 Some free colored persons who possessed 
 sufficient means began sending their children to the North 
 to be educated; but in 1838 all such efforts were forestalled 
 by an act declaring that any free person of color who should 
 go beyond the State for education should be considered to 
 have emigrated. 84 This was equivalent to a declaration that 
 no free negro going out of the State for education should 
 return. It was apparently in anticipation of this act for 
 bidding Virginia free negroes to seek education in the North 
 that sixteen free negroes of Fredericksburg, all of whom 
 possessed considerable property, petitioned the Virginia leg- 
 
 81 Acts, 1830-1831, p. 107; Supplement to Revised Code, 244-245. 
 
 82 Acts, 1831-1832, p. 20; Supplement to Revised Code, 246-247. 
 In 1834 ten free negroes of Richmond complained in a petition to 
 the legislature that the consequence of this law was that many 
 colored human beings were interred like brutes, their friends and rel 
 atives being unable to procure the usual ceremony in the burial of 
 the dead (MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1834, A 9483). 
 
 88 Acts, 1840-1842, p. 21 ; 1847-1848, p. 120; Code (1860), 810-811. 
 84 Acts, 1838, p. 76; Hurd, vol. ii, p. 10; Acts, 1847-1848, p. 119. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 145 
 
 islature in 1838 for the privilege of establishing a school 
 for free colored children in their city. 85 They complained 
 of the inconvenience of sending their children to the North 
 for education, and very tactfully added that they preferred 
 not to send them where " they imbibe bad doctrines." The 
 legislature refused them the right to establish the school, 88 
 and attended in its own way to the danger of imbibing bad 
 doctrines by withdrawing from free negroes even the privi 
 lege of educating their children beyond the limits of the 
 State. From 1838 to the close of the Civil War the only 
 educational advantage that could lawfully be given to the 
 free negroes was strictly private instruction. Rarely and 
 with difficulty did some free colored families procure white 
 persons to teach their children privately. 87 
 
 In view of the difficulties to be met by free colored persons 
 in the pursuit of learning, the discovery of a high percentage 
 of illiteracy in that class of the population occasions no sur 
 prise. " Calx," writing in the later fifties, observed that 
 "the free negroes, as a class, are ignorant." 88 There were, 
 however, in 1850 a little above one free negro in six who 
 could read and write. In the white population of the State 
 a little more than eleven out of twelve were literate. In 
 other words, about eighty per cent of the free colored popu 
 lation throughout the State was illiterate, as compared with 
 eight per cent, in the white population. 89 Quite generally 
 throughout the entire period of two and a half centuries 
 under review free negroes and mulattoes could merely make 
 their marks in affixing their signatures to records of legal 
 or business transactions. 
 
 In the fifty years before 1861 it was the practice of persons 
 
 "MS. Petitions, Spottsylvania County, 1838. 
 88 House Journal, 1837-1838, p. 248. 
 
 87 Upon the authority of elderly men who are able to recall events 
 of the kst two decades before the Civil War, it may safely be stated 
 that white persons sometimes taught free negro children in the 
 homes of the negroes. 
 
 88 / 1 
 
 Calx, p. 4. 
 
 88 Census of 1850, Population, vol. vii, p. 271. 
 
 10 
 
146 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 opposed to the residence of free negroes in Virginia, par 
 ticularly the promoters of societies for colonizing them in 
 Africa, to condemn them almost indiscriminately as being 
 not only morally depraved but economically worthless. 90 
 Fortunately there are other and less biased witnesses from 
 whose evidence may be formed an estimate of the value and 
 merits of the free colored class as an economic factor. It 
 should be remembered that all efforts to remove the free 
 negroes from Virginia failed utterly, and with truth it may 
 be said that one of the chief obstacles in the way of those 
 efforts was, then as at the present time, the demand for 
 their labor. Between 1790 and 1860 the free negro class, 
 numbering from twelve thousand to sixty thousand, was far 
 from being a negligible factor in the labor supply of that 
 half of the State in which they resided and to which their 
 labor was accessible. Any conception that the free negro 
 was crushed in the scramble for employment between the 
 slave and the white laborer may at the outset be banished 
 from mind. Let us see in a general way what were the con 
 ditions affecting the economic opportunities of the free negro 
 from 1782 to the Civil War as regards the character of em 
 ployment and employers. 
 
 The agricultural and especially the plantation work was 
 done principally by slaves. But there was a large element 
 in the white population, even in the eastern part of the State, 
 which was non-slaveholding and not devoted to agriculture, 
 except in an avocational and subsidiary manner. To this 
 element belonged the larger part of town and city popula 
 tions. Whatever employment was furnished to laborers by 
 the non-slaveholding class of whites was open to competition 
 by the free negro ; and his competitors were white laborers 
 and persons who had slaves to hire. 81 But many non-slave- 
 
 90 Compare what William Jay had to say in 1835 on the char 
 acter and tendency of the American colonization societies, in a little 
 book entitled Slavery in America, chapters i-v. He quotes C. L. 
 Moseby s address before the Virginia Colonization Society, as fol 
 lows: "This class of persons is a curse and a contagion wherever 
 they reside" (p. 12; African Repository, vol. iii, p. 203). 
 
 91 Local newspaper advertisement, City Point, 1800 : " Encourage- 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 147 
 
 holding employers preferred free labor to slave labor be 
 cause of conscientious scruples as to the moral justification 
 of slavery, 92 and hired slaves were not well suited to do 
 small irregular jobs. Hence there was a certain amount of 
 employment for which the free negro had no competitor, 
 except the white laborer, or white hireling, as he was some 
 times called. 
 
 Within this field of demand for free laborers, where the 
 only handicap upon the free negro in his contest with the 
 free white workman was race prejudice, he was easily the 
 winner. In the first place, white men of pride, disdaining 
 to enter into competition with the free negro for employ 
 ment open to them, emigrated to the West. "While he 
 [the free negro] remained here," asserted citizens of Hen- 
 rico County in 1825, "no white laborer will seek employ 
 ment near him. Hence, it is that in some of the richest 
 counties east of the Blue Ridge the white population is sta 
 tionary and in many others it is retrograde." 93 Governor 
 Smith in his message of 1847 to the legislature said, " I ven 
 ture the opinion that a larger emigration of our white labor 
 ers is produced by our free negroes than by the institution 
 of slavery." 94 
 
 Such white laborers as remained to seek employment in 
 the State fared badly where the free negroes were at all 
 numerous. There were at least two important reasons for 
 the free negro s supremacy over the white laborer: First, 
 his standard of living and mode of living permitted him to 
 accept smaller wages than the whites could accept and live. 
 Governor Smith protested in 1848 that in the kind of work 
 
 merit offered to free negroes or to persons having negroes to hire. 
 William Heth." The work to be done was ditching and draining. 
 (Taken from a fragment of a newspaper accompanying a legislative 
 petition, in Virginia State Library.) 
 
 92 MS. Petitions, Loudoun Co., 1843, B 1900; F. L. Olmstead, 
 A Journey in the Seaboard Slave States, p. 94; see statement of Ran 
 dolph in the National Federal Convention, 1787, in Madison Papers, 
 vol. iii, p. 1396. 
 
 93 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1825, A 9358, A 9359. 
 
 94 House Journal, 1847-1848, p. 20. Governor Smith reaffirmed 
 this belief in his message of 1848 (ibid., 1848-1849, p. 22). 
 
148 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 required in cities and in odd jobs the free negroes "wholly 
 supersede by the smallness and nature of their compensation 
 the employment of white men." 95 Secondly, the free negro, 
 being naturally of an obedient, tractable disposition and re 
 spectful of personal authority, and being hedged about by 
 numerous legal incapacities and perils, was more easily com 
 manded and directed, and was therefore a more desirable 
 servant. Again, we have Governor Smith to testify, not in 
 praise, but in blame, of the free negroes that " they perform 
 a thousand little menial services to the exclusion of the 
 white man, preferred by their employers because of the au 
 thority and control which they can exercise and frequently 
 because of the ease and facility with which they can remu 
 nerate such services." 96 
 
 The extent of the white employer s power to command a 
 free negro workman or servant was even greater than that 
 of a master over a slave ; for by nature the free negro was 
 quite as docile and as amenable to supervision as the slave, 
 and unlike the slave he could be driven from the job and thus 
 deprived of his means of support. Hence, as a matter of 
 practice, the free negro was not infrequently a better " slave" 
 than his kinsman in bondage. Between 1806 and 1860 large 
 numbers of free negroes, when found beyond the limits of 
 the counties or towns where they were known to have legal 
 residence rights, were hired out by law as vagrants. Upon 
 an occasion of a number of arrests, or when such prisoners 
 arrested at various times had accumulated, the sheriff held 
 a public auction, and cried off to the highest bidder the ser 
 vices of these freemen for a definite term of months or 
 years, their labor selling from a few cents up to twenty-five 
 cents per day. 97 Certainly with this system of hiring out 
 free negroes under the vagrancy laws nothing but "poor 
 white trash " could compete. The feelings of the white 
 
 90 Message, in House Journal, 1848-1849, p. 22. 
 
 "Message, in House Journal, 1847-1848, p. 20. 
 
 97 Hiring out free negroes who were willing to be engaged by en 
 terprising white agents became such a prosperous business that in 
 1852 a license tax of twenty-five dollars was exacted of such agents 
 (Acts, 1852-1853, P- 15; 1855-1856, p. 45). 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 149 
 
 laborer in view of the conditions were correctly voiced by 
 a white citizen writing in the Richmond Whig, December 
 n, 1845 : " Those whose hearts are now sickened when they 
 look into the carpenters shops, the blacksmiths shops and 
 the shops of all the different trades in Richmond and see 
 them crowded with negro apprentices and negro workmen, 
 are ready to quit in disgust." Laws imposing direct restric 
 tion upon the economic activities and competition of the 
 free negro were repeatedly asked for, but were refused by 
 the legislature. 98 
 
 Further light may be thrown upon the character and scope 
 of the economic need served by the free negro by summar 
 izing from many concrete cases the occupations in which he 
 prospered. From the list may be eliminated lawyers, doc 
 tors, and, after 1832, teachers and preachers. Free negroes 
 were forbidden by law to act in an official capacity, to ad 
 minister medicine, and to teach or preach to persons assem 
 bled." By reason of a prejudicial interpretation of the 
 laws, if not in open violation of them, free negroes were 
 not allowed to pursue unmolested the business of an inn 
 keeper or proprietor. 100 A small part of the free colored 
 class were landowners and farmers, having come into pos 
 session of land usually by bequest from their former owner. 
 
 88 House Journal, 1830-1831. Citizens of Culpeper County peti 
 tioned the legislature in 1831 to pass a law " for encouraging white 
 mechanics by forbidding any slave free negro or mulatto to be bound 
 apprentice to learn any trade or art" (House Journal, 1831-1832, 
 pp. 2, 84). Certain limitations were placed by law upon the eco 
 nomic freedom of the free negro; but they were ostensibly for police 
 purposes, and only incidentally affected his freedom in getting 
 employment. 
 
 "See above, pp. 116, 144. 
 
 100 In 1844 Jacob Sampson, a free mulatto, was ordered to show 
 why his license of the court of Goochland County for keeping an 
 inn or ordinary should not be revoked, and with no charges against 
 him his license was revoked without any portion of the tax being 
 refunded to him. By way of appeal to the legislature, he procured 
 testimonials from a number of white citizens showing that he was 
 honest, sober, and of good character; that in an orderly house 
 which he had kept for fifteen years on the " three chopped " road 
 he had entertained persons generally, and stock drivers especially, 
 in a satisfactory manner. But his appeals were rejected by the 
 legislature (MS. Petitions, Goochland County, 1844, A 7113; House 
 Journal, 1844-1845, p. 37). 
 
I5O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 But the free negro was in general a toiler. Tucker observed 
 that " the occupations of persons of this class are nearly the 
 same as those of slaves." 101 Among those petitioning the 
 legislature between 1776 and 1860 were the following, 
 enumerated by trades and occupations : barbers, coopers, car 
 penters, mechanics, cabinet-makers, wheelwrights, chair- 
 makers, bricklayers, plasterers, painters, tanners, shoemakers, 
 blacksmiths, millers, sawyers, wood-dealers, draymen, huck 
 sters, gardeners, confectioners, bakers, fishermen, fishmon 
 gers, oysterers, commanders of boats, lead miners, day labor 
 ers at all work, body servants and attendants, household ser 
 vants, and washerwomen. There were known also to be a 
 few merchants or dealers, 102 a few musicians, 103 and a few 
 undertakers. 104 
 
 A glance at this list will reveal the reason why free negroes 
 flocked to the cities and towns. The employment in urban 
 districts was in the nature of job work and service in un 
 skilled trades to which the free negroes were adaptable. 
 "Bad as they are," admitted an unfriendly critic in 1859, 
 "the free- negroes [in cities and towns] serve best in many 
 menial and low stations." 105 Furthermore, as between occu 
 pations on the water and on the land, the free negro showed 
 an inclination to choose the former. Tucker thought that 
 one reason why the number of adult free colored females 
 
 101 G. Tucker, Progress of the United States in Population and 
 Wealth in Fifty Years, p. 139. In the census enumeration made in 
 Virginia in 1782 some free negroes appear as appurtenances of the 
 estates of white persons (Heads of Families, First Census of United 
 States, 1790, Virginia, pp. 112-118). 
 
 102 Law and sentiment were not favorable toward free negro deal 
 ers, especially hawkers and pedlars (2 Revised Code, 43). See 
 Richmond Daily Dispatch, February 18, 1858, on the whipping of a 
 free negro poultry dealer for stealing. 
 
 103 At one time before the Civil War the colored band of the Rich 
 mond Blues was composed of free negroes. 
 
 104 A free negro undertaker of Charlestown, West Virginia, makes 
 the assertion that before the Civil War he buried the dead of the 
 better classes of whites. 
 
 105 " Calx," p. 15. See petition from Norfolk to the legislature, 
 which, while pleading the cause of a free negro who was about to 
 be forced to quit the city, pleaded also in behalf of " female fam 
 ilies " of the city whom the free negro had been supplying with 
 fuel (MS. Petitions, Norfolk County, 1834, B 4566). 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 exceeded the number of adult males of this class, while the 
 reverse was true of other classes of the population, was 
 that the male free negroes sought a seafaring life. 106 Bagby 
 hints that the negro s preference for the Baptist Church may 
 possibly find some explanation in his love for the water. 107 
 Fishing, oyster-dredging, and working on ships or boats as 
 servants, cooks, stewards, stevedores, or navigators were all 
 enticing employments for the free negro. Many of the best 
 patronized boats on the rivers and bays were owned by free 
 persons of color. 
 
 Probably the most prosperous and useful class of free 
 negroes were the barbers. Many of the towns and cities, 
 for example Lynchburg and Richmond, were at times almost 
 wholly dependent upon free colored barbers. 108 Reuben 
 West, a Richmond free negro following the trade of a 
 barber, acquired a fortune of several thousand dollars. 109 
 In his shop on Main Street he ran from one to four chairs, 
 and had as apprentice a free mulatto, William Mundin, who 
 learned, and for a number of years followed, the trade as 
 an apprentice to this free black man. If an assertion may 
 be based wholly upon the declaration of a freeborn and very 
 respectable negro yet living 110 who knew Reuben West, the 
 latter owned for a few years two slaves whom he employed 
 at his trade in his shop. 
 
 In some trades there were free negro entrepreneurs, who ; 
 used and directed the labor of hired free negroes and slaves. 
 A. E. Andrews, writing from Fredericksburg in 1835, as 
 serted that " some of the best mechanics of the city are 
 coloured men, and among them are several master workmen, 
 
 G. Tucker, Progress of the United States, p. 60. 
 
 108 A distinguished gentleman of Richmond, who in 1912 was 
 eighty-four years of age, asserts that in all his life he never had a 
 barber who was not colored to cut his hair or shave him. This was 
 told the author to illustrate the extent to which the free negro was 
 relied upon in the barber s trade. 
 
 109 Tax-books, 1856, 1857, 1859. City Hall, Richmond. 
 
 110 James H. Hill, 227 V Street, N. W., Washington, D. C, in 
 structor in wood-work in the public schools, owns property in 
 Richmond which belonged to the Hill family of free negroes long 
 before the Civil War. 
 
152 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 who employ a considerable number of coloured laborers." 111 
 It was no uncommon practice for free negroes to hire slaves 
 to labor for them. The legislature considered repeatedly 
 the expediency of denying to free negroes the right to hire 
 slaves, 112 the ground of objection probably being the tendency 
 of such employment to cause the slave, commanded by one 
 not socially his superior, to despise his slavery, or the oppor 
 tunity in such employ to acquire a knowledge of antislavery 
 doctrines and propaganda. 
 
 How largely the failure of all attempts to remove the free 
 negro from the State was due to a fairer appreciation of 
 his economic worth when the value of an individual was to 
 be considered than when the class as a whole was under 
 review is shown by the protests forthcoming from the 
 white inhabitants wherever and whenever an effort was 
 made to enforce the law requiring negroes set free after 
 1806 to quit the State. 113 The protests are hardly less sig 
 nificant because they attempt to have only individuals ex- 
 cepted from the operation of the law than if they aimed at 
 saving the entire class. In 1810 sixty persons prayed the 
 legislature to allow a free negro wheelwright, "who will 
 benefit the whole country," to remain in the State and the 
 county; 114 and in the same year citizens of Petersburg de 
 clared to the Assembly that the town could not spare without 
 loss one Uriah Tyner. 115 In 1812 a large number of citizens 
 of Berkeley and Frederick counties told the legislature that 
 "there is not a human being in this part of the country 
 where they [Jerry and Susanna, free colored] reside who is 
 
 111 P. 162. 
 
 112 The matter was before the legislature of 1841-1842 (House 
 Journal, p. 16) ; a bill was introduced to prevent the practice in 
 1843 (ibid., 1842-1843, p. 182) ; the expediency of similar legislation 
 was considered in 1844 (ibid., 1844-1845, p. 66), but the committee 
 asked to be discharged. 
 
 " The harsh measures often proposed in the legislature by those 
 who feel the evil of their increasing numbers, have not been carried 
 into laws " because of " the examples of intelligence, honesty and 
 worth among them" (Message of Governor Smith, in House Jour 
 nal, 1850-1851, p. 30). 
 
 114 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1810, A 9180. 
 
 115 MS. Petitions, Dinwiddie County, 1810, A 4946. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 153 
 
 opposed to their remaining in Virginia." 116 The plea of the 
 inhabitants of Lynchburg for Pleasant Rowan, a free colored 
 carpenter and mechanic, was that " his loss would be felt in 
 the community ;" 116a for Frederick Williams that he was a 
 much needed barber ; llob and for Ned Adams, that he was 
 an almost indispensable cooper. 117 The people of Henrico 
 County, petitioning for John Hopes, a free negro, said that 
 he was a cooper "who would be useful in any community." 118 
 The same thing was said of Daniel Warner, a free negro 
 barber of Warrenton, by one hundred and twenty white peti 
 tioners. 119 Ninety-five citizens of Accomac County declared 
 to the legislature in 1838 that the services of John, a free 
 negro sawyer, "are much required in his neighborhood." 120 
 Henry Parker of Loudoun County was considered by his 
 white neighbors as "a good and useful man," desirable in 
 the community as. a day laborer. 121 No better example of 
 the economic value placed upon the free negro could be 
 found than the following petition from thirty-eight citizens 
 of Essex County: "We would be glad if he [Ben, a free 
 negro] could be permitted to remain with us and have his 
 freedom as he is a well disposed person and a very useful 
 man in many respects, he is a good carpenter, a good cooper, 
 a coarse shoemaker, a good hand at almost everything that 
 is useful to us farmers." 122 
 
 In behalf of Harriet Cook, free colored, nearly one hun 
 dred white persons, among whom were seven justices of the 
 peace, five ex-justices, sixteen merchants, six lawyers, and 
 one postmaster, made to the legislature this petition: "It 
 
 U8 MS. Petitions, Berkeley County, 1812, A 1980. Cf. a petition 
 in behalf of Thomas Richard, of Lee County, who, it was asserted, 
 could have got every man who knew him to consent to his remain 
 ing (MS. Petitions, Lee County, 1820, B 1315). 
 *MS. Petitions, Campbell County, 1826, A 3482. 
 
 I9b Ibid., 1834, A 3546, one hundred and seventy-five white peti 
 tioners. 
 
 7 Ibid., 1834, A 3544, one hundred and sixty names. 
 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1836, A 9531. 
 
 1 MS. Petitions, Fauquier County, 1836, A 5848. 
 
 20 MS. Petitions, Accomac County, 1838, A 88. 
 
 MS. Petitions, Essex County, 1842, A 5413. 
 
152 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 who employ a considerable number of coloured laborers." 111 
 It was no uncommon practice for free negroes to hire slaves 
 to labor for them. The legislature considered repeatedly 
 the expediency of denying to free negroes the right to hire 
 slaves, 112 the ground of objection probably being the tendency 
 of such employment to cause the slave, commanded by one 
 not socially his superior, to despise his slavery, or the oppor 
 tunity in such employ to acquire a knowledge of antislavery 
 doctrines and propaganda. 
 
 How largely the failure of all attempts to remove the free 
 negro from the State was due to a fairer appreciation of 
 his economic worth when the value of an individual was to 
 be considered than when the class as a whole was under 
 review is shown by the protests forthcoming from the 
 white inhabitants wherever and whenever an effort was 
 made to enforce the law requiring negroes set free after 
 1806 to quit the State. 113 The protests are hardly less sig 
 nificant because they attempt to have only individuals ex- 
 cepted from the operation of the law than if they aimed at 
 saving the entire class. In 1810 sixty persons prayed the 
 legislature to allow a free negro wheelwright, "who will 
 benefit the whole country," to remain in the State and the 
 county; 114 and in the same year citizens of Petersburg de 
 clared to the Assembly that the town could not spare without 
 loss one Uriah Tyner. 115 In 1812 a large number of citizens 
 of Berkeley and Frederick counties told the legislature that 
 "there is not a human being in this part of the country 
 where they [Jerry and Susanna, free colored] reside who is 
 
 111 P. 162. 
 
 112 The matter was before the legislature of 1841-1842 (House 
 Journal, p. 16) ; a bill was introduced to prevent the practice in 
 1843 (ibid., 1842-1843, p. 182) ; the expediency of similar legislation 
 was considered in 1844 (ibid., 1844-1845, p. 66), but the committee 
 asked to be discharged. 
 
 113 " The harsh measures often proposed in the legislature by those 
 who feel the evil of their increasing numbers, have not been carried 
 into laws" because of "the examples of intelligence, honesty and 
 worth among them" (Message of Governor Smith, in House Jour 
 nal, 1850-1851, p. 30). 
 
 14 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1810, A 9180. 
 115 MS. Petitions, Dinwiddie County, 1810, A 4946. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 153 
 
 opposed to their remaining in Virginia." 116 The plea of the 
 inhabitants of Lynchburg for Pleasant Rowan, a free colored 
 carpenter and mechanic, was that " his loss would be felt in 
 the community ;" 116a for Frederick Williams that he was a 
 much needed barber ; llcb and for Ned Adams, that he was 
 an almost indispensable cooper. 117 The people of Henrico 
 County, petitioning for John Hopes, a free negro, said that 
 he was a cooper "who would be useful in any community." 118 
 The same thing was said of Daniel Warner, a free negro 
 barber of Warrenton, by one hundred and twenty white peti 
 tioners. 119 Ninety-five citizens of Accomac County declared 
 to the legislature in 1838 that the services of John, a free 
 negro sawyer, u are much required in his neighborhood." 120 
 Henry Parker of Loudoun County was considered by his 
 white neighbors as "a good and useful man," desirable in 
 the community as. a day laborer. 121 No better example of 
 the economic value placed upon the free negro could be 
 found than the following petition from thirty-eight citizens 
 of Essex County: "We would be glad if he [Ben, a free 
 negro] could be permitted to remain with us and have his 
 freedom as he is a well disposed person and a very useful 
 man in many respects, he is a good carpenter, a good cooper, 
 a coarse shoemaker, a good hand at almost everything that 
 is useful to us farmers." 122 
 
 In behalf of Harriet Cook, free colored, nearly one hun 
 dred white persons, among whom were seven justices of the 
 peace, five ex-justices, sixteen merchants, six lawyers, and 
 one postmaster, made to the legislature this petition: "It 
 
 118 MS. Petitions, Berkeley County, 1812, A 1980. Cf. a petition 
 in behalf of Thomas Richard, of Lee County, who, it was asserted, 
 could have got every man who knew him to consent to his remain 
 ing (MS. Petitions, Lee County, 1820, B 1315). 
 *MS. Petitions, Campbell County, 1826, A 3482. 
 
 I6b Ibid., 1834, A 3546, one hundred and seventy-five white peti 
 tioners. 
 
 7 Ibid., 1834, A 3544, one hundred and sixty names. 
 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1836, A 9531. 
 
 1 MS. Petitions, Fauquier County, 1836, A 5848. 
 
 * MS. Petitions, Accomac County, 1838, A 88. 
 
 " MS. Petitions, Loudoun County, 1848, B 1961 ; 1849, B 1971. 
 
 122 MS. Petitions, Essex County, 1842, A 5413. 
 
156 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 the terms of the act placed a penalty upon white persons 
 employing a free colored person not known to be a resident 
 of the county or town in which the employer lived, thus 
 narrowly limiting the scope of industrial activity of every 
 free negro to his home town or county unless he ventured 
 abroad to face conditions of employment doubly hazardous. 
 Five years later an act made unlawful the permanent resi 
 dence in Virginia of any slave set free after May I, 1806. 
 For a number of years there was almost no effort made to 
 punish violators of this law ; consequently there accumulated 
 a considerable number of free colored persons who were not 
 by law entitled to reside in the State. By and by spasmodic 
 efforts began to be made to give the act life. The efforts 
 were not such as to prevent the increase of this expatriated 
 class by means of manumission, but were sufficient to incite 
 many of them to leave a community in which they were 
 threatened or molested, and to seek safety and a means of 
 subsistence elsewhere in the State. Some who were forced 
 to move by the operation of this law were kept from settling 
 by the above-mentioned prohibitions upon white employers 
 to furnish them work. By 1860 probably from one fourth 
 to one third of the free colored population in Virginia were 
 unlawful residents under the provisions of the act of 1806. 
 How little wonder it is that a colored population, facing 
 the adverse industrial conditions which produced the " poor 
 whites," and contending furthermore with every obstruction 
 to economic freedom that laws could provide short of slav 
 ery, furnished many recruits for a class of negroes that 
 were idle, vagrant, and parasitical in their method of ob 
 taining a living. 
 
 In passing now to a discussion of the moral character of 
 the free negro, we must avoid the error of his unfriendly 
 contemporary critics who judged him solely by that portion 
 of his class which was wandering through or living in the 
 State without employment. If we have in mind only this 
 idle set of vagabond free negroes, it would indeed be difficult 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO I 5/ 
 
 to exaggerate the moral degradation into which they fell. 
 It is well worth while to take notice of some of the many 
 adverse criticisms of the Virginia free negro by persons and 
 societies unfriendly to him, because such characterizations 
 may be justly applied to the worst element of the free col 
 ored population. 
 
 A petition of the Virginia Colonization Society for legis 
 lation in aid of efforts to remove the free negroes declared 
 in 1833 that "the free negro is degraded, vicious and crimi 
 nal." 132 In 1846 Governor Smith asserted that " our crimi 
 nal statistics . . . demonstrate the moral degradation of the 
 free negro, the hopelessness of his reform, the mischievous 
 influence of his associations." 133 Again, in 1847 Governor 
 Smith characterized the free negro class as " a race of idlers, 
 thriftless and unproductive ; they labor only from necessity, 
 are content to put up with only a meagre supply of wants, 
 prowl at dead of night and filch the labor of others." 134 
 Olmstead found a Virginia slave-owner who contended with 
 him that the free negroes were "a miserable set of vaga 
 bonds, drunken, vicious, worse than those who are retained 
 in slavery." 135 C. L. Moseby, in a speech before the Vir 
 ginia Colonization Society, characterized the free colored 
 class as " a large mass of human beings who hang as a vile 
 excrescence upon society." 136 General Mercer, vice-presi 
 dent of the society, described the class as " a horde of mis 
 erable people the objects of universal suspicion subsist 
 ing by plunder." 137 
 
 133 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1833, A 9456. 
 
 133 House Journal, 1846-1847, p. 9. 
 
 134 Ibid., 1847-1848, p. 20. But Governor Smith s generalizations 
 were not expressed in words which conceal his prejudiced point of 
 view. Having declared that the free negro was " a moral leper," 
 he added : " That he will prove the ready instrument of those to be 
 found in certain sections of our Union, who would kindle into flame 
 our social edifice, cannot be doubted," thus revealing a strong motive 
 for rinding fault with the free negro character (ibid., 1846-1847, 
 
 130 Address before the Virginia Colonization Society, quoted from 
 Jay, Slavery in America, p. 12; African Repository, vol. iii, p. 203. 
 137 African Repository, vol. ii, p. 189. 
 
158 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 A few of the free negro s critics were more discriminat 
 ing, and by carefully confining their criticisms to the lowest 
 stratum of the free negro class they afford additional proof 
 that persons or societies who indiscriminately condemned all 
 free negroes were judging the whole in view of only its 
 worst part. For an example of the more conservative opin 
 ion of the degradation of the free negroes we may note the 
 petition of the county court of Loudoun County to the legis 
 lature in 1836: "It is a curious fact that this unfortunate 
 and degraded population, unwilling to leave the state ; and 
 placing itself in a condition to elude the officers of justice 
 by flying from neighborhood to neighborhood and from 
 county to county, is restrained from making permanent set 
 tlements; and is thus actually legislated into poverty, va 
 grancy, and crime." 138 
 
 In the debate of 1832 Thomas Marshall with truth and 
 with a discernment not usual with those who attempted to 
 solve the free negro problem declared that in proportion as 
 they were idle they were mischievous. 139 Professor Thomas 
 R. Dew saw the close relation which the crimes and moral 
 degradation of free negroes bore to their poverty and want, 
 and explained it thus : " Idleness generates want, want gives 
 rise to temptation, and strong temptation makes the crimi 
 nal." 140 The wisdom of these observations is abundantly 
 verified when we turn to the record of free negroes who 
 were able to find remunerative employment in a tolerant 
 community. In the place of such descriptive words as " de 
 graded," " idle," " vicious," " drunken," " dishonest," which 
 filled the memorials of the colonizers, there appear such 
 phrases as " a man of integrity and honesty," 141 " honest and 
 prosperous man," 142 " gentility, trustworthiness and skill." 143 
 In 1810 some of the most prominent citizens of Accomac 
 County certified to the legislature that Jingo, a free negro, 
 
 138 MS. Petitions, Loudoun County,, 1836, B 1849. 
 
 139 Richmond Enquirer, February 14, 1832. 
 
 140 P. 83. 
 
 141 MS. Petitions, Campbell County, 1822, A 3460. 
 
 142 Ibid., 1851, A 3684. 
 
 143 MS. Petitions, Loudoun County, 1850, B 1988. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO I5Q 
 
 "hath uniformly supported an excellent character for so 
 briety, honesty and industry and that he hath a wife and five 
 children. . . . His wife is a woman of good character. . . . 
 The husband and wife have provided well for their children 
 and bring them up in a moral way." 144 Even among the 
 class of whites who were hostile to the continued existence 
 of the free negroes in Virginia there was an occasional wit 
 ness to the fact that " examples of intelligence, honesty and 
 worth are not lacking among them," 145 and that " there are 
 many of better habits and a few who are industrious, provi 
 dent and even worthy and useful ;" 146 and a traveller from 
 a Northern State expressed the opinion that " the free blacks 
 are more moral and respectable than many among the lowest 
 class of whites." 147 In view of the various conflicting as 
 sertions we are led to give credit to the recollections of 
 respectable free negroes still living, who insist on dividing 
 the free negroes, on a moral and social basis, into two classes, 
 the upper one of which was thoroughly respectable, law- 
 abiding, and prosperous, while to the lower element prop 
 erly belongs the reputation for being evil associates and 
 corruptors of slaves, and parasites on the community in 
 which they lived. 148 Persons of the former class were des 
 ignated by the respectful name of " men of color ; " indi 
 viduals of the latter class were called " free niggers." 149 
 The foregoing remarks on the moral character of the free 
 
 144 MS. Petitions, Accomac County, 1810, A 42. 
 
 145 Governor Floyd s message, in House Journal, 1850-1851, p. 30. 
 
 1 " Calx," p. 5. In his essay, written about 1859, Calx proposed a 
 scheme for reducing the number of free negroes by making a lack 
 of employment evidence of guilt sufficient to authorize sale into slav 
 ery as a punishment He opposed any indiscriminate sale or re 
 moval of both good and bad. 
 
 147 Andrews, p. 162. 
 
 148 This is the testimony of William Mundin, born 1839, now living 
 (1911) in Richmond. 
 
 149 Interview with Richard A. Tucker, 13 Suffolk Street, Norfolk, 
 Virginia. Judge Crothers, of Portsmouth, recalled that when he 
 was a boy going to school four miles from his home in Isle of 
 Wight County he passed on the way five families of free negroes. 
 " They were respectable, respected, and fairly well-to-do." As far 
 as he knew, there was no desire on the part of the white persons 
 of the community to be rid of them (interview, Portsmouth, Jan 
 uary 4, 1911). 
 
l6o THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 negro have been made touching his deportment in general. 
 To be able to determine what measure of justification there 
 was for a vast deal of legislation imposing special limita 
 tions and restrictions upon his conduct inquiry must be 
 made specifically into the truth of a few of the oft-repeated 
 charges and indictments upon which discriminatory legisla 
 tion was based. The four charges which were made with 
 most telling effect were: (i) that he was a thief and a re 
 ceiver of stolen goods; (2) that he was criminally disposed 
 in an unusual degree; (3) that he was insurrectionary; and 
 (4) that he was lazy and improvident. 
 
 First, then, as to his propensity to steal. That the free 
 negro class produced a rather disproportionate number of 
 thieves should not be doubted, but that the free negroes were 
 worse in this respect than the slaves, or that they were worse 
 than so many white persons would have become if placed in 
 their circumstances and forced to remain there, is by no 
 means proved. Jefferson observed with truth that " a man s 
 moral sense must be unusually strong if slavery does not 
 make him a thief." 150 While many of the free negroes of 
 the period between 1782 and 1865 received their training 
 in slavery, the possession of such qualities as trustworthi 
 ness, honesty, and faithfulness to duty was a prerequisite 
 to the attainment of freedom. A bad slave, like an unruly 
 horse, was more likely to go on the market, and was less 
 likely to have the commiseration of his master, than one of 
 better qualities. The fact is that the free negroes, as far as 
 they had employment, were less inclined to steal than were 
 slaves; but in this regard the less fortunate free negroes 
 were subject to greater temptation, if possible, than slaves, 
 and the evidence is conclusive that they were surpassed by 
 no other inhabitants of the Commonwealth in the number 
 and variety of their depredations. Mr. Archer, addressing 
 the Virginia Colonization Society, said : " The free blacks are 
 destined by an insurmountable barrier to the want of occu 
 pation, thence to the want of food thence to the distresses 
 
 150 Writings of Jefferson, vol. v, p. 66 (1789). 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO l6l 
 
 which ensue that want thence to the settled deprivation 
 which grows out of those distresses and is nursed in their 
 bosoms." 151 " Since they are idle," observed ninety citizens 
 of Culpeper County, " they either steal or perish." 152 
 
 It should, however, be kept in mind in a comparison of 
 the free negro with the slave in regard to all such misde 
 meanors as thievery that the free negro was severely brought 
 to account and universally criticised for his offenses, whereas 
 the slave was often shielded from prosecution and criticism 
 by reason of the dignity and authority of his master. Slave 
 owners were sometimes reluctant to admit that their slaves 
 were as bad as or worse than the slaves of their neighbors, 
 and by way of self-defense and self-protection from criti 
 cism condoned the misdemeanors of their slaves or punished 
 them in private. But there was no cloak for the " free nig 
 ger." The old warning " Be sure your sin will find you 
 out " had abundant sanction as applied to him. 
 
 The economic activities of the roguish free negroes and 
 slaves were thoroughly complementary and harmonious. 
 The free negro, unlike the slave, could market products, the 
 presumption being that he lawfully possessed them. The 
 slave possessed first-hand information as to the location of 
 many articles of produce. Hence the problem of produc 
 tion was managed by the slave ; the burden of transportation 
 was borne by the free negro ; and the method of distribution 
 was determined by mutual agreement. As early as 1691 the 
 free negro was charged with being a receiver and conveyer 
 
 151 Quoted from Dew, p. 83. 
 
 152 MS, Petitions, Culpeper County, 1846, A 4611. County and 
 hustings court records of the nineteenth century contain numerous 
 examples of theft by free negroes. See, for example, case of Bob 
 Green, a free negro, who in a single night stole seven hams of 
 bacon (Orders of the Richmond Hustings Court, no. u, 1814, p. 
 153). Newspaper notes of their larcenies were sometimes tinged 
 with a sarcasm that is indicative of their frequent repetition, as for 
 instance the following : " The Poultry Trade A negro engaged in 
 the poultry business was detected a few nights ago in the act of rob 
 bing a hen house on the premises of a citizen of Manchester. A 
 magistrate ordered 39 for his benefit the next day" (Richmond 
 Daily Dispatch, February 18, 1858). 
 
 1 1 
 
162 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 of stolen goods, 153 and upon this and other accusations was 
 based the legal restriction upon manumission. Soon after 
 the act removing these restrictions went into effect, in 1782, 
 complaints were heard from different quarters that " free 
 negroes are agents, factors, and carriers to the neighboring 
 towns for slaves, of property by them stolen from their 
 masters and others." 154 
 
 In the neighborhood of almost every gristmill in certain 
 parts of eastern Virginia there were located squads of free 
 negroes who were suspected by their white neighbors of 
 procuring a large part of their sustenance by concert with 
 roguish slave millers. In 1831 a number of citizens of 
 Charles City and New Kent counties, seeking from the leg 
 islature relief from such conditions, asserted that it was a 
 custom almost universal with owners of mills in their coun 
 ties and in fact in the whole lower part of the State to em 
 ploy slaves to attend the mills, and that the millers " are a 
 sort of communication between slaves and the free persons 
 of color" in the neighborhood. 155 The legislature, however, 
 took no action in relief of the persons aggrieved. 156 
 
 A complaint of a similar kind was received by the legisla 
 ture in 1836 from Loudoun County. According to the peti 
 tioners, free negroes who owned " trading carts " and oper 
 ated them between Washington or Georgetown and the rural 
 communities of Virginia near the District of Columbia line 
 were in the habit of receiving stolen goods from free negroes 
 and slaves. 157 Complaints were heard at the same time from 
 other quarters of the State, and, although the legislature 
 refused to grant the specified request of the Loudoun County 
 petitioners, 158 a bill of general application was introduced 
 which was designed to prevent free negroes from trading 
 
 153 Hening, vol. iii, p. 87. 
 
 154 MS. Petitions, Hanover County, 1784, A 8124; Henrico County, 
 1784, A 8971. 
 
 165 MS. Petitions, Charles City County, 1831, A 3962. 
 158 House Journal, 1831-1832, pp. 56, 84. 
 m MS. Petitions, Loudoun County, 1836, B 1840. 
 158 House Journal, 1835-1836, p. 262. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 163 
 
 beyond the town in which they resided. The measure met 
 with defeat. 159 
 
 There was a manifest reluctance on the part of the legis 
 lature to interfere by law with the right of the free negroes 
 to trade freely, and, although complaints were becoming 
 ominous, 160 proposed legislation for prohibiting them from 
 selling grain without a certificate or evidence that they were 
 the lawful possessors of it was in 1840 declared inexpe 
 dient. 161 In some counties, however, the white citizens were 
 determined not to take further denial from the legislature. 
 In 1843 one hundred and twenty-seven citizens of Accomac 
 County signed a petition for a law imposing a penalty upon 
 all white persons who made purchases of grain from free 
 negroes without requiring from them the certificate of two 
 respectable housekeepers showing that the grain was law 
 fully possessed. " Country stores are in the habit," reads 
 the petition, " of receiving grain from free negroes who are 
 not the producers of a single bushel of grain of any kind. 
 The grain they sell is either stolen by the negroes who sell it 
 or more frequently received by them of slaves who steal it 
 from their masters and others and by this means exerts a 
 most pernicious influence upon our slaves." 162 In response 
 to the appeal there was introduced in the House of Dele 
 gates a bill containing provisions similar to those asked for 
 by the Accomac petition and applicable to the entire State. 
 It was later narrowed in application to the counties of Acco 
 mac and Richmond and enacted into law. 163 
 
 159 Ibid., p. 244. 
 
 180 In 1836 the following petition was made to the legislature by 
 citizens of Northumberland County : " This class of people, as is 
 well known to your honorable body, is everything that is the very 
 opposite of honesty and industry. . . . The law to prevent dealing 
 with slaves is a dead letter . . . for the slave has nothing to do 
 but to pass over the plundered property of his owner to the free 
 negroes who can openly carry it to market and make sale of it as 
 the production of his own labor." 
 
 Since 1785 it had been unlawful for free persons to trade with a 
 slave without leave from the slave s master and to trade with slaves, 
 free negroes, or mulattoes on Sunday (i Revised Code, 426). 
 
 161 House Journal, 1840-1841, p. 59. 
 
 62 MS. Petitions, Accomac County, 1843, A 98. 
 
 163 House Journal, 1842-1843, pp. 213, 269; Acts, 1842-1845. 
 
164 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 The second charge or accusation, as above enumerated, 
 which was repeatedly made against the free negro was that 
 he was unusually criminal. Upon the assumption of the 
 truth of this indictment were based the criminal laws of the 
 second quarter of the nineteenth century applicable to the 
 free negro. Before the beginning of the nineteenth century 
 the free negro class was not so large as to attract special 
 attention to its criminal record. Statistics relative to the 
 inmates of the penitentiary made and published during the 
 first quarter of the nineteenth century brought to the atten 
 tion of the public the fact that the free negroes were com 
 mitting from two to twelve times as many of the crimes of 
 the State for which punishment was meted out as an equal 
 number of average white persons. According to criminal 
 statistics in 1804, the free negroes committed in proportion 
 to the population twice as many crimes as the free whites. 
 In 1808 in proportion to the population they committed 
 twelve crimes punished in the penitentiary to one among the 
 whites; in 1810, three to one; in 1812, eight to one; and in 
 1824, twelve to one. The conclusions drawn from these sta 
 tistics created a very general belief that the free negro was 
 fast becoming more criminal, and that existing criminal laws 
 were wholly inadequate for a class so vicious as the free 
 Africans. Consequently, in 1823 a law was passed which 
 substituted for confinement in the penitentiary, transporta 
 tion and sale as a method of punishing the crimes of free 
 negroes. For four years this law was effective, during 
 which time thirty-five free negroes were convicted, trans 
 ported, and sold into slavery. 164 During this period the 
 number of free negro convicts in proportion to the whites 
 was no less than it had been under the penitentiary system. 
 It is to the credit of Governor William B. Giles that the law 
 was repealed in 1828. He realized the absurdity of taking 
 the number of free negro convicts and comparing it with 
 the number of white convicts in judging the relative criminal 
 capacities and tendencies of the free negroes and the whites. 
 
 104 House Documents, no. 15, 1848-1849; no. 4, 1853-1854. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 165 
 
 The injustice to the negro of such a method consisted, first, 
 in an erroneous assumption that the laws were administered 
 as severely against white persons as against free negroes, 185 
 and, secondly, in a comparison of the record of the free 
 negroes with the whole white population instead of with 
 an equal number of whites similarly situated as to means of 
 earning a living. So pertinent in this connection are the re 
 marks of Governor Giles that they may be quoted at some 
 length : 
 
 I am far from yielding to the opinion expressed by the intelligent 
 committee of the House of Delegates of Virginia and the enthu 
 siastic memorialists of Ppwhatan respecting the degraded and de 
 moralized condition of this caste at least in degree and extent. It 
 will be admitted that this caste of colored population attracted but 
 little of the public sympathy and commiseration, in fact, that the 
 public feeling and sentiment are opposed to it. It is also admitted 
 that the penal laws against it have been marked with peculiar sever 
 ity ; 166 so much so, as to form a characteristic exception to our whole 
 penal code. When I first came into the office of Governor, such 
 was the severity of the penal laws against this caste, that for all 
 capital offences short of punishment by death and for many of 
 fences not capital, slavery, sale and transportation formed the 
 wretched doom denounced by the laws against this unfavored, 
 despised caste of colored population. ... I have also reason to fear, 
 that under the influence of general prejudices, the laws, in some 
 instances, have been administered against this class more in rigour 
 than in justice. Yet, notwithstanding all these deprecated circum 
 stances, the proportion of convicts to the whole population has 
 been small. 
 
 He points out the fact that only about one out of every 
 thousand free negroes was a criminal, and concludes that 
 
 185 It was made a penitentiary offense for a free person " to advise 
 any slave to abscond from his master or aid such slave to abscond 
 by procuring for or delivering to him a pass, register or other 
 writing or furnish him money, clothes, etc." (Acts, 1855-1856, p. 42). 
 
 In 1848 ten put of eighty-one free negroes in the penitentiary were 
 there for aiding or abetting slaves to escape from their masters. 
 This is only one example of the many more chances for a free negro 
 to be sent to the penitentiary than for a white person (House Journal, 
 1847-1848, pp. 20, 22; MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1844, A 9654). 
 Two thirds of the offenses for which free negroes were arraigned 
 before the hustings court of Richmond were defined by laws which 
 did not apply to white persons, such, for instance, as that which 
 made it a criminal offense for a free negro to remain in a city 
 or county without proper registration (Richmond Daily Dispatch, 
 February 8, 1859). 
 
 1M Compare Howison, vol. ii, pp. 458-459, for similar- expressions. 
 For example, he says: "They are subject to restraints and surveil 
 lance in points beyond number." 
 
1 66 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 " these facts prove, first, that this class of population is by 
 no means so vicious, degraded and demoralized as repre 
 sented by their prejudiced friends and voluntary benefac 
 tors. And, second, that evils attributed to this class are 
 vastly magnified and exaggerated." 167 
 
 From 1828, the date of the repeal of the law fixing trans 
 portation and sale as a penalty in the case of free colored 
 convicts, to 1861 the free colored class furnished from one 
 tenth to one fifth of the inmates of the penitentiary. The 
 apparent disproportion of the crimes of this class was often 
 pointed out in argument for a general deportation or colo 
 nization. 168 Governors Smith, Floyd, Johnson, and Wise 
 brought the fact repeatedly to the attention of the legisla 
 ture. 169 Governor Smith, however, attributed much of the 
 disparity to circumstances which, for the free negro, were 
 unavoidable. " If there be," said he, " in his natural char 
 acter the elements to make him a great and good man, it is 
 hopeless to expect that they will ever be developed under 
 our policy." 170 Governor Wise, in stating in 1857 some pos 
 sible arguments in defense of the free negro, observed that 
 " if many of them are corrupted and degenerated ... it is 
 owing not only to their own improvidence, but to evil com 
 munication with bad white men who associate and deal with 
 them and abuse their weakness and who are not restrained 
 by penal laws." 171 
 
 It should be said that the penal record of the Virginia free 
 negro was not worse than that of the negro in some northern 
 free States, for instance, Massachusetts. Between 1840 
 and 1850 the number of colored convicts to one white con 
 vict, in proportion to the population, was in Massachusetts, 
 
 167 P. 20. 
 
 1 " An ominous disparity ! which was constantly pressed upon 
 the attention of the reflecting men of the state" (Howison, vol. ii, 
 p. 458). 
 
 169 Messages of the Governors, in House Journal, 1846-1847; 1847- 
 1848, p. 20; 1850-1851, p. 30; 1853-1854, doc. no. i, p. 14; House 
 Documents, no. I, 1857-1858, p. 151. 
 
 170 House Journal, 1847-1848, p. 20. 
 
 171 House Documents, no. i, 1857, p. 151. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO l6/ 
 
 9.6 ; in Virginia, 7.2. For the first two years of the decade 
 of the fifties it was in Massachusetts, 13 ; in Virginia, 6.3. 172 
 
 If a comparison is made of the criminal record of the ne 
 groes of Virginia at the present time on the basis of the 
 relative number of white and black convicts in the peniten 
 tiary, the disparity will appear as great today as at almost 
 any time prior to the Civil War. 173 The conclusion seems 
 irresistible that the criminal capacities and tendencies of the 
 antebellum free negro were not so great as they were quite 
 generally believed to be. 
 
 Thirdly, was the free negro insurrectionary and turbu 
 lent? No criticism of the free negro was more general and 
 more undeserved than that he contrived, or was disposed to 
 contrive, insurrections, and that he induced the slaves to 
 rebel against their masters. He was referred to on the 
 floor of the legislature in 1805 as a possible leader of a rebel 
 lion or an "active chieftain of a formidable conspiracy." 174 
 
 The insurrection in Santo Domingo, headed by the free 
 blacks of the island, for a long time furnished the starting- 
 point of arguments advanced to show that free negroes 
 might at any time head a slave rebellion. In 1823 La 
 fayette asked Madison whether it was considered that the 
 increase in the proportion of free blacks to slaves tended to 
 increase or diminish the dangers of insurrection. Madison s 
 answer was, " Rather increases," and that in case of a slave 
 insurrection the free blacks would be more likely to side 
 with the slaves than with the whites. Madison certainly 
 gave a correct expression of the general feeling or belief 
 of the white population, but there is really little evidence to 
 show that the impression was correct. There are no in 
 stances on record of insurrections in Virginia initiated by 
 or carried out under the leadership of free negroes. Not 
 a free negro was proved to have had any criminal relation 
 to the Gabriel plot in 1800, and only two free negro men 
 
 L " House Documents, no. 14, 1853-1854, pp. 38, 54. 
 
 173 Reports of Virginia Penitentiary, October, 1909, September 30, 
 1910. 
 
 174 Richmond Enquirer, January 15, 1805. 
 
1 68 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 whose wives were slaves were implicated in the Nat Turner 
 insurrection ; neither of the two seems to have been a lead 
 ing spirit among the seventy or more slaves who partici 
 pated in the affair. 175 
 
 An insurrection always brought out expressions of fear 
 of the free negro, first, because he was presumed to have 
 kindred and sympathetic feelings for the slave and to share 
 with him prejudices against the whites ; and secondly, be 
 cause he was known to have intimate relations with the 
 slaves and an increased capacity for organization by reason 
 of his freedom to go from place to place. Expressed opin 
 ions of the danger of free negro insurrections were very 
 numerous for a while after the Southampton affair, 176 but 
 occasionally some writer or speaker who thought twice be 
 fore venturing a remedy for the ills of society pointed out 
 the fact, which now seems plain enough, that the free negroes 
 who had a legal right to remain and those who, despite the 
 law, were tolerated in Virginia were too well satisfied to 
 create insurrection. 177 Thomas Marshall observed with truth 
 in the legislature of 1832, " There is no evidence of a dispo 
 sition to join in revolt or disturb the public tranquility." 178 
 Professsor Dew observed that the Virginia free negro had 
 been taught to understand his place and to occupy it hum 
 bly. 179 The antebellum free negro did not demand social or 
 political equality, but rather felt that any right that he pos 
 sessed was so much for which he should be thankful. The 
 slave set free because of meritorious conduct or faithful 
 ness of service, far from being insurrectionary, was an ex 
 ample of politeness, humility, and respect for superiors and 
 for authority such as is rarely if ever seen at the present 
 
 175 Richmond Enquirer, November 18, 1831 ; W. S. Drewry, The 
 Southampton Insurrection, appendix. 
 
 170 " We are not unmindful of the aid slaves would get from 
 this source [the free negroes] in case of a servile insurrection" 
 (Petition of 200 citizens of Northampton, in MS. Petitions, Decem 
 ber, 1831, A 4884). 
 
 177 See article contributed to the Richmond Enquirer, November 
 18, 1831. 
 
 178 Richmond Enquirer, February 14, 1832. 
 "Pp. 85, 87. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 169 
 
 among either the white or the black population. 180 The in 
 fusion of this, the best type of African in America, among 
 the free negro class was sufficient in itself to influence the 
 class toward submissiveness. 
 
 Thomas Marshall believed with not a few thoughtful men 
 that the free negro constituted " no inconsiderable barrier 
 to a future insurrection of slaves." 181 A similar opinion 
 was expressed on the floor of the legislature in i8o5. 182 In 
 truth, there are numerous instances of the forestalling of 
 insurrections and the preventing of plots of slaves through 
 the agency of free negroes. Moses, a free negro of Gooch- 
 land County, revealed a conspiracy of slaves in 1822. 183 In 
 1810 two hundred citizens of Petersburg declared to the 
 legislature through a petition that a free negro, Emanuel, 
 had saved the town from conflagration by reporting and 
 aiding in the capture of incendiary, plotting slaves. 184 Lewis 
 Bowlagh presented certificates to the legislature to show 
 that he had given information to the whites in time to pre 
 vent bloodshed plotted by slaves. 185 A petition in behalf of 
 Isaac, of Rockbridge County, was based on the ground that 
 he had been a useful man in detecting and bringing negroes 
 to account for their wrongdoing. 186 Daniel Brady s father, 
 a man of good character, even surrendered up his own son 
 to stand his trial and suffer punishment. 187 It was certainly 
 not the disposition of the free negro, knowingly and with 
 design, to increase the prejudices of the whites against him 
 by creating insurrection. Far from being of "a turbulent 
 and discontented " disposition, as those in favor of coloniza- 
 
 are peaceable, orderly in their deportment, humble to 
 those whom the law has made their superiors and polite to those who 
 are considered their equals." Said by fifty-nine white persons of 
 Caroline County of nine free negroes Joseph Tyree, his wife, and 
 seven children (MS. Petitions, Caroline County, 1821, A 3804). 
 
 81 Richmond Enquirer, February 14, 1832. 
 
 183 Ibid., January 15, 1805. 
 
 83 MS. Petitions, Goochland County, 1822, A 7085. 
 
 84 MS. Petitions, Dinwiddie County, 1810, A 5196. 
 "MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1824, A 9353. 
 
 86 MS. Petitions, Rockbridge County, uncatalogued. 
 187 Pardons issued by Governor Wise, in House Documents, no. I, 
 1857-1858, p. clxx. 
 
I7O THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 tion declared him to be, he longed to be left alone in the 
 place of his birth, free from fears of molestation and annoy 
 ance, to enjoy perfect contentment. Without question the 
 free negro population in Virginia was in general meek and 
 submissive and not inclined to rebellion. 188 
 
 Fourthly, the charge often made that the free negro was 
 lazy and improvident must not be accepted without some 
 qualification. It is reasonable to believe that the free ne 
 groes, like the slaves, were naturally lazy; but it is really 
 remarkable what examples of thrift and economy this class 
 produced. Within the space of four years Rose Hailstock 
 purchased with her saved earnings her own freedom and, 
 one by one, the freedom of her three children, paying alto 
 gether 125 sterling. 189 Samuel Jackson saved enough to 
 purchase in 1815 the freedom of his wife and two chil 
 dren. 100 Arthur Lee, of Alleghany County, displayed a per 
 severance and an ability to economize that is not often sur 
 passed by laboring men of any race or condition. For six 
 teen years he was the slave of a man named Brown, who 
 lived in North Carolina, but he was permitted to remain in 
 Virginia on the condition that he pay his owner one hundred 
 dollars per annum. Having paid, at this rate, sixteen hun 
 dred dollars by 1835, ne purchased his freedom, paying his 
 owner five hundred dollars for his future liberty. Not sat 
 isfied, he immediately set to work to earn three hundred and 
 fifty dollars with which to purchase his wife s freedom. 
 This done, he procured the signatures of one hundred and 
 seventy-six citizens of Alleghany County to his humble peti 
 tion to the legislature for a law granting to him and his wife 
 a legal right to reside in the Commonwealth, that he might 
 continue to ply the honorable trade of a blacksmith. 191 As 
 to the character for industry of Billy Williams, forty-seven 
 
 188 Professor Dew admitted, or, we might say, contended that the 
 Virginia free negro was more orderly and well behaved than the 
 free negro of the Northern States. In the North, he said, the negro 
 was taught arrogance and equality. In the South he was made to 
 understand his place and to occupy it humbly (pp. 85, 87). 
 
 189 Hening, vol. xiii, p. 618. 
 
 190 MS. Petitions, Fauquier County, 1815, A 5760. 
 
 191 MS. Petitions, Alleghany County, 1835, A 666. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 citizens of Campbell County said: "We are his neighbors 
 and are willing and indeed desirous that the legislature pass 
 the law permitting him to remain in the state, as he is not 
 only an honest, prosperous man, but in truth a most useful 
 and accommodating man to his neighbors and all with whom 
 he has anything to do. A farmer by occupation and owns 
 loo acres of land." 192 Examples could be multiplied indefi 
 nitely in contradiction of indiscriminating indictments, such, 
 for instance, as that made by Governor Smith when he char 
 acterized the free colored population as a " race of idlers, 
 thriftless and unproductive/ 103 The exaggerated and often 
 self-contradictory character of the statements of coloniza 
 tion zealots will best appear by a quotation from a widely 
 circulated memorial 184 to the legislature: 
 
 Their idleness is proverbial ; they live, few know in what way and 
 fewer where. . . . Whatever energy can be spared from annoying 
 both classes [slave and white] is expended in multiplying their own 
 numbers. 
 
 And yet this same individual, the pest of the land which gives him 
 only birth, when transported to a seat where his industry may have 
 excitement and object becomes the active, thriving, and happy citizen 
 of Liberia. 195 
 
 Rigorous and discriminatory as were the laws of Virginia 
 enacted for the purpose of controlling that presumably law- 
 
 192 MS. Petitions, Campbell County, 1851, A 3684. 
 
 193 House Journal, 1847-1848, p. 20. 
 
 194 MS. Petitions, Henrico County, 1831, A 9431. See also me 
 morial of the Auxiliary Colonization Society of Buckingham County, 
 in MS. Petitions, Buckingham County, 1832, A 3080. A memorial 
 of the Fairfax Colonization Society read : " Pursuing no course of 
 regular business and negligent of everything like economy and 
 husbandry they are a part of the community supported by the in 
 dustry of others" (MS. Petitions, Fairfax County, 1832, A 5578). 
 
 195 With this picture of what the Virginia colonizers professed to 
 think the free negro would become in Liberia may be compared 
 what citizens of Somerset County, Maryland, thought of the Vir 
 ginia free negroes who had come into Maryland from Virginia 
 after the law of 1806 made the residence of certain ones illegal 
 in Virginia: "We reap not the rewards or fruits of our labor . . . 
 all is snatched from us by that curse of God s Creation, the de 
 graded free negro ... he toils not neither does he spin, yet like 
 Dives he fares sumptuously and is arrayed in purple and fine linen 
 and well he may, for he appropriates to his own use the labors of 
 the entire white population" (MS. Petitions to Maryland Legisla 
 ture, in Maryland Historical Society, portfolio 7, no. 28). 
 
172 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 less, disorderly and vicious member of society, the free 
 negro, they fail in some respects to reveal the extent to 
 which he was subjected to surveillance and discipline, while 
 in other respects they represent a harsher treatment than he 
 actually received. In the nineteenth century there existed 
 a law for keeping watch over and controlling the conduct 
 of free negroes not found among the statutes or supported 
 by legal precedents. Its sanction was in community senti 
 ment, and its name was lynch-law. The practice before the 
 Civil War of policing the free negroes by self-appointed 
 bailiffs was the historical antecedent of the Ku Klux Klan 
 of reconstruction days, although there was not the same 
 degree of organization and not so wide a gap between local 
 sentiment and legal administration before as during that 
 time. 
 
 Prostitution and vice among the free colored population 
 .were frequently dealt with by methods not approved by 
 law. For example, in Amelia County in 1821 the inmates 
 of houses of ill repute were visited and chastized by a party 
 of disguised white men. 196 Although a fine was imposed 
 upon at least one of the persons connected with this raid, 
 the state of sentiment favorable to the method of procedure 
 is seen in the effort made by half a hundred of the local resi 
 dents to have the convicted man released from his fine. 
 General Brodnax, speaking from the floor of the legislature 
 in 1832, was not challenged upon the assertion that such 
 methods of getting rid of undesirable free negroes were of 
 common occurrence. " Who does not know," said he, " that 
 when a free negro, by crime or otherwise, has rendered him 
 self obnoxious to a neighborhood, how easy it is for a party 
 to visit him one night, take him from his bed and family, 
 and apply to him the gentle admonition of a severe flagella 
 tion, to induce him to go away. In a few nights the dose 
 can be repeated, perhaps increased, until, in the language 
 of the physicians, quantum suff has been administered . . . 
 
 186 MS. Petitions, Amelia County, 1821, A 781. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 and the fellow becomes perfectly willing to go away." 197 
 So commonly was lynch-law of this character resorted to by 
 the whites in prevailing upon free negroes to yield to their 
 wishes that one argument strongly urged in 1832 in favor 
 of a law authorizing the use of force in carrying out a colo 
 nization scheme was the necessity of shielding the negroes 
 from the cruelty of private intimidation and compulsion. 198 
 William Miles Cuffee, a free negro born in 1839, now living 
 at Hickory Ground, Virginia, tells how in 1859, upon a 
 rumor of insurrection, whites assembled in bands to intimi 
 date and frighten the free negroes in the community. Ac 
 cording to his report, he remained hidden in the woods for 
 about three days and nights while the raids were being con 
 ducted against persons of his class. 
 
 While local sentiment often permitted the authority of the 
 law to be exceeded or ignored by individuals self-appointed 
 to discipline and punish free negroes, it no less frequently 
 permitted laws to remain unenforced. Speaking of the laws 
 which forbade free negroes to move from one town or 
 locality to another and to assemble in considerable numbers 
 and of those which compelled them to submit to search of 
 their houses and persons by patrols, a writer in the Richmond 
 Enquirer declared that " these provisions and many other 
 laws on this subject are so much at variance with the feel 
 ings of our citizens that in many parts of the state they are 
 merely a dead letter. ... So long as our humanity prepon 
 derates over our fears, so long will those laws be very par 
 tially and feebly executed." 19 * 
 
 The same writer clearly discerns and explains the reason 
 why legislation dealing with the free negroes outran execu 
 tion: "As legislators, impressed with the jeopardy that 
 threatens the public safety, men readily give their assent to 
 
 L9T Richmond Enquirer, February 14, 1832. Compare Jay, Slavery 
 in America, p. 45. 
 
 198 Speech of Mr. Chandler, in the Richmond Enquirer, February 
 14, 1832. General Brodnax said that he understood that the consent 
 of the emigrants in a cargo which had recently set sail for Africa 
 was obtained by private compulsion. 
 , 189 Richmond Enquirer, October 8, 1805. 
 
1/4 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 any measure that seems calculated to protect it, but when 
 they return to the bosom of their families and are sur 
 rounded by those among whom they were born and nursed 
 and from whose labor they obtain the means of comfort and 
 independence the sentiments of the legislator are frequently 
 lost in the feelings of humanity and affection in the private 
 man." 
 
 An illustration of this fact is seen in the operation of that 
 law which directed emancipated slaves to leave the State 
 within twelve months from the date of their emancipation. 
 Henry Howe said in 1845 tnat " these laws, and every other 
 having the appearance of rigor . . . are nearly dead letters 
 upon our statute books, unless during times of excitement, 
 or since the efforts of the abolitionists have reanimated 
 them. I have, until lately, scarcely known an instance in 
 which they have been enforced." 200 Petitions were con 
 tinually being sent to the legislature by white persons com 
 plaining "that the law requiring the removal [of ex-slaves] 
 is in its operation perfectly nugatory." 201 
 
 In certain localities, however, and at certain times the law 
 was rendered in some measure effective. The act was a 
 penal statute, depending upon local officials for its execu 
 tion; hence enforcement was not uniform as to times and 
 places. The appearance of the successive census reports 
 showing the rapid increase and accumulation of the free 
 negroes in the State usually gave rise to some zeal for pro 
 ceeding against free negroes who remained in violation of 
 the law. 202 The number and the deportment of these ne 
 groes in a community went far toward determining the 
 length to which the local officials would go in prosecuting 
 them. In the counties of western Virginia, where but few 
 negroes resided, almost no use was made of this law. In 
 
 200 Historical Collections of Virginia, p. 157. 
 
 201 MS. Petitions, Hampshire County, 1836, A 7904; Loudoun 
 County, 1836, B 1849; Loudoun and Fauquier Counties, 1847, B 1952. 
 
 202 " The excitement which now prevails will in a little while en 
 tirely subside and you will see things move on just as they have 
 done until the next census, when we shall again begin to stir and 
 flutter for awhile" (Richmond Whig, December n, 1845). 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 1/5 
 
 most of the eastern counties the prescribed penalty sale 
 into slavery was so much at variance with sentiment that 
 grand juries usually refused to indict, or attorneys refusecl 
 to prosecute, violators of the law. 203 When indictments 
 were made, the cases were continued from time to time or 
 finally dismissed. 204 
 
 When arrests, prosecutions, and sales of free negroes were 
 made, the object was usually to make examples of some that 
 all others might take warning and leave the community. 
 The overseers of the poor of Accomac County held a meet 
 ing in 1825, and determined to make an example of one 
 negro, thinking that they would by this means be spared 
 the necessity of selling as slaves the free negroes who had 
 become unlawful residents under the act of i8o6. 205 A 
 negro named Jack Bagwell was the unlucky victim ; but a 
 single example was not sufficient to induce all other free 
 negroes liable to sale to quit the community, and at a meet 
 ing held the following year the Board of Overseers ordered 
 that notice be posted throughout the county " that the Over 
 seers of the Poor . . . will sell one free negro in each dis 
 trict of this county for every month from this date." 206 
 
 In pursuance of the order, seven negroes were sold into 
 slavery on June 5, 1826. The maximum price received for 
 any one of the seven freemen was thirty-six dollars and 
 fifty cents. The fact that some of them brought so low a 
 price as one dollar creates a doubt as to whether the pur 
 chasers expected to force them into bondage or whether 
 they did not intend to allow them to escape from the neigh 
 borhood. In 1839 Richard Rew purchased at the price of 
 five hundred and thirty dollars a free negro who had lived 
 in Virginia contrary to law since his manumission in 1819. 
 
 203 MS. Orders of Northampton County, 1831-1836, pp. 136, 147, 
 505; MS. Petitions, Loudoun and Fauquier Counties, 1847, B 1952; 
 Frederick County, 1828, A 6495. 
 
 1 " By this mode, they were annually before the court, their 
 cases called and continued and in this evasive way, they spent the 
 remainder of their days in their old communities" (T. K. Cartmell, 
 Shenandoah Valley Pioneers and Their Descendants, p. 521). 
 
 205 MS. Petitions, Accomac County, 1825, A 91. 
 
 206 Ibid, 1826, A 80. 
 
176 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 The negro made good his escape to New York, and Rew, 
 who had paid a high price for him, expecting to subject him 
 to actual bondage, appealed earnestly but in vain to the 
 legislature for a refunding of the purchase money. 207 
 
 Even such a timid and spasmodic enforcement of this law 
 as these instances represent rendered the condition of a 
 great number of free negroes anomalous and insecure. Not 
 only those negroes emancipated after 1806, but also their 
 posterity were liable to be sold as slaves, and many deserv 
 ing negroes were forced to appeal to the humanity of their 
 white neighbors to save them from banishment or sale. In 
 1834 Titus Brown, whose hair was white with age, related 
 how he and his wife, childless and almost as old as he, had 
 been "ordered to depart from the Commonwealth." 208 It 
 was not often that a free negro of fair character was unable, 
 even in times of excitement, to get his white neighbors to 
 intercede in his behalf. These could usually bring about a 
 relaxation of energy in the prosecution, or, as in the case of 
 Archy Carey, they might " agree that so long as his conduct 
 comports with his recommendation they will not enforce the 
 law against him." 209 If in this way they could not render 
 secure a negro threatened with sale or banishment, his white 
 sympathizers would often draft earnest appeals to the hu 
 manity of the legislators, and procure to these petitions hun 
 dreds of white subscribers. Very frequently the legislature 
 was moved to pass acts excepting certain free negroes from 
 the operation of the law. 210 In some such way were toler 
 ated nearly all ex-slaves who ventured to assume the risk of 
 losing their freedom. It was asked in the House of Dele 
 gates in 1832 why the laws providing for the banishment or 
 sale of certain free negroes had not been carried out. The 
 answer was : " Because its provisions were in violation of 
 the feelings of the people. A thousand such laws would 
 
 207 House Journal, 1839-1840, p. 205. 
 
 208 MS. Petitions, Loudoun County, 1834, B 1830. 
 
 "MS. Petitions, Campbell County, 1830, A 1013. 
 210 For examples, see Acts, 1821-1822, p. 84; 1833-1834, p. 316; 
 1834-1835, p. 240; or Acts of any year from 1812 to 1848. 
 
SOCIAL STATUS OF THE FREE NEGRO 
 
 fall to the ground and be inoperative for lack of public sen 
 timent." 211 The same explanation was given by Governor 
 Wise in his message to the legislature in 1857. " It would 
 be more humane and more just," he said, " to sell them 
 wholesale into slavery " than to force upon them dispersion 
 and extinction in the cold climate of the free States; "but 
 the moral sense of our people would revolt at a violation of 
 individual and personal rights like this and no such usurpa 
 tion would be tolerated by public sentiment." 212 
 
 m Richmond Enquirer, February 14, 1832. 
 212 House Documents, no. I, 1857, p. 151. 
 
 12 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 Lack of space necessitates the omission from this list of 
 a large number of secondary authorities having bearing 
 upon, but not contemporary with, some portion of the period 
 treated in this monograph. Footnote references to the 
 most useful of the works of postbellum writers touching 
 the subject herein treated must suffice to show the extent 
 of the author s indebtedness to authorities. With the ex 
 ception of a few county or local histories having special 
 value because of their limited territorial scope, only primary 
 sources are here enumerated. 
 
 MANUSCRIPT 
 
 A. COUNTY COURT RECORDS, Orders, Deeds, Wills, Inventories, and 
 
 so forth ; certified copies transcribed from the original records 
 in pursuance of an act of the Virginia State Legislature and 
 preserved in the Virginia State Library in Richmond, Virginia. 
 19 vols., folio: 
 
 1. Accomac County, 1632-1640, 1676-1690. 
 
 2. Elizabeth City County, 1684-1699. 
 
 3. Essex County, 1695-1699. 
 
 4. Henrico County, 1677-1692, 1682-1701. 
 
 5. Warwick County, 1748-1762. 
 
 6. York County, 1633-1694, 1638-1648, 1657-1662, 1664-1672, 
 
 1675-1684, 1677-1692, 1677-1699, 1684-1687, 1687-1691, 1690- 
 1694, 1694-1702, 1694-1697. 
 
 B. COUNTY COURT RECORDS, Orders, Deeds, Wills, and so forth; 
 
 original records : 
 
 1. Henrico County, various volumes, 1776-1860, in County Court 
 
 House, Richmond, Virginia. 
 
 2. Lower Norfolk and Norfolk County, 1637-1646, 1646-1651, 
 
 1686-1695, and various volumes, 1700-1860, in Norfolk 
 County Court House, Portsmouth, Virginia. 
 
 In this county free negroes and mulattoes were registered 
 in volumes kept for that purpose only : vol. i, 1802-1852 ; 
 vol. 2, 1852-1861. Concerning each free negro registered 
 by the county court clerk there was recorded the answer 
 to the following queries: Name, How free, Age, Height, 
 Complexion, Marks or Scars. Each negro was numbered 
 and the date of his registration recorded. 
 
 3. Northampton County, 1632-1640, 1640-1645, 1645-1651, 1651- 
 
 1654, 1654-1655, 1655-1658, 1657-1664, 1683-1689, 1689-1698, 
 1710-1720, and various volumes, 1720-1860. 
 178 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 179 
 
 Records of the Hustings Court, Richmond, Virginia, vari 
 ous volumes, 1782-1860. 
 
 Ordinances of the City of Richmond, 3 vols., 1804-1860. 
 
 C. PARISH RECORDS. 
 
 At Episcopal Theological Seminary, Alexandria, Virginia : 
 
 1. Register of Christ s Church, Middlesex County, Virginia, 
 
 1653-1812. 
 
 2. Register of Kingston Parish, Mathews County, Virginia, 
 
 1674-18 . 
 
 3. Vestry Book of Charles Parish, York County, Virginia, 1670- 
 
 1800. 
 At Bruton Church, Williamsburg, Virginia : 
 
 4. Register of Middletown and Bruton Parishes, 1662-1797. 
 At Library of William and Mary College, Williamsburg: 
 
 5. Register of Abingdon Parish, transcribed by Lyon G. Tyler. 
 
 6. Register of Charles Parish, 1648-1800, transcribed for Li 
 
 brary of William and Mary College. 
 
 D. RECORDS OF FRIENDS MEETINGS, at Park Avenue Meeting House, 
 
 Baltimore, Maryland. 
 
 1. Minutes of the Baltimore Yearly Meeting held at West River 
 
 and Third Haven, 3 vols., 1677-1758, 1754-1764, 1798-1821. 
 
 2. Condensed record of the action of yearly meetings on ques 
 
 tions relating to slavery and the slave trade, 1760-1819. 
 
 3. Minutes of the Warrenton and Fairfax Quarterly Meeting, 
 
 1776-1787. 
 
 4. Minutes of the Warrenton and Fairfax Quarterly Meeting of 
 
 Women Friends, 1775-1787. 
 
 5. Minutes of the Warrenton Quarterly Meeting, 1787-1801. 
 
 6. Minutes of the Fairfax Quarterly Meeting, 1787-1850. 
 
 7. Minutes of Crooked Run Monthly Meeting, 1782-1789. 
 
 8. Minutes of Fairfax Monthly Meeting: vol. A, 1745-1776; vol. 
 
 B, 1776-1802; vol. C, 1802-1845. 
 
 9. Minutes of Hopewell Monthly Meeting: bk. i, 1759-1777; bk. 
 
 2, 1777-1791; bk. 3, 1791-1811; bk. 4, 1811-1851. 
 10. Minutes and Proceedings of Goose Creek Monthly Meeting, 
 1785-1818; 1818-18 . 
 
 E. Records of the General Court of Virginia, transcribed by Con- 
 
 way Robinson, 1640-1661, 1670-1676. Virginia Historical So 
 ciety. 
 
 F. Legislative Petitions of Virginia, 1776-1860. 
 
 This collection of original manuscript documents, one of the 
 most important sources of this monograph, is preserved in the 
 archives of the State and is divided into as many groups 
 as there were counties from which the petitions or memorials 
 originated. The arrangement within the county groups is 
 with reference to chronology. Fifteen thousand five hundred 
 documents are catalogued and arranged in the archives in 
 upright filing cases, each document being assigned to a stiff 
 folder, folio size, having upon it a letter and a number which 
 distinguishes it from every other document in the files. The 
 numbers run in two series, A and B. Series A runs from I 
 to 10,000. Series B is complete from I to 5500; and the two 
 series combined cover the counties from Accomac to Orange. 
 The county groups from P to Y inclusive are wrapped sepa 
 rately in bundles, awaiting the systematic arrangement of the 
 
ISO THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 other county groups. In most instances double reference by 
 date and by number has been made in the footnotes of this 
 monograph to the petitions that are filed in the cases. Little 
 if any use has been made, up to this time, of this, one of the 
 richest sources for Virginia history during the period of the 
 Commonwealth. The documents contain invaluable informa 
 tion about almost every subject that was of interest to the 
 people of the various localities of the State within the period 
 covered. 
 
 G. Virginia Land Patents, folio, vols. I and 2, 1623-1643; vol. 3 
 1643-1651; vol. 4, 1652-1655; vol. 5, 1655-1664; vol. 6, 1666- 
 1679. Land Office, Richmond. 
 
 H. Tax Books (for various counties), 1856-60. Auditor s Office, 
 Richmond. 
 
 I. Transcripts made from original papers in the British Public 
 Record Office, London. By Angus W. MacDonald, 7 vols., 
 1619-1695; containing abstracts or complete transcripts of 581 
 documents relating to the settlement and early history of 
 Virginia. By William Noel Sainsbury, 20 vols., 1606-1740; 
 containing abstracts of 5108 documents relating to early Vir 
 ginia history. Virginia State Library. 
 
 J. Letter Book of the Executive of Virginia, 1844-1848, folio. Vir 
 ginia State Library. 
 
 K. Proclamation Book; containing the proclamations of the Gov 
 ernors of Virginia from 1786 to Aug. 31, 1801. Virginia State 
 Library. 
 
 L. Land Books of the City of Richmond, 1856-1860. City Hall, 
 Richmond. 
 
 LAWS AND COURT DECISIONS 
 
 1. Statutes at Large of Virginia, 13 vols., 1619-1792. By William 
 
 Waller Hening. Richmond, 1819-1820. 
 
 2. Statutes at Large of Virginia, 3 vols., 1792-1807. By Samuel 
 
 Sheppard. Richmond, 1835-1836. 
 
 Being an addition to Hening s Statutes, these three volumes 
 are referred to in this monograph as vols. xiv, xv, and xvi 
 of Hening. 
 
 3. Acts of the General Assembly of Virginia, 1807-1865. 
 
 4. Statutes at large of the Confederate States of America, 1861- 
 
 1864, including both public and private acts and resolutions. 
 Edited by James M. Mathews. Richmond, 1864. 
 
 5. Revised Code of Laws of Virginia, 2 vols. Richmond, 1819. 
 
 6. Supplement to the Revised Code of the Laws of Virginia. Rich 
 
 mond, 1833. 
 
 7. Code of Virginia. Richmond, 1849. 
 
 8. Code of Virginia. Richmond, 1860. 
 
 9. Constitutions of Virginia, 1776, 1830, 1851. 
 
 10. Reports of Cases Determined in the General Court and the Su 
 preme Court of Appeals of Virginia : 
 (a) By Thomas Jefferson, I vol., 1730-1740 and 1768-1772. 
 (&) By Bushrod Washington, 2 vols., 1790-1796. 
 
 (c) By Daniel Call, 6 vols., 1790-1825. 
 
 (d) By William W. Hening and William Munford, 4 vols., 
 1806-1810. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 1 8 I 
 
 O) By William Munford, 6 vols., 1809-1820. 
 
 (/) By Francis W. Gilmer, I vol., 1820-1821. 
 
 (g) By Peyton Randolph, 6 vols., 1821-1828. 
 
 (/i) By Benjamin Watkins Leigh, 12 vols., 1829-1842. 
 
 () By Conway Robinson, 2 vols., 1842-1844. 
 
 (/) By Peachy R. Grattan, 16 vols., 1844-1865. 
 
 (&) Virginia Colonial Decisions. The Reports by Sir John 
 Randolph and Edward Barradall of Decisions of the Gen 
 eral Court of Virginia, 2 vols., 1728-1741. Edited by R. T. 
 Barton. Boston, 1909. 
 
 PUBLIC DOCUMENTS 
 
 1. Journals of the House of Burgesses, 1727-1776, 8 vols. Edited 
 
 by H. R. Mcllwaine, 1905-1910. 
 
 2. Journals of the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of 
 
 Virginia, 1776-1865. [Journals for May session of 1782 and 
 session of 1796 are missing.] Richmond. 
 
 3. Journals of the Senate of the Commonwealth of Virginia, 1778- 
 
 1865. [Missing Journals: 1780-1784, 1791-1799, 1802-1828, 
 1836-1838, 1854-1855, 1856-1860.] Richmond. 
 
 4. Proceedings of the Convention of Delegates for the Counties and 
 
 Corporations of the Colony of Virginia, held at Richmond 
 Town, in the County of Henrico, 1775. Richmond, 1816. 
 
 5. Proceedings and Debates of the Virginia State Convention of 
 
 1829-1830. Edited by Ritchie and Cook. Richmond, 1830. 
 
 6. Journal, Acts, and Proceedings of a General Convention of the 
 
 State of Virginia, 1850. Richmond. 
 
 7. Journal of the Congress of the Confederate States of Amer 
 
 ica, 1861-1865. In 7 vols. Issued as Senate Document No. 
 234, 58th Congress, 2nd Session. Washington, 1904. 
 
 8. Documents of the House of Delegates, containing the messages 
 
 of the Governors to the General Assemblies and annual re 
 ports of the public officers of the State, and of boards of direc 
 tors, visitors, superintendents, and other supervisors of pub 
 lic institutions of Virginia, 1814-1865. 
 
 9. Documents of the Senate, containing bills introduced and passed 
 
 by the Senate, reports of commissions and various other state 
 papers, 1831-1865. 
 
 10. Colonial Records of Virginia (1619-1680). Issued as State Sen 
 
 ate Document, Extra, 1874. Richmond. 
 
 11. A Collection of the Official Publications of the Confederate 
 
 States Government. Virginia State Library. 
 
 12. The Federal Censuses of the United States, 1790 to 1860, vol 
 
 umes on population. 
 
 NEWSPAPERS 
 
 FILES IN THE STATE LIBRARY. 
 
 1. The Richmond Examiner and Argus, August, i8oo-Febru- 
 
 ary, 1801. 
 
 2. The Virginia Argus, Richmond, February, i8o4-December, 
 
 1805. 
 
 3. The Daily Dispatch, Richmond, 1852-1865. 
 
 4. The Enquirer, Richmond, May, i8o4-December, 1864. 
 
1 82 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 5. The Virginia Gazette, Williamsburg, January, 1767-Decem- 
 
 ber, 1768; January, I77i-December, 1777; February, 1779- 
 December, 1779. 
 
 6. The Virginia Gazette and General Advertizer, Richmond, 
 
 March, I79i-December, 1809. 
 
 7. The Norfolk and Portsmouth Herald, January-December, 
 
 1847- 
 
 8. The Constitutional Whig and The Daily Richmond Whig, 
 
 Richmond, 1824-1865. 
 
 9. The Recorder, Richmond, 1802-1803. 
 FILES IN THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
 
 10. The Virginia Gazette and the American Advertizer, Rich 
 
 mond, January, 1782-December, 1794. 
 
 11. The Enquirer, Richmond, 1804-1805 [contain numbers ex 
 
 amined to supplement files in Virginia State Library]. 
 
 MAGAZINES AND PERIODICALS 
 
 1. The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography. Edited by 
 
 R. A. Brock. Vols. i to v. Edited by William G. Stanard, 
 vols. vi-xix. Richmond, 1893-1911. 
 
 2. The William and Mary College Quarterly Historical Magazine. 
 
 Edited by Lyon G. Tyler. Vols. i-xix. Williamsburg, 1892- 
 1911. 
 
 3. Calendar of Virginia State Papers. Edited by William P. Pal 
 
 mer. Vols. i-xi. Richmond, 1875. 
 
 4. Collections of the Virginia Historical Society, New Series. 
 
 Edited by R. A. Brock. Vols. i-xx. Richmond, 1882-1891. 
 
 The above serial publications are really source books of Vir 
 ginia history. They make available in published form many 
 original and valuable manuscripts from collections in the Vir 
 ginia Historical Society, the Virginia State Archives, county 
 archives, and in the possession of private individuals. 
 
 5. The Commercial Review of the South and West. A monthly 
 
 journal of trade, etc. Edited by J. D. B. DeBow. Vols. 
 i-xxxi. New Orleans, 1846-1861. 
 
 6. The Virginia Historical Register and Literary Advertizer. Edited 
 
 by William Maxwell. Vols. i-vi. Richmond, 1848-1853. 
 
 Contains extracts from "records, journals, diaries, letters, 
 inscriptions and other relics of the olden time. " 
 
 7. The Lower Norfolk County Virginia Antiquary. Edited by Ed 
 
 ward Wilson James. Vols. i-v. Norfolk, 1897-1906. 
 
 Contains abstracts and gleanings from official records of 
 churches and courts of Lower Norfolk and Princess Anne 
 counties. 
 
 8. Virginia County Records. Published quarterly by the Genealog 
 
 ical Association, New York City. William Armstrong Croz- 
 ier, editor. Vols. i-vii. 
 
 These volumes contain abstracts of wills and extracts from 
 other county and probate court records such as orders, mar 
 riage bonds, and land grants. 
 
 9. The African Repository and Colonial Journal. Vols. i-xxv. 
 
 Published by the American Colonization Society. Washing 
 ton, 1825-1850. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 183 
 
 PUBLISHED PARISH RECORDS AND LOCAL HISTORIES 
 
 1. The Vestry Book and Register of Bristol Parish, Virginia, 
 
 1720-1789. Transcribed and published by C. G. Chamberlayne. 
 Richmond, 1898. 
 
 2. Register of Christ s Church, Middlesex County, Virginia, 1653- 
 
 1812. Published by the National Society of the Colonial 
 Dames of America in the State of Virginia. Richmond, 1897. 
 
 3. The Vestry Book of Henrico Parish, Virginia, 1730-1773, from 
 
 the original MS. By R. A. Brock. Richmond, 1874. 
 
 4. Register of St. Peter s Parish, New Kent County, Virginia, 1680- 
 
 1787. Published by the National Society of the Colonial 
 Dames of America in the State of Virginia. Richmond, 1904. 
 
 5. Vestry Book of Saint Peter s Parish, New Kent County, Vir 
 
 ginia. Published by the National Society of Colonial Dames 
 of America in the State of Virginia. Richmond, 1904. 
 
 6. Papers Relating to the History of the Church in Virginia, 
 
 1650-1776. Edited by William S. Perry. Privately printed. 
 1870. 
 
 7. BAGBY, REV. ALFRED. King and Queen County, Virginia. New 
 
 York and Washington, 1908. 
 
 8. BRUCE, THOMAS. Southwest Virginia and the Shenandoah Val 
 
 ley. Richmond, 1891. 
 
 9. BURTON, REV. L. W. Annals of Henrico Parish, Diocese of Vir 
 
 ginia and especially of St. John s Church, 1611-1884. Rich 
 mond, 1904. 
 
 10. CARTMELL, T. K. Shenandoah Valley Pioneers and Their De 
 
 scendants. A History of Frederick County, Virginia, from 
 its formation in 1738 to 1908. Compiled mainly from orig 
 inal records of old Frederick County, now Hampshire, Berke 
 ley, Shenandoah, Jefferson, Hardy, Clarke, Warren, Morgan, 
 and Frederick. Privately published by the author, 1909. 
 
 11. GOODWIN, REV. W. A. R. Historical Sketch of Bruton Church, 
 
 Williamsburg, Virginia. Williamsburg, 1903. 
 
 12. WISE, JENNINGS CROPPER. Ye Kingdome of Accawmacke; or, 
 
 the Eastern Shore of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century. 
 Richmond, 1911. 
 
 13. WOODS, REV. EDGAR. Albemarle County in Virginia, giving some 
 
 account of what it was by nature, of what it was made by man, 
 and of some of the men who made it. Charlottesville, 1901. 
 
 CONTEMPORARY WORKS AND PAMPHLETS 
 
 1. ALEXANDER, ARCHIBALD. A History of Colonization on the 
 
 Western Coast of Africa. Philadelphia, 1849. 
 
 2. ANDREWS, E. A. Slavery and the Domestic Slave Trade in the 
 
 United States. In a series of letters addressed to the ex 
 ecutive committee of the American Union for the relief and 
 improvement of the colored race. Boston, 1836. 
 
 3. ASBURY, REV. FRANCIS, BISHOP OF M. E. CHURCH. Journal from 
 
 Aug. 7, I77i-Dec. 7, 1815. 3 vols. New York, 1821. 
 
 4. ASHMUM, J. History of the African Colony in Liberia, from 
 
 December, 1821 to 1823. Compiled from the authentic records 
 of the colony. Washington, 1826. 
 Bound in " Slavery Pamphlets," in Virginia State Library. 
 
184 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 5. BEVERLY, ROBERT. The History and Present State of Virginia, 
 
 in four parts. By a native and inhabitant of the place. Lon 
 don, 1705. 
 
 6. BULLOCK, WILLIAM, GENT. Virginia impartially examined and 
 
 left to the publick view to be considered by all iudicious and 
 honest men, etc. London, 1649. Pp. 66. 
 
 7. BURK, JOHN. The History of Virginia from its first settlement 
 
 to the present day. n vols. Petersburg, Virginia, 1804-1816. 
 
 8. BURNABY, ANDREW. Travels Through the Middle settlements of 
 
 North America, in the years 1759 and 1760. Pp. 52. 
 In Pinkerton, J., Voyages, vol. 13. 
 
 9. " CALX." Two Great Evils of Virginia and their one Common 
 
 Remedy. 
 
 A pamphlet written September 17, 1859, and printed by 
 John W. Randolph of Richmond. Pp. 18. 
 
 One of the evils referred to was the free negro and the 
 other was the seduction of slaves by abolitionists. Bound in 
 " Political Pamphlets," vol. 12, in Virginia State Library. 
 
 10. CHASE, A. M., AND SANBORN, CHARLES W. A Statistical View of 
 
 the Condition of the Free and Slave States. Compiled from 
 official documents. Boston, 1856. 
 
 11. CHASTELLUX, FRANCOIS JEAN. Travels in North America in the 
 
 years 1780-82. Translated from the French by an English 
 gentleman who resided in America at that period. 2 vols. 
 London, 1787. 
 
 12. DABNEY, PROF. ROBERT L. A Defence of Virginia in Recent and 
 
 Pending Contests against the Sectional Party. New York, 
 1867. 
 
 13. DEW, THOMAS R. Review of the Debates in the Virginia Legis 
 
 lature of 1831-32. Richmond, 1832. 
 
 14. FITZHUGH, GEORGE. What shall be done with the Free Negroes. 
 
 Four essays written for the Fredericksburg Recorder, 1851. 
 This is a biased argument in favor of reducing free negroes 
 to slavery. 
 
 15. Sociology for the South, or The Failure of Free Society. 
 
 Richmond, 1854. 
 
 16. FORCE, PETER. Tracts and Other Papers, relating principally to 
 
 the Origin, Settlement, and Progress of the Colonies of North 
 America, from the discovery of the country to the year 1776. 
 4 vols. Washington, 1836-1846. 
 
 17. GARLAND, HUGH A. The Life of John Randolph of Roanoke. 
 
 2 vols. New York, 1851. 
 
 18. GODWYN, MORGAN. Negro s and Indian s Advocate suing for 
 
 their Admission into the Church: For a persuasive to the in 
 structing and baptizing of the Negroes and Indians in our 
 Plantations, To which is added a brief account of religion in 
 Virginia. London, 1680. Pp. 174. 
 
 19. . A Supplement to the Negro s and Indian s Advocate, or 
 
 some further considerations and proposals for the effectual 
 and speedy carrying on of the Negro s Christianity in our 
 plantations without any prejudice to their owners. London, 
 1681. Pp. 12. 
 
 20. GOODELL, WILLIAM. The American Slave Code in theory and 
 practice: Its distinctive features shown by its statutes, judicial 
 decisions, and illustrative facts. Fourth edition. New York, 
 1853- 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 1 8$ 
 
 21. HAMMOND, JOHN. Leah and Rachel, or the Two Fruitfull Sis 
 
 ters Virginia, and Mary-Land: Their Present Condition, Im 
 partially stated and related. London, 1656. 
 
 22. HARTWELL, BLAIR, AND CHILTON. The Present State of Virginia 
 
 and the College. London, 1727. Pp. 95. 
 
 23. HILDRETH, RICHARD. The History of the United States of 
 
 America from the discovery of the continent to the organiza 
 tion of the government under the Federal Constitution. 1497- 
 1789. Revised edition. 3 vols. New York, 1856. 
 
 24. HOWE, HENRY. Historical Collections of Virginia. Charleston, 
 
 S. C, 1852. 
 
 25. HOWISON, ROBERT R. A History of Virginia from its Discovery 
 
 and Settlement by Europeans to the Present Time. 2 vols. 
 Richmond, 1848. 
 
 26. JAY, WILLIAM. Miscellaneous writings on Slavery. Boston, 
 
 1853- 
 
 27. . Slavery in America : or An Inquiry into the character 
 
 and tendency of the American Colonization and the American 
 Anti-Slavery Societies. London, 1835. 
 
 28. JEFFERSON, THOMAS. Writings. Edited by P. L. Ford. 10 vols. 
 New York, 1892-1899. 
 
 29. . Notes on the State of Virginia with an appendix. Third 
 
 American edition. New York, 1801. 
 
 30. LEIGH, BENJAMIN WATKINS. The letter of Appomattox to the 
 People of Virginia exhibiting a connected view of the recent 
 proceedings in the House of Delegates on the subject of aboli 
 tion of slavery; and a succinct account of the doctrines 
 broached by the friends of abolition in debate; and the mis 
 chievous tendencies of those proceedings and doctrines. 
 Richmond, 1832. 
 
 31. . Virginia Slavery Debate. Richmond, 1832. 
 
 Contains nine of the speeches delivered by members of the 
 House of Delegates of 1831-1832 on the policy of the State 
 in relation to her colored population, and the Letter of Appo 
 mattox to the People of Virginia. 
 
 32. MADISON, JAMES. Letters and other Writings of James Madison. 
 
 In four volumes, published by order of Congress, 1769-1836. 
 New York, 1884. 
 
 33. MONROE, JAMES. The Writings of James Monroe, including a 
 
 collection of his public aad private papers and correspondence 
 now for the first time printed (1778-1831). Edited by S. M. 
 Hamilton. 7 vols. New York, 1898-1903. 
 
 34. NEILL, EDWARD D. History of the Virginia Company of London, 
 
 with letters to and from the first colony never before printed. 
 Albany, N. Y., 1869. 
 
 35. OLMSTEAD, FREDERICK LAW. A Journey in the Seaboard Slave 
 
 States, with remarks on their economy. New York, 1856. 
 
 36. ROWLAND, KATE MASON. The life of George Mason, 1725-1792. 
 
 Including his Speeches, Public Papers, and Correspondence; 
 with an Introduction by General Fitzhugh Lee. 2 vols. New 
 York, 1892. 
 
 37. RUFFIN, EDMUND. African Colonization Unveiled. By Edmund 
 
 Ruffin. Washington [1859?]. Pp. 32. Virginia State Library. 
 38. . The Political Economy of Slavery, or the institution con 
 sidered in regard to its influence on public wealth and the 
 
1 86 THE FREE NEGRO IN VIRGINIA, 1619-1865 
 
 general welfare, with an appendix on the influence of slavery, 
 or of its absence, on manners, morals, and intellect. 1852. 
 Pp. 32. 
 
 39. SCHOOLCRAFT, HENRY R. Information respecting the History, 
 
 Condition and Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United 
 States. 5 vols. Philadelphia, 1855. 
 
 40. SLAUGHTER, PHILIP. Virginia History of African Colonization. 
 
 Richmond, 1855. 
 
 41. SMITH, CAPT. JOHN. Works, 1608-1631. Edited by Edward 
 
 Arber. Birmingham, England, 1884. 
 
 42. STITH, WILLIAM. The history of the first discovery and settle 
 
 ment of Virginia : being an essay towards a general history of 
 this colony. Williamsburg, Virginia, 1747. 
 
 43. STRINGFELLOW, B. F. Negro Slavery no Evil ; or the North and 
 
 the South. A report to the Platte county self-defence asso 
 ciation, St. Louis: 1854. Pp. 38. 
 
 Bound in " Slavery Pamphlets " in the library of William 
 and Mary College. 
 
 44. STROUD, GEORGE M. A Sketch of the Laws Relating to Slavery 
 
 in the Several States of America. Philadelphia, 1827. 
 
 45. TUCKER, GEORGE. Progress of The United States in Population 
 
 and Wealth in fifty years, as exhibited by the decennial Cen 
 sus from 1790 to 1840. New York, 1855. 
 
 46. TUCKER, ST. GEORGE. A Dissertation on Slavery with a proposal 
 
 for the gradual abolition of it in the State of Virginia. Phil 
 adelphia, 1796. Pp. 106. 
 
 A second edition was printed in 1803 as an appendix to the 
 author s Commentaries on Blackstone. 
 
 47. A Dialogue Concerning the Slavery of the Africans ; Shewing it 
 
 to be the Duty and Interest of the American States to eman 
 cipate all their African Slaves. With an Address to the 
 owners of such Slaves, New York, 1785. Norwich, 1796. 
 A rare pamphlet in Virginia State Library. 
 
 48. Political Pamphlets. 
 
 A collection of 45 bound volumes of miscellaneous pamph 
 lets, most of which refer to political events immediately pre 
 ceding or during the Civil War, in Virginia State Library. 
 
 49. Views of American Slavery, taken a century ago. Anthony 
 
 Benzet, John Wesley, etc. Philadelphia, 1858. 
 
 This pamphlet contains a miscellaneous collection of views 
 of slavery in the eighteenth century. It is important on man 
 umission sentiment in Virginia. 
 
INDEX 
 
 Aberdeen, a slave set free, 62. 
 
 Abolition Society, the Virginia, 
 58 n. 
 
 Abolitionists, attacks of, 79; ef 
 forts of, reanimate harsh laws, 
 174. 
 
 Adams, John, Mayor of Rich 
 mond, 142. 
 
 Adams, Ned, free negro, 153. 
 
 Africans, first brought to Vir 
 ginia, 16. 
 
 Anglican church, aid of, to ne 
 groes, 40, 41 ; labors to edu 
 cate them, 138. 
 
 Angus, Judith, free negress, 
 owns two slaves, 93 ; will of, 
 93- 
 
 Anthony, negro in Virginia in 
 1623, 24, 24 n. 
 
 Apprentices, free negro, 40, 41 ; 
 to be given instruction, 138, 
 I 39>" opposition to, 149, 149 n. 
 
 "Aristocracy," negro, 133-135- 
 
 Bacon, Nathaniel, sr., will of, 51. 
 
 Bagwell, Jack, free negro sold 
 into slavery, 175. 
 
 Ballagh, Dr. J. C, 18, 18 n., 20. 
 
 Bancroft, George, 121. 
 
 Banishment, penalty upon white 
 persons marrying negroes, 124; 
 of slaves freed after 1806, 70; 
 spasmodic enforcement of law 
 requiring, 174 et seq. 
 
 Baptism, of free negroes, 12, 
 12 n.; of slaves does not be 
 stow freedom, 137. 
 
 Baptists, favorable toward manu 
 mission, 58; offer education 
 and Christianity to negroes, 
 141-143 ; African churches, 143. 
 
 Barbers, free negro, 151. 
 
 Barlow, Betsey, manumits and 
 renames two slaves, 84 n. 
 
 Barnhouse, Anne, discharges a 
 negro servant, 48. 
 
 Barr, John, will of, setting slaves 
 free, 44. 
 
 Beasley, Thomas, petitions to be 
 allowed to use firelock, 97. 
 
 Berkeley, Governor, estimate of 
 black population of Virginia, 
 10. 
 
 Beverly, Robert, 18; defines over 
 seer, 38. 
 
 Bilberry, Benjamin, slave of, set 
 free by act of legislature, 44. 
 
 Bill of Rights, appealed to in be 
 half of negroes, 61 ; principles 
 of, interpreted by courts, 98. 
 
 Binford, William, last will of, 
 56 n., 61. 
 
 Bird, Samuel, a free mulatto, 65. 
 
 Black masters, or free negro 
 slave-owners, 78, 90-94. 
 
 Bledsoe, A. T., defends slavery, 
 80. 
 
 Bowlagh, Lewis, free negro, in 
 War of 1812, in; gave infor 
 mation concerning plot, 169. 
 
 Brady, Daniel, free negro, sur 
 rendered by his father to stand 
 trial, 169. 
 
 Brodnax, General, on deporta 
 tion of free negroes, 90, 172, 
 173 n. ; on constitutional rights 
 of free negroes, 122. 
 
 Brown, Titus, free negro, 176. 
 
 Bruce, Thomas, 133. 
 
 Bruton parish, free negroes in, 
 12. 
 
 Burdett, William, inventory of 
 estate, 36. 
 
 Burk, John, history of Virginia, 
 16 ; on emancipation, 75 n. 
 
 Burnaby, Andrew, observations 
 of, 54; on two laws of Vir 
 ginia, H7n. 
 
 Bushrod, Thomas, purchaser of 
 mulatto as slave, 31. 
 
 Caesar, a slave, set free, 62. 
 
 " Calx," on manumission, 81 ; on 
 intermarriage of free negroes 
 and slaves, 132; on illiteracy 
 of free negroes, 145; scheme 
 
 187 
 
188 
 
 INDEX 
 
 for reducing free negro popu 
 lation, 16, I59n. 
 
 Cambew, Emanuel, negro, ac 
 quires title to land, 38. 
 Campbell, history of Virginia, 16. 
 Capitation tax, on free negroes, 
 
 112-116. 
 
 Carter, John, will of, 51. 
 Casor, John, negro servant of a 
 negro, 32; gains his freedom, 
 32; reduced to slavery, 33; 
 owned by Anthony Johnson, 
 negro, 93. 
 
 Charlton, Stephen, 26, 27. 
 Christian servants, 21, 31, 37, 39, 
 
 91. 
 
 Christianity, test of freedom, 22. 
 Church wardens, care of, for 
 
 mulatto bastards, 40, 41, 138. 
 Citizenship, of free negroes, 120- 
 122 ; Bancroft s opinion con 
 cerning, 121 ; Judge Tucker s 
 opinion concerning, 121. 
 Clark, Bowling, negro, purchases 
 
 freedom of wife, 77. 
 Classes of free negroes, 40, 41. 
 Clemenze, Scott, free negro, 
 
 property tax of, H4n. 
 Colonization, resolution in legis 
 lature concerning, 65, 73; cor 
 respondence concerning, be 
 tween Monroe and Jefferson, 
 66; becomes an important is 
 sue, 71 ; appropriations for, 73 ; 
 failure of, 74 n. ; Brodnax on, 
 oo, 172. 
 
 Colonization Society, American, 
 735 Virginia, 73, 157; Powha- 
 tan, 75 ; Richmond, petition of, 
 76; Fairfax County, memorial 
 of, 171 n.; misrepresentations 
 of free negroes in memorials, 
 157, 171 ; tax levied on free 
 negroes for, 115; money spent 
 for, 115. 
 
 Constitution, state, 68, 122; Fed 
 eral, provisions respecting cit 
 izenship, 121. 
 
 Cook, Harriet, free negress, peti 
 tion in behalf of, 153, 154. 
 Cook, history of Virginia, 16. 
 Cooper, Phil, petition of, 92 n. ; 
 
 in bondage to wife, 92 n. 
 Corporal punishment, adminis 
 tered to free negroes, 105, 161 n. 
 
 Cowen, Philip, defrauded of free 
 dom, 34. 
 
 Criminal tendencies of free ne 
 groes, 164-167. 
 
 Cuffee, William Miles, free ne 
 gro, intimidated by mob, 173. 
 
 Cuffie, James, free negro, li 
 censed to keep a gun, 96 n. 
 
 Dabney, Sally, slave of husband, 
 93; incapable of receiving be 
 quest of property, 93. 
 
 Day, James, no. 
 
 Debts, free negroes sold for, 82, 
 
 83- 
 
 Declaration of Independence, 56, 
 56 n. ; in contradiction of slave 
 laws, 62 n. ; doctrines of, held 
 not to apply to negroes, 98. 
 
 Delony, Henry, negro slave of, 
 set free, 44. 
 
 Dew, Thomas R., defends slav 
 ey* 79 > "Essay on Slavery," 
 81 ; views regarding criminal 
 tendencies of free negroes, 
 158; views concerning behavior 
 of free negroes in Virginia, 
 170 n. 
 
 Disfranchisement, of free ne 
 groes, 119. 
 
 Dogs, free negroes not allowed 
 to own, 97, 98. 
 
 Doyle, Benjamin, grant of land 
 to, 37- 
 
 Dregis, Emanuel, negro servant, 
 26, 27, 28, 28 n. 
 
 Dregis, Frances, 27. 
 
 Dregis, Jane, 26, 27. 
 
 Dungie, John, an Indian, mar 
 ries mulatto, 129. 
 
 Dunmore, Governor, 44. 
 
 Dutch, bring in cargo of negroes, 
 17, 22 ; import duties on slaves 
 assessed upon, 19; importers 
 of negroes, 20 n.; plantation 
 of, 30 n. 
 
 Edloe, Henry, 89 n. 
 
 Education, free negroes forbid 
 den to leave State to obtain, 
 107 ; opportunities for, open to 
 free negroes, 137-145; of ne 
 gro apprentices, 138, 139. 
 
 Elkonheade, Jane, discharges ne 
 gro servant, 29. 
 
INDEX 
 
 189 
 
 Emancipation, progress of, in 
 Virginia, Maryland, and north 
 ern colonies, 55; propositions 
 looking to, 59, 60 ; accomplished 
 in Virginia, 42, 42 n. 
 
 Emanuel, free negro, reveals plot, 
 169. 
 
 Employment of free negroes, 
 146-156. 
 
 Equity courts, open to free ne 
 groes, 101. 
 
 Ermana, slave woman, escheats 
 to literary fund, 93. 
 
 Ex-slaves, removal of, provided 
 for, 51, 71, 156, 174; law of 
 1806 concerning, not enforced, 
 174-177- 
 
 Farnando, Bashasar, negro owner 
 of property, 27, 28. 
 
 Farrar, John, last will, 50. 
 
 Firearms, free negroes forbidden 
 to own or carry, 52, 95; free 
 negroes licensed to keep, 96, 
 96 n. ; petition of free negro 
 farmers concerning, 97. 
 
 Fiske, John, 79. 
 
 Fitzgerald, John, will of, con 
 strued, 87 n. 
 
 Fitzhugh, George, defends slav 
 ery, 80. 
 
 Fitzhugh, Giles, frees slaves, 85. 
 
 Floyd, Governor, 143 n., 166. 
 
 " Free niggers." See " Men of 
 Color." 
 
 "Free papers," free negroes re 
 quired to have, 101, 107; prima 
 facie evidence of freedom, 100, 
 101 ; free negroes imprisoned 
 for want of, 107 n. ; transferred 
 by free negroes to slaves, 64, 
 64 n.; forged by slaves, 64, 
 64 n. 
 
 Freedom, purchased by slaves, 
 63, 77, 170. 
 
 Freedom dues, negro servants 
 entitled to, 34 n., 39, 49. 
 
 Freehold, definition of, 119; as 
 requirement for voting, 119. 
 
 Friends. See Quakers. 
 
 Fuller, Betsey, owns her husband 
 as slave, 92 n. 
 
 Gabriel Insurrection, 64, 65, 65 n., 
 69; effect of, on negro educa 
 
 tion, 140; no evidence of free 
 negroes in, 167. 
 
 Gatch, Philip, liberates slaves, 58. 
 
 Geaween, John, negro servant, 
 28. 
 
 Giles, Governor William B., pro 
 cures reform of criminal laws 
 applicable to free negroes, 164; 
 condemns discriminations 
 against free negroes, 165. 
 
 Gingaskin Indians, 128, 128 n. 
 
 Glary, John, servant, 47. 
 
 Glasgow, Ellen, "The Battle- 
 Ground," 133. 
 
 Gooch, Governor, 53 n. 
 
 Goodell, W., 54- 
 
 Gowen, Mihil, set free, 48. 
 
 Grayson, Colonel William, sets 
 free slaves, 56 n. 
 
 Greene, Rev. Charles, 53. 
 
 Gromes, Frank, purchases free 
 dom of his family, 91, 92. 
 
 Gwyn, Hugh, servants of, 29. 
 
 Habeas corpus, free negroes en 
 titled to writ of, 101, 102, 102 n. 
 
 Hailstock, Rosetta, set free, 45 n. ; 
 purchases freedom of her chil 
 dren, 170. 
 
 Hamander, John G., negro serv 
 ant, 26. 
 
 Harmonites, befriend negroes, 
 140. 
 
 Harris, James, free negro, 96. 
 
 Harris, John, negro, land deeded 
 to, 38. 
 
 Hawkins, Peter, deed of manu 
 mission to his wife Rose, 84. 
 
 " Head rights," claimed by ne 
 gro, 25, 37, 88. 
 
 Heth, William, wants free negro 
 laborers, 147 n. 
 
 Hill, James H., free black man, 
 
 95- 
 
 Hill, Joseph, last will of, 61. 
 
 Hiter, Abram, free negro, loon. 
 
 Hobday, Thomas, 139. 
 
 Holmes, William, mulatto, de 
 serter from Revolutionary 
 Army, lion. 
 
 Hopes, John, free negro, 153. 
 
 House of Burgesses, right of, to 
 manumit slaves, 45. 
 
 Howe, Henry, 174. 
 
190 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Howell, Peggy, children of, kid 
 napped, 100. 
 
 Hungar s parish, negroes in, u. 
 
 Hunnicutt, Cloister, bequeathes 
 slaves to Monthly Meeting, 57. 
 
 Illiteracy, of free negroes, 145, 
 146. 
 
 Immigration of free negroes 
 forbidden, 64; laws concern 
 ing, revised, 66. 
 
 Indentures of negro servants, 
 26, 32, 38. 
 
 Indians, not to be slaves, 19 ; 
 forbidden to purchase Chris 
 tian servants, 91 ; presumed at 
 law to be free, 99 ; denied right 
 to hold office, 116; not to be 
 admitted as witnesses, 117; 
 social and marriage relations 
 with free negroes, 41, 127-130; 
 Gingaskins, 128; Nottoways, 
 128; Pamunkeys, 129, 129 n. 
 
 Infidels, forbidden to purchase 
 Christian servants, 91 n. 
 
 Ingle, Edward, on manumission 
 sentiment, 80. 
 
 Insurrections, negro, feared, 52, 
 168; Gabriel, 64, 65, 65 n., 69, 
 140, 167; Southampton, 80, 144, 
 168. 
 
 Intermarriage, of free negroes 
 and Indians, 127-130; of free 
 negroes and slaves, 130-133; 
 of negroes with whites, 123, 
 124, 126. 
 
 Isdel, James, 138. 
 
 Jackson, Samuel, free negro, 170. 
 
 James City County, free negroes 
 in, 15. 
 
 James, David, free negro, 138. 
 
 Jefferson, Thomas, on status of 
 first negroes brought to Vir 
 ginia, 24; favors emancipation, 
 54; proposes freedom of man 
 umission, 55, 56 n., 59; on colo 
 nization, 66; concerning f reed- 
 men, 75; on effect of slavery 
 on character of bondmen, 160. 
 
 Johnson, Anthony, free negro, 
 exempted from taxation, 24, 
 24 n., 25, 25 n. ; owner of negro 
 servant, 32, 33; land grant to, 
 
 Johnson, James, will of, 86 n. 
 
 Johnson, John, negro landowner, 
 37- 
 
 Johnson, John, sr., negro, suit 
 against, 38. 
 
 Johnson, Mary, free negress, 24, 
 24 n., 25 n. 
 
 Johnson, Richard, free negro 
 landowner, 25, 38. 
 
 Johnson, Samuel, free negro, 131. 
 
 Jones, David A., sells slaves to a 
 black man, 91, 92. 
 
 Jones, Robert, deeds land to ne 
 gro, 38. 
 
 Jubilee, Jane, free negress, wife 
 of slave, 134 n. 
 
 Jury trial, allowed to free ne 
 groes, 103 ; denied to them, 104. 
 
 Kidnapping of free negroes, pen 
 alty for, 99; decision relating 
 to, 100; reward for offenders, 
 100. 
 
 Kingsmall, Richard, 23 n. 
 
 Kitt, set free by legislative act, 
 44- 
 
 Lafayette, Marquis, slave spy of, 
 62 n. ; inquiry of, concerning 
 free negro insurrection, 167. 
 
 Landowners, free negro, 25, 37, 
 38. 
 
 Lee, Arthur, slave, purchases 
 freedom of himself and wife, 
 170. 
 
 Lee, Governor Henry, proclama 
 tion of, 100. 
 
 Legal rights of free negroes, to 
 own and alienate property, 88- 
 90 ; to own and sell slaves, 90- 
 94 ; limited as to ownership of 
 white servants, 94; limited as 
 to ownership of firearms, 95~ 
 97; limited as to ownership of 
 dogs, 97, 98; to freedom from 
 unjust restraint of liberty, 98- 
 102; means of asserting, 102- 
 104 ; to go from place to place, 
 106-108; to enslave themselves, 
 108-109. 
 
 Light, George, owns indented 
 negro servant, 26; judgment 
 against, 38. 
 
 London Company, servitude in, 
 23- 
 
INDEX 
 
 Lucas, Charles, defrauds a negro 
 servant of his freedom, 34. 
 
 Ludlowe, Thomas, owner of ne 
 groes, 36. 
 
 Lynch-law for controlling free 
 negroes, 172, 173. 
 
 Madison, James, favors manu 
 mission, 81 ; on negro insur 
 rections, 167. 
 
 Malacai, mulatto boy, to be 
 taught trade, 139. 
 
 Manumission, free negro popu 
 lation increased by, 41 ; mean 
 ing of term, 42; methods of, 
 42 ; by special act of the legis 
 lature, 43-45 ; precedents found 
 in customs of servitude, 46- 
 50; right of, restricted bylaw, 
 51; right denied except for 
 meritorious service, 53; un 
 popular in colony, 53, 53 n. ; 
 growth of sentiment favorable 
 to, 54-59; law permitting free 
 dom of, proposed in legisla 
 ture, 55; movement favoring, 
 aided by religious societies, 57- 
 59; proposed law enacted, 59, 
 59 n. ; produces sudden increase 
 of free negro class, 61 ; aided 
 by Revolutionary philosophy, 
 61, 62 ; evil results of, 64, 65 ; 
 repeal of act of 1782 proposed 
 and debated, 67-69; effect of 
 law of 1806 upon, 70, 71 ; prop 
 osition relating to, 74; causes 
 of decline in frequency of, 70- 
 82 ; relation of, to economic 
 conditions, 77-82; stages in 
 progress of, summarized, 82; 
 legal aspects of, 82-87 ; instru 
 ments of, 83, 84; in future, 86. 
 
 Marshall, Thomas, in debate of 
 1832, 90, 158; thought free ne 
 groes a barrier to servile in 
 surrection, 169. 
 
 Martin, Nicholas, last will, 49. 
 
 Mayo, Joseph, frees slaves, 56. 
 
 Medlicott, Richard, Spanish mu 
 latto, 39 n. 
 
 " Men of color," and " free nig 
 gers " distinguished, 159. 
 
 Mercer, General, 157. 
 
 Methodists, favor manumission, 
 57; disapprove of slavery, 58, 
 
 58 n.; petition for gradual abo 
 lition, 60 n. ; to be spared by 
 insurgent negroes, 65; offer 
 Christianity to negroes, 139, 
 139 n., 140; arouse hostility of 
 slave owners, 141. 
 
 Military service required of free 
 negroes, 109-112. 
 
 Militia, free negroes in, 95; reg 
 ulation for enlistment of free 
 negroes, 96. 
 
 Miller, John, free negro, account 
 of his life, H2n. 
 
 Millers, roguish slave, aid to free 
 negroes, 162. 
 
 Monroe, Governor, on coloniza 
 tion, 66; favorable toward 
 manumission, 81. 
 
 Moorman, Charles, 56. 
 
 Moral character of the free ne 
 groes, 156-159- 
 
 Moravians, befriend negroes, 140. 
 
 Morgan, Philip, negro lessee, 38. 
 
 Morris, Richard, on taxation of 
 slaves, 78 n. 
 
 Moseby, C. L., 157. 
 
 Moses, free negro, reveals con 
 spiracy, 169. 
 
 Mulattoes, Spanish, 39; classes 
 of, 40, 41 ; set free, 44 ; de 
 tested by whites, 125 ; number 
 in Virginia in 1860, 127; dis 
 tinguished from mustees, 130. 
 
 Mundin, William, free mulatto, 
 apprenticed to free negro, 95 
 n., 151. 
 
 Mustees, 128, 128 n., 130. 
 
 Mustizos. See Mustees. 
 
 Natural rights, philosophy of, 
 54, 55; interpreted to apply to 
 negroes, 56, 59; victory for, 61. 
 
 Navy, Confederate, free negroes 
 in, 112; United States, 1 12, 
 112 n. 
 
 Nottoway Indians, 128. 
 
 Occupations of free negroes, 
 
 149, 150. 
 Offices, free negroes forbidden 
 
 to hold, 116. 
 Olmstead, F. L., 157. 
 Overseers, negro, 38. 
 Overseers of poor, to bind out 
 
 free negroes, 41, 139; to sell 
 
192 
 
 INDEX 
 
 free negroes remaining in 
 State in violation of law, 175. 
 
 Pamunkey Indians, 129, 129 n. 
 
 Parke, Daniell, manumits slave, 
 50, 51 n. 
 
 Parker, Henry, free negro, 153. 
 
 Parker, Robert, sued by a free 
 negro, 33. 
 
 Parrish, Col. Jolly, lion. 
 
 Payne, John, frees his slave, 56. 
 
 Pedro, John, negro, 23 n. 
 
 Petition, of ninety-one free ne 
 groes, 142; right of, belonging 
 to free negroes, 103. 
 
 Philosophy of the Revolution, 
 effect on slavery, 55, 56 ; favor 
 able to freedom, 59. 
 
 Pillory, negro compelled to stand 
 in, 124 n. 
 
 Pleasants, John, last will, 57. 
 
 Pleasants, Jonathan, 56 n. 
 
 Pleasants, Robert, frees slaves, 
 61. 
 
 Poll tax. See Capitation tax. 
 
 Poor whites, unable to compete 
 successfully with free negroes, 
 147, 148, 156. 
 
 Population, free colored in Vir 
 ginia, compared with that of 
 other States, 9-13 ; increase of, 
 39-41 ; from 1782 to 1810, 61 ; 
 from 1820 to 1840, 80; relative 
 to slaves in colonial period, 
 126. 
 
 Pott, Francis, 26, 27, 34, 34 n., 
 138. 
 
 Pott, John, 34, 34 n. 
 
 Preachers, negro, forbidden to 
 preach, 144. 
 
 Presbyterians, favorable toward 
 manumission, 58. 
 
 Prostitution among free negroes, 
 how dealt with, 172. 
 
 Pryne, Francis, negro discharged 
 from servitude, 29. 
 
 Punch, John, negro servant, 29, 
 
 30- 
 
 Punishments, prescribed by law 
 for free negroes, 104-106. 
 
 Quakers, favor manumission, 57, 
 58, 58 n.; urged to free slaves, 
 62 ; condemn slavery and the 
 slave trade, 62 n. ; to be spared 
 
 by insurgent negroes, 65 ; offer 
 instruction to free negroes, 139, 
 140, 141. 
 
 Quickley, Mary, free black wo 
 man, owns slave, 94. 
 
 Rachel, free negress, wife of 
 slave, 131. 
 
 Radford, George, negro, pur 
 chases a slave, 91. 
 
 Radford, James, sells slave to a 
 black freeman, 91. 
 
 Randolph, John, of Roanoke, lib 
 erated slaves of, driven from 
 Ohio, 72; will of, 76, 85, 85 n. 
 
 Reginald, Mr., runaway negro 
 of, 30 n. 
 
 Registers. See "Free papers." 
 
 Registration of free negroes, 
 101, 108, 178. 
 
 Revolutionary War, service in, 
 by slaves rewarded with free 
 dom, 62, 62 n.; free negroes 
 in, no, non. 
 
 Rew, Richard, purchases free 
 negro, 175. 
 
 Richmond Enquirer, attitude to 
 ward manumission in 1805, 68; 
 on variance of laws and senti 
 ment, 173. 
 
 Richmond Recorder, manumis 
 sion opposed by, 75. 
 
 Richmond Whig, on free negro 
 labor, 149. 
 
 Rolfe, Master John, 22. 
 
 Rowan, Pleasant, free negro 
 carpenter, 153. 
 
 Ruffin, Edmund, defends slav 
 ery, 80; views in regard to 
 manumission, 85. 
 
 Sabb, John, free negro, purchased 
 and manumitted father-in-law, 
 92. 
 
 Sampson, Jacob, free negro, li 
 cense of, to keep an ordinary 
 revoked, 149 n. 
 
 Santo Domingo, negro insurrec 
 tion in, 67, 67 n., 167. 
 
 Schools, free colored, not al 
 lowed by law, 144, 145. 
 
 Schwartz, J. A., nuncupative 
 will of, concerning his slaves, 
 85 n. 
 
INDEX 
 
 193 
 
 Servitude, distinguished from 
 slavery, 18; white, or indented, 
 beginning of, 22; negro servi 
 tude, 25-31, 38; encroachments 
 of slavery upon, 31-34. 
 
 Shakers, befriend negroes, 140. 
 
 Sheepraising, free negroes and 
 dogs a menace to, 97, 97 n. 
 
 Sheppard, Robert, 28. 
 
 Slavery debate of 1832, 135. 
 
 Slavery, what is evidence of, 18; 
 distinguished from servitude, 
 18; developed in customary 
 law, 18, 19; servitude the his 
 toric basis of, 18 n. ; first act 
 concerning, 19; Indian, 19; 
 legislative sanction of, 21-22; 
 Ballagh s history of, 20; earli 
 est records of, 34-37; abol 
 ished in Virginia, 42 n. 
 
 Slaves, permitted to give testi 
 mony against free negroes, 66; 
 owned by free negroes, 77, 91- 
 95 ; social relations with free 
 negroes, 130-137. 
 
 Smith, Colonel William, 31. 
 
 Smith, Governor, on free negro 
 labor, 147, 148; characterizes 
 free negroes, 157, 157 n. ; opin 
 ion concerning lack of indus 
 try among free negroes, 171. 
 
 Smyth, of Wythe County, op 
 poses manumission, 67. 
 
 Stafford, Christopher, 48. 
 
 Stephens, Rice, free negro, 131. 
 
 Stringfellow, Rev. Dr. Thornton, 
 defends slavery, 80. 
 
 Suffrage, rights shared by free 
 negroes, 117-119; denied to 
 free negroes, 119, 120. 
 
 Taxation, of free negroes, 112- 
 116. 
 
 Taxpayers, free negroes as, 1151*. 
 
 Taylor, John E., will of, 86 n. 
 
 Testimony, free negroes not al 
 lowed to give, against a white 
 man, 116, 117; slaves permit 
 ted to give, against free ne 
 groes, 66. 
 
 Thacker, Samuel, gift to servant, 
 47- 
 
 Thomas, Fortune, free negress, 
 petition in behalf of, 154. 
 
 Tidewater, free negro popula 
 tion of, 13, 14, 15. 
 
 Trans-Allegheny, free negro pop 
 ulation of, 13, 14. i 
 
 Trial of free negroes, method of, 
 102-106. 
 
 Tucker, St. George, u, 12, 17; 
 on progress of manumission in 
 Virginia, 61 n. ; decision of, in 
 suit for freedom, 98, 98 n. ; on 
 citizenship of negroes, 121. 
 
 Turner, Nat, insurrection, 144. 
 
 Tyner, Uriah, free negro, peti 
 tion in behalf of, 152. 
 
 Unlawful meetings of negroes, 
 52; of slaves, 141 n. 
 
 Vagrants, free negroes as, 107, 
 107 n. ; liable to arrest, 155. 
 
 Valley of Virginia, free negro 
 population of, 13, 14. 
 
 Vaughan, Richard, discharge of 
 negro, 47; last will and testa 
 ment of, 49, 49 n. 
 
 Vaughn, Craddock, quadroon 
 children of, 135. 
 
 Viney, Joseph and James, free 
 negroes, petition to keep fire 
 locks, 97. 
 
 Voting. See Suffrage. 
 
 Walker, Major Peter, inventory 
 of slaves of, 36. 
 
 Wall, Anne, banished from col 
 ony, 124. 
 
 War of 1812, free negroes serve 
 in, in; poll-tax on free ne 
 groes to support, 114. 
 
 Warner, Daniel, free negro bar 
 ber, 153. 
 
 Warwick, Hannah, 38. 
 
 Washington, George, on slaves 
 as property, 78. 
 
 West, Reuben, free negro slave 
 owner, 95 n. ; property tax on, 
 H3n. ; occupation as barber, 
 
 I5i. 
 West, Richard, on free negro 
 
 suffrage, 119. 
 Whitehead, Thomas, last will of, 
 
 49, 50, 89 n. 
 Whittaker, William, petition of, 
 
 35- 
 
194 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Whittington, William, sold negro 
 slave, 34. 
 
 Will, negro slave, set free by 
 legislature, 43, 52. _ 
 
 Wilson, Henry, on introduction 
 of negroes into Virginia, 17; in 
 error concerning manumission 
 laws of Virginia, 82 n. 
 
 Wise, Governor Henry A., on 
 need of free negro labor, 155; 
 on general character of free 
 negroes, 166; on banishment of 
 free negroes, 177. 
 
 Witness, limited ability of free 
 negroes to become, 116, 117; 
 charge administered to free 
 negro witnesses, 117. See also 
 Testimony. 
 
 Wood, Janette, free negress, 92. 
 
 Wyatt, Sir Francis, 24. 
 
 Wythe, George, decision of, as 
 chancellor, 98. 
 
 Yates, William, free negro, will 
 
 of, 89 n. 
 Yeardly, George, 23 n. 
 
VITA 
 
 John Henderson Russell was born in Lee County, Vir 
 ginia, April 8, 1884, and received his elementary and sec 
 ondary education in the public schools and in the Jonesville 
 Institute. After teaching for two years in the public schools 
 of Lee County, he entered Emory and Henry College in 
 1904, and received the degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1907. 
 For the two following sessions he was principal of a state 
 high school in Lee County. He entered the Johns Hopkins 
 University in October, 1909, and pursued graduate studies 
 in Political Science, History, Philosophy, and Political Econ 
 omy. In the summers of 1910 and 1911 he was instructor 
 in Civil Government in the Virginia Summer Institute for 
 Teachers at Big Stone Gap, Virginia. He was a holder of 
 a Hopkins Scholarship from Virginia for three years, 1909- 
 1912, and was Fellow in Political Science, 1912-1913. 
 
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