THE ROYAL ADVENTURERS AND THE PLANTATIONS
The early trade of the English to the coast of Africa was very largely
in exchange for products which could be sold in England. Among these
may be mentioned elephants' teeth, wax, malaguetta and gold. As has
been shown, the hope of discovering gold mines was the principal cause
of the first expedition sent to Africa by the Royal Adventurers in
December, 1660. When this scheme to mine gold was abandoned the
company's agents traded for gold which was brought down from the
interior or washed out by the slow and laborious toil of the natives.
The other African products, especially elephants' teeth, were brought
to London where they sold quite readily for very good prices.
Although this direct trade between England and Africa was never
neglected, the slave trade with the English colonies in the West
Indies was destined to absorb the company's attention because the
supply of indentured servants[1] was never great enough to meet the
needs of the rapidly growing sugar and indigo plantations. From the
planters point of view, moreover, slaves had numerous advantages over
white servants as plantation laborers. Slaves and their children after
them were chattel property for life. The danger of rebellion was very
small because often the slaves could not even converse with one
another, since they were likely to be from different parts of Africa
and therefore to speak a different dialect. Finally, neither the
original outlay for slaves nor the cost of feeding and clothing them
was great, and therefore slaves were regarded as more economical than
indentured servants. Moreover, there was much to be said against
encouraging the lower classes of England to come to the plantations,
where they often engaged engaged in disturbances of one kind and
another. Also, after a service of a few years, it was necessary to
allow them to go where they pleased. Nevertheless, with all their
disadvantages, it may be truly said that the planters preferred the
white servants to any others. It was, however, impossible to obtain
the needed supply of labor from this source and therefore it was
always necessary to import slaves from Africa.
Previous to the accession of Charles II not many slaves were imported
into the English possessions in the West Indies. Of this small number
all but a few had been brought by the ships of the Dutch West India
Company. The Dutch centered their West India trade at the island of
Curaçao, whence they could supply not only their own colonies with
slaves but those of the French, English and even the Spanish when
opportunity offered. So great was the demand for slaves and other
necessities procured from the Dutch that the English planters in the
West Indies regarded this trade as highly desirable. For instance,
when the island of Barbadoes surrendered to the Parliamentary forces,
January 11, 1652, it stipulated that it should retain its freedom of
trade and that no company should be formed which would monopolize its
commodities.[2] Nevertheless, by the Navigation Act of 1660 colonial
exports, part of which had to be carried only to England, were
confined to English ships. This was a sufficient limitation of their
former freedom of trade to incense the planters in the West Indies
but, as a matter of greater importance to them, the king granted to
the Company of Royal Adventurers the exclusive trade to the western
coast of Africa, thus limiting their supply of Negro slaves to this
organization. The company therefore undertook this task, realizing
that in the Negro trade it would find by far its most lucrative
returns. Not only did the company supply the planters with slaves,
their greatest necessity, but in exchange for these it took sugar and
other plantation products which it carried to England. It was natural
that the company should endeavor to make a success of its business,
but, on the other hand, it was to be expected that the planters would
regard the company as a monopoly and a nuisance to be outwitted if
possible.
In 1660 Barbadoes was in much the same condition as is true of every
rapidly expanding new country. The settlers occupied as much land as
they could obtain and directed every effort toward its cultivation and
improvement. The growing of sugar had proved to be very profitable and
every planter saw his gains limited only by the lack of labor to
cultivate his lands. Every possible effort was therefore made to
obtain laborers and machinery. Although the planters had little ready
capital, they made purchases with a free hand, depending upon the
returns from their next year's crop to pay off their debts. As a
result, the planters were continually in debt to the merchants. The
merchants greatly desired that Barbadoes should be made as dependent
on England as possible in order that the constantly increasing amount
of money which the planters owed them might be better secured.
Moreover, they wished to prevent the planters from manipulating the
laws of the island in such a way as to hinder the effective collection
of debts.[3] The planters, on the other hand, appreciated very keenly
the ill effects upon themselves of the laws which were passed in
England for the regulation of commerce. They bitterly complained of
the enumerated article clause of the Navigation Act of 1660, which
provided that all sugars, indigo and cotton-wool should be carried
only to England. Already the planters were very greatly in debt to the
merchants and they saw in this new law the beginning of the
restrictions by which the merchants intended to throttle their trade.
Indeed it seemed to the planters as if they were completely at the
mercy of the merchants, who paid what they pleased for sugar, and
charged excessive prices for Negroes, cattle and supplies.[4] Among
those who were regarded as oppressors were the factors of the Royal
Company, which controlled the Negro supply upon which the prosperity
of the plantations depended.
Sir Thomas Modyford, speaker of the assembly, also became the agent
for the Royal Adventurers in Barbadoes. Modyford was very enthusiastic
about the company's prospects for a profitable trade in Negroes with
the Spanish colonies. The people of Barbadoes neither shared
Modyford's enthusiasm for this trade nor for the company's monopoly
because they believed that thereby the price of slaves was
considerably increased. On December 18, 1662, the council and assembly
of Barbadoes resolved to ask the king for a free trade to Africa or to
be assured that the factors of the Royal Company would sell their
slaves for the same price as other merchants.[5] Very shortly, the
duke of York, the company's governor, informed Governor Willoughby
that the company had made arrangements to provide Barbadoes and the
Caribbee Islands with 3,000 slaves per annum and that the needs of the
islands would be attended to as conditions changed. Moreover, the
company pledged itself to see that all Negroes imported into the
island should be sold by lots, as had been the custom, at the average
rate of seventeen pounds per head or for commodities of the island
rated at that price.[6] The duke of York also requested Governor
Willoughby to ascertain if possible how many Negroes were desired by
the planters at that rate, and to see that any planters who wished to
become members of the company should be given an opportunity to do
so.[7]
When the company's factors, Sir Thomas Modyford and Sir Peter
Colleton, began to sell Negroes to the planters they encountered
endless trouble and litigation in the collection of debts. In a vivid
description of their difficulties to the company they declared that
Governor Willoughby did nothing to assist them until he received
several admonitions from the king. To be sure the governor's power in
judicial matters was limited by the council, which in large part was
made up of landholders who naturally attempted to shield the planters
from their creditors. In case an execution on a debt was obtained from
a local court the property remained in the hands of the debtor for
eighty days. During this time the debtor often made away with the
property, if it was in the form of chattel goods. If the judgment was
against real estate the land also remained in the hands of the debtor
for eighty days, during which time a committee, usually neighbors of
the debtor, appraised the land, often above its real value. If this
sum exceeded the debt, the creditor was compelled to pay the
difference. As the factors declared, therefore, it was a miracle if
the creditors got their money.[8]
In 1664, Sir Thomas Modyford was called from Barbadoes to become
governor of Jamaica.[9] In his place the Royal Adventurers selected
John Reid, who had resided for several years in Spain and was
therefore conversant with the needs of the Spanish colonies concerning
slaves. Reid also obtained the office of sub-commissioner of prizes in
Barbadoes.[10]
After Modyford's departure from Barbadoes the factors still
experienced great difficulty in collecting the company's debts. Since
Willoughby had not exerted himself in its behalf the company informed
the king that it had supplied the planters liberally with slaves, but
that the planters owed the company £40,000,[11] and that by reason of
the intolerable delays in the courts it was impossible to collect this
sum. Thereupon the earl of Clarendon wrote to Governor Willoughby
admonishing him to take such measures as would make a renewal of the
company's complaints unnecessary. In this letter Clarendon also
declared that while the king had shown great care for the planters by
restraining the company from charging excessive prices for slaves, he
should also protect the interests of the merchants. Willoughby,
therefore, was recommended to see speedy justice given to the company,
and to use his influence in obtaining a better law for the collection
of debts.[12]
To add to the company's difficulties private traders began to infringe
upon the territory included in the company's charter. As an instance
of this Captain Pepperell, in charge of one of the company's ships,
seized an interloper called the "William" and "Jane" off the coast of
New Callabar in Guinea. When Pepperell appeared at Barbadoes with his
prize, one of the owners of the captured ship brought suit in a common
law court against the company's commander for damages to the extent of
500,000 pounds of sugar. The company's factors at once went bail for
Pepperell. Ordinarily the case would have been tried by a jury of
planters from whom the company's agents could expect no consideration.
The factors, therefore, petitioned to have the case removed from the
common law courts to the admiralty court where the governor was the
presiding officer. A jury of sympathetic islanders would thus be
dispensed with and, if necessary, the case could be appealed to a
higher court in England with greater ease. When Willoughby called the
admiralty court on June 17, 1665, the factors cited the company's
royal charter which justified the seizure of interlopers.
Notwithstanding the clear case which the company's agents seemed to
have the case was adjourned for a week. Fearing that the governor
might take action adverse to the company's interests the factors
succeeded in sending the ship in question to Jamaica where it was not
under the jurisdiction of Lord Willoughby.[13] The bail bonds against
Pepperell were not withdrawn, and therefore he stood in as great
danger of prosecution as ever. When the company learned of this
situation it immediately petitioned Secretary Arlington that
Willoughby be commanded not to permit any further procedures against
Pepperell and to transmit the whole case to the Privy Council. It also
requested that those who had transgressed the company's charter should
be punished.[14] The Privy Council issued an order in accordance with
the company's desires.[15] Willoughby accused the factors of having
reported the case falsely and of having affronted him grossly by
taking the vessel in question away from the island by stealth.
Moreover, he declared that he would have made them understand his
point of view "if they had not been employed by soe Royall a
Compagnie."[16]
Since Willoughby persistently neglected to send Pepperell's bail bonds
to England, the Royal Company finally reported the matter again to the
king.[17] Once more the case was heard in the Privy Council where it
was referred to the committee on trade and plantations.[18] On January
31, 1668, the Privy Council issued an order to Governor Willoughby,
brother of the former incumbent, commanding him to stop all
proceedings against the Royal Company and commanding him to send
everything in regard to the case to England without delay.[19] Lord
Willoughby replied that so far as he could ascertain all the records
had been sent to England and that if any others were found he would
also despatch them.[20] Thus ended this contest in regard to the
maintenance of the company's privileges. The king had not allowed his
royal prerogative to be interfered with and the company's charter was
regarded as intact. Theoretically the victory was all in favor of the
company, but on account of the losses which it was incurring in the
Anglo-Dutch war, it was impossible for the company to furnish a
sufficient supply of Negroes to Barbadoes, that is, if Lord
Willoughby's heated protests can be trusted.
Speaking of the general prohibitions on their trade, the governor
exclaimed, May 12, 1666, that he had "come to where itt pinches, and
if yor Maty gives not an ample & speedy redress, you have not onely
lost St. Christophers but you will lose the rest, I (aye) & famous
Barbadoes, too, I feare." In bitter terms he spoke of the poverty of
the island, protesting that anyone who had recommended the various
restraints on the colony's trade was "more a merchant than a good
subject." The restriction on the trade to Guinea, he declared, was one
of the things that had brought Barbadoes to its present condition; and
the favoritism displayed toward the Royal Company in carrying on the
Negro trade with the Spaniards had entirely deprived the colonial
government of an export duty on slaves.[21]
The decision of the company to issue licenses to private traders did
not allay the storm of criticism that continued to descend on the
company from Barbadoes. The new governor, as his brother had done,
urged a free trade to Guinea for Negroes, maintaining that slaves had
become so scarce and expensive that the poor planters would be forced
to go to foreign plantations for a livelihood.[22] He complained that
the Colletons, father and son, the latter of whom was one of the
company's factors, had helped to bring about this critical
condition.[23] On September 5, 1667, representatives of the whole
colony petitioned the king to throw open the Guinea trade or to force
the company to supply them with slaves at the prices promised in the
early declaration, although even those prices seemed like a canker of
usury to the much abused planters.[24]
Following these complaints Sir Paul Painter and others submitted a
petition to the House of Commons in which they asserted that an open
trade to Africa was much better than one carried on by a company. They
maintained that previous to the establishment of the Royal Adventurers
Negroes had been sold for twelve, fourteen and sixteen pounds per
head, or 1,600 to 1,800 pounds of sugar, whereas now the company was
selling the best slaves to the Spaniards at eighteen pounds per head,
while the planters paid as high as thirty pounds for those of inferior
grade. This, they declared, had so exasperated the planters that they
often refused to ship their sugar and other products to England in the
company's ships no matter what freight rates the factors offered.
In reply to the petition of Sir Paul Painter, Ellis Leighton, the
company's secretary, admitted that as a natural result of the
Anglo-Dutch war the price of slaves like all other products in
Barbadoes, had increased considerably. He denied that this increase
could be attributed to the sale of Negroes to the Spaniards since the
company had not disposed of more than 1,200 slaves to them. He
contended that the company had been thrown into a critical financial
condition, partly as the result of the losses incurred from DeRuyter
in Africa, but mostly by the constantly increasing debts which the
planters owed to the company. Notwithstanding these difficulties
Secretary Leighton maintained that since the formation of the company
Barbadoes had been supplied more adequately with slaves than at any
previous time. As for the planters' having refused to ship their goods
on the company's ships, he declared that this was nothing more than
they had consistently done since the formation of the company.[25]
In answer to the planters' representation of September 5, 1667, Sir
Ellis Leighton admitted that if Barbadoes alone was being considered,
a free trade to Guinea was preferable to any other, but since the
trade of the whole nation had to be given first consideration the idea
was pernicious. He asserted that the company was willing to furnish
the planters with all the Negroes they desired at the rates already
published, seventeen pounds per head, provided security was given for
payment in money or sugar; that instead of a lack of Negroes in
Barbadoes there had been so large a number left on the hands of the
factors that many had died; and that if the planters were sincere in
their complaints they would be willing to agree with the company on a
definite number of slaves which they would take annually.[26]
Since the importance of the Royal Company was by this time definitely
on the wane Sir Paul Painter succeeded in presenting his petition
regarding affairs in Barbadoes to the House of Commons, in September,
1667. Although the Royal Company was ordered to produce its charter no
further action was taken. The planters were by no means discouraged
and again requested the Privy Council to consider the matter of
granting a free trade to Guinea.[27] Later the people of Barbadoes
once more represented to the king the inconceivable poverty caused by
the lack of free trade to Guinea and other places.[28] Some of the
Barbadoes assemblymen even suggested that all the merchants be
excluded from the island, and that an act be passed forbidding any one
to sue for a debt within four years.[29]
Finally, on May 12, 1669, in answer to the numerous complaints of
Barbadoes, the Privy Council informed the islanders that the king
would not infringe upon the charter granted to the African Company;
and that sufficient Negroes would be furnished to the planters at
reasonable prices providing the company was assured of payment.[30]
The company was pleased at the king's favorable decision and at once
represented to him its critical financial condition because the
planters refused to pay their just debts.[31] The complaint of the
company was considered in the Council September 28, 1669, at which
time an order was issued requiring that henceforth land as well as
chattel property in Barbadoes might be sold at public auction for the
satisfaction of debts. The governor was directed to see that this
order not only became a law in Barbadoes, but that after it had been
passed it was to be executed.[32]
Thus it became clear that the planters of Barbadoes could hope for no
relief from the king and, therefore, during the few remaining years in
which the company was in existence they made no other consistent
effort to convince the king of their point of view. On the other hand,
if the company expected the king's instructions to be of great
assistance it was sorely disappointed. On August 2, 1671, John Reid
reported that they had been unable to recover the company's debts,[33]
and further appeals to the king for relief were of no avail.[34]
It is difficult to ascertain whether Barbadoes was in as great need of
slaves as the planters often asserted. The records kept by the factors
in the island have nearly all disappeared. From an early ledger kept
by the Barbadoes factors it appears that from August 11, 1663, to
March 17, 1664, the usual time for the chief importation of the year,
3,075 Negroes were received by the company's factors. These slaves,
1,051 men, 1,018 women, 136 boys and 56 girls, were sold in return
partly for sugar and partly for money. Estimating 2,400 pounds of
sugar as equal to seventeen pounds it appears that the average price
for these Negroes was a little over sixteen pounds per head.[35] This
comparatively low price is to be accounted for by the fact that the
women and children are averaged with the men, who sold for a higher
price. These figures show therefore that the company's factors were
selling adult slaves at about seventeen pounds each, as the company
had publicly declared that it would do.
In 1667 the company asserted that it had furnished the plantations
with about 6,000 slaves each year. This statement is to be doubted
since the Anglo-Dutch war had practically disrupted the company's
entire trade on the African coast. On the other hand, there is reason
to think that the need for slaves in Barbadoes was not so pressing as
might be inferred from the statements of the planters.[36] They
naturally insisted on a large supply of slaves in order to keep the
prices as low as possible. There seems no doubt, however, that the
islanders were able to obtain more Negroes than they could pay for and
were therefore hopelessly in debt to the company. On July 9, 1668,
Governor Willoughby estimated the total population of Barbadoes at
60,000, of which 40,000 were slaves.[37] Indeed some merchants
declared that the slaves outnumbered the white men twenty to one.[38]
As compared to its trade with Barbadoes and Jamaica the company's
trade in slaves to the Leeward Islands was insignificant. The company
located at Nevis a factor who reported to the agents in Barbadoes[39]
and also at Antigua and Surinam where Governor Byam acted as
agent.[40] In Surinam, the lack of slaves was attributed to the
prominent men of Barbadoes who were supposed to be influential with
the Royal Company.[41] Later, during the Anglo-Dutch war, one of the
company's ships in attempting to go to Surinam with Negroes, was
captured by the Dutch.[42]
After the war the company seems to have neglected the islands
altogether. Upon one occasion the planters of Antigua pleaded
unsuccessfully to have Negroes furnished to them on credit.[43] At
another time they asserted that the company treated them much worse
than it did the planters of Barbadoes because the latter were able to
use their influence with the company to divert the supply of slaves to
Barbadoes. Their condition, they declared, seemed all the more bitter
when they considered the thriving trade in Negroes which the Dutch
carried on from the island of Curaçao.[44]
The history of the slave trade to Jamaica from 1660 to 1672 does not
present the varied number of problems which arose during the same time
in Barbadoes. Jamaica was as yet more sparsely settled than Barbadoes
and therefore unable to take as large a number of Negroes.
Nevertheless, even before 1660, there was a need for servants in
Jamaica,[45] and there, as in Barbadoes, the Dutch had furnished the
planters with Negroes. When a Dutch ship laden with 180 slaves
appeared at the island in June, 1661, Colonel d'Oyley, the governor,
who was desirous of making a personal profit out of the sales, was
strongly in favor of permitting the vessel to land its Negroes. The
Jamaica council, however, realized that the Navigation Act made the
Negro trade with the Dutch illegal, and therefore it refused to accede
to the governor's desire. This action so enraged the governor that on
his own responsibility he purchased the whole cargo of slaves, some of
which he sold to a Quaker in the island, while the others he disposed
of at considerable profit to a Spaniard.[46] Again, in February, 1662,
d'Oyley bought a number of Negroes from another Dutchman. When one of
the king's ships attempted to seize the Dutch vessel for infringing
the Navigation Act, the governor even contrived to get it safely away
from the island.[47]
When Colonel Modyford became governor of Jamaica in 1664, he was
instructed to do all that he possibly could to encourage the trade
which the Royal Company was endeavoring to set on foot in the West
Indies.[48] In the instructions mention was also made of Modyford's
previous interest in managing the affairs of the Royal Company in
Barbadoes for which company, it was said, he undoubtedly retained
great affection. Shortly thereafter he issued a proclamation
promising extensive freedom of commerce except in the Negro trade
which was in the hands of the Royal Company.[49]
Although Modyford's proclamation indicated a continued interest in the
company's trade, he gave his first consideration to the welfare of the
colony. This appears from a list of the island's needs which he
submitted to the king, May 10, 1664, in which he asked among other
things that the Royal Company be obliged to furnish annually whatever
Negroes were necessary, and that the poorer planters be accorded easy
terms in paying for them. Furthermore he requested that indentured
servants be sent from England and that the island might have freedom
of trade except in Negroes.[50] His desires for a free trade were
denied, but the Privy Council agreed to consult with the Royal Company
and to recommend that it be obliged to furnish Jamaica with a
sufficient supply of Negroes.[51]
There is no evidence that the Privy Council called the company's
attention to Modyford's request, nor is there any indication that it
endeavored to send very many Negroes to Jamaica. Modyford attended to
a plantation which the company had bought in Jamaica[52] and he sold a
few slaves to the Spaniards,[53] but all the company's affairs in the
aggregate really amounted to little in that island. There was a
continual call for a greater supply of Negroes than the company
sent.[54] Two ledgers used by the factors show that 690 Negroes were
sold in 1666 and in the following year,[55] 170. Although this number
was inadequate to meet the colony's needs, it is doubtful whether the
company sent any slaves to Jamaica after 1667.
Under these circumstances Modyford lost interest in the company's
affairs and therefore it resolved, April 6, 1669, to dispense with his
services. Modyford had received a pension of three hundred pounds per
year up to Michaelmas, 1666, but after that time the company's
financial condition no longer warranted this expense. The company does
not seem to have been displeased with Modyford because it requested
that he use his good offices as governor to assist it in every
possible way. At the same time the services of the other factor, Mr.
Molesworth, were discontinued and he was requested to send an
inventory of the company's affairs.[56]
Modyford thus free from his connection with the company probably
represented the desires of the Jamaica people in a more unbiased
manner. On September 20, 1670, he enumerated a number of needs of the
island and asked Secretary Arlington that licenses to trade to Africa
for Negroes be granted free of charge or at least at more moderate
rates. For this privilege he declared that security could be given
that the slaves would be carried only to Jamaica. The Royal Company
itself could not complain when it realized how much this freedom of
trade would mean toward the prosperity of Jamaica, and thus ultimately
to the entire kingdom.[57] Modyford admitted that the Anglo-Dutch war
had been a great hindrance to Jamaica's prosperity but that the lack
of Negroes since 1665 had been a much greater obstruction.[58]
The more insistent demands which Governor Modyford made in 1670 for
freedom of trade to Africa show that the company's failure to send
Negroes to Jamaica after 1667 was beginning to be resented. Although
there had been a constant demand for Negroes in Jamaica there was up
to 1670 less need for slaves there than in Barbadoes. At least the
demands made by the planters of Jamaica were not so frequent and so
insistent as they were in Barbadoes. To a certain extent the planters
of Jamaica may have been deterred from representing the lack of labor
supply while Governor Modyford was one of the company's factors.
Modyford had been very much interested in the company's trade,
especially with the Spanish colonies. As soon as it became clear,
however, that the losses incurred in the Anglo-Dutch war, would make
it impossible for the company to continue the slave trade to the West
Indies, Modyford undoubtedly voiced a genuine demand on the part of
the planters for more slaves. By the year 1670 the island was better
developed than it had been ten years before and the need for slaves
was beginning to be acute.[59]
About the first of March, 1662, two Spaniards made their appearance at
Barbadoes to make overtures for a supply of slaves, which they
intended to transport to Peru. If they received encouragement, the
Spaniards asserted that they would come every fortnight with large
supplies of bullion to pay for the slaves which they exported. Sir
Thomas Modyford, the company's factor and the speaker of the Barbadoes
assembly, was enthusiastic about this proposition and pointed out that
the trade with the Spanish colonies would increase the king's revenue
and at the same time would deprive the Dutch of a lucrative trade.[60]
Since they were well treated on their first visit to Barbadoes the
Spaniards returned in April, 1662, at which time they bought four
hundred Negroes for which they paid from 125 to 140 pieces of
eight.[61] When the Spaniards came to export their Negroes, however,
they found that Governor Willoughby had levied a duty of eleven pieces
of eight on each Negro. The assembly under Modyford's leadership at
once declared the imposition of such a tax illegal. This resolution
was carried to the council where, against the opposition of the
governor, it was also passed. Governor Willoughby, nevertheless, had
the temerity to collect the tax on some of the Negroes then in port,
and a little later when one of the ships of the Royal Adventurers sold
its Negroes to the Spaniards, he again enforced the payment of the
export tax.[62] Notwithstanding the governor's actions, Modyford
despatched one of his own ships with slaves to Cartagena where it
arrived safely and was well treated by the Spaniards.[63] Modyford was
now more than ever convinced of the possibilities of the trade with
the Spanish colonies, but believing that it could not be conducted
successfully by private individuals, he recommended that it be settled
on the Royal Company.[64]
When the Royal Company learned that the trade in Negroes to the
Spanish colonies offered many possibilities it was very much
interested. A petition was immediately submitted to the king
requesting that, if the Spaniards were allowed to come to Barbadoes
for slaves, the whole trade be conferred on the Royal Company. The
company declared that the planters in the colonies had no reason to
object to this arrangement because they had not engaged in this trade,
and moreover an opportunity was being offered to them to become
members of the company.[65]
The Privy Council was favorable to the company's proposition, and on
March 13, 1663, the king instructed Lord Willoughby to permit the
Spaniards to trade at Barbadoes for slaves notwithstanding any letters
of marque that had been issued against them, or any provisions of the
Navigation Act. He declared that the Spaniards were to be allowed to
import into Barbadoes only the products of their own colonies, and
were not to be permitted to carry away the produce of the English
colonies. The effect of this provision was that in addition to slaves
the Spaniards might obtain any products imported into Barbadoes from
England.[66] The king settled the question of duties on slaves by
ordering that ten pieces of eight on each Negro should be paid by all
persons who exported slaves from Barbadoes or Jamaica to the Spanish
colonies, except the agents of the Royal Company. The company was to
pay no export duties on Negroes especially when the Spaniards had made
previous contracts for them in England.[67]
Probably on account of the export duty on slaves which Willoughby had
levied in 1662, the Spaniards were not anxious to return to Barbadoes.
The company's factors therefore sent one of their ships with slaves to
Terra Firma in order to convince the Spaniards that their desire for a
Negro trade was genuine. On this occasion Lord Willoughby and the
council of the island exacted £320 in customs from the factors. When
the company heard of this procedure it immediately asked the king to
enforce the order allowing it to export Negroes free of duty.[68]
Thereupon the king ordered Willoughby to make immediate restitution of
the £320 and to give the company's factors as much encouragement as
possible.[69] Willoughby finally obeyed in a sullen manner. On May 20,
1665 he declared that the company had finally monopolized the Spanish
trade for Negroes and that, because the king refused to permit an
export duty to be levied on them, there was no revenue from that
source.[70] The king's concessions to the Royal Company were of little
avail, however, because the Anglo-Dutch war effectually stopped most
of the company's trade in Negroes including that from Barbadoes to the
Spanish colonies.
In considering the trade in slaves from Jamaica to the Spanish
colonies it is well to keep in mind that this island lay far to the
west of all other English possessions in the West Indies. It was
located in the very midst of the Spanish possessions from which it had
been wrested in 1655 by the expedition of Sir William Penn and Admiral
Venables. The people of the island realized their isolation and
occasionally attempted to break down the decrees of the Spanish
government, which forbade its colonies to have any intercourse with
foreigners. Although the English government began a somewhat similar
policy with respect to its colonies in the Navigation Act of 1660, it
was generally agreed that some exception should be made for the island
of Jamaica in connection with the Spanish trade.
When Lord Windsor became governor of Jamaica in 1662 he was instructed
to endeavor to secure a free commerce with the Spanish colonies. If
the governors of the Spanish colonies refused to grant this trade
voluntarily, Lord Windsor and the council of the island were given
permission to compel the Spanish authorities to acquiesce by the use
of force or any other means at their disposal.[71] Accordingly a
letter embodying this request was written to the governors of Porto
Rico and Santo Domingo, but unfavorable replies were received. In
accordance with the king's instructions the Jamaica council determined
to obtain a trade by force.[72] This was done by issuing letters of
marque to privateers for the purpose of preying upon Spanish
ships.[73]
In the following year, 1663, as has already been mentioned, Charles II
commanded the governors of Barbadoes and Jamaica to permit the
Spaniards to buy goods and Negroes in their respective islands, and to
refrain from charging duties on these Negroes in case they were
reexported by the agents of the Royal Adventurers.[74] This was
followed by a royal order of April 29, 1663, commanding the governor
to stop all hostile measures against the Spaniards. Sir Charles
Lyttleton, the deputy governor, replied that he hoped the attempt to
begin a trade with the Spaniards would be successful, especially in
Negroes, which the Spaniards could not obtain more easily than in
Jamaica.[75]
When Sir Charles Modyford became governor of Jamaica in 1664, the king
repeated his desire to promote trade and correspondence with the
Spanish plantations. Indeed Modyford's previous success in selling
Negroes to the Spaniards probably influenced his appointment to this
office. As soon as Modyford reached Jamaica he wrote a letter to the
governor of Santo Domingo informing him that the king had ordered a
cessation of hostilities and desired a peaceful commerce with the
Spanish colonies.[76] Modyford instructed the two commissioners by
whom the letter was sent to emphasize the trade in Negroes and to
induce the Spaniards, if possible, to negotiate with him in regard to
this matter.[77] Again the answer of the governor of Santo Domingo was
unfavorable. He pointed out that it was not within his power to order
a commerce with Jamaica, but that this was the province of the
government in Spain. The governor, moreover, complained that the
people of Jamaica had acted in the same hostile manner toward the
Spaniards since the Restoration as they had in Cromwell's time, and
therefore his people were little inclined to begin a trade with
Jamaica.
The refusal of the Spanish governor to consider Modyford's proposition
seemed all the more bitter since it was well known at that time that
the Spaniards were obtaining many Negroes from the Dutch West India
Company. The Genoese also had a contract with the Spaniards to deliver
24,500 Negroes in seven years nearly all of whom they expected to
obtain from the Dutch at that "cursed little barren island" of
Curaçao, as Sir Thomas Lynch called it. Lynch also observed that if
the Royal Company desired to participate in the Spanish trade it would
either have to sell to the Genoese or drive the Dutch out of Africa,
because he did not believe it was possible to call in the privateers
without the assistance of several men-of-war.[78] Just how much weight
should be attached to this opinion is doubtful since Lynch was
probably so much interested in continuing privateering against the
Spaniards, that he cared little how much this would interfere with the
company's attempt to develop the Negro trade.
Lynch's opinion was not shared by the king, who had heard that the
privateers were continuing their hostilities against the Spaniards. He
therefore informed Modyford that he could not adequately express his
dissatisfaction at the daily complaints made by the Spaniards about
the violence of ships said to belong to Jamaica. Modyford was strictly
commanded to secure and punish any such offenders.[79] The governor
issued a proclamation in accordance with the king's instructions,[80]
and also notified the governor of Havana that offenders against
Spanish commerce would hereafter be punished as pirates.[81]
After the Anglo-Dutch war began the company imported very few Negroes
to Jamaica for the Spanish trade or for any other purpose. The king's
stringent orders regarding privateers were gradually allowed to go
unnoticed. Modyford again began to issue letters of marque, a
procedure which naturally destroyed all possibility of commerce
between the Spanish colonies and the Royal Company.
At the time the desultory trade in Negroes was being started with the
Spaniards at Barbadoes, Richard White, of Spain, came to England as an
agent for two Spaniards, Domingo Grillo and Ambrosio Lomoline.[82]
These two men had been granted the assiento in Spain, that is, the
privilege of furnishing the Spanish colonies with Negro slaves. In
order to wrest some of this trade from the Dutch West India Company
the Royal Company entered into a contract with White, in the year
1663, to furnish the Spanish assientists with 3,500 Negroes per year
for a definite number of years. According to this contract the slaves
were to be delivered to the vessels of the assientists in Barbadoes
and Jamaica; one of the company's factors was to be placed on board
such ships; and the necessary safe conducts were to be procured for
their voyage to and from the port of Cadiz.[83] Sir Ellis Leighton,
secretary of the Royal Adventurers, obtained permission for Grillo's
agents to reside in Jamaica and Barbadoes.[84] Sir Martin Noell, one
of the most important West Indian merchants, as well as a prominent
member of the African Company, seems to have been intrusted with the
collection of the money due on this contract.[85]
Not long after this agreement was made the possibility of a war with
the Dutch began to appear. The company considered ways by which Grillo
might be induced to mitigate the contract.[86] Complications
concerning the security to be given arose, and Grillo complained that
the required number of Negroes was not being furnished to him. Under
the circumstances this was almost impossible because the outbreak of
the Anglo-Dutch war made it very difficult to obtain slaves.
Nevertheless, on May 26, 1665, the company resolved to procure as many
Negroes as possible to fill the contract, providing Grillo made prompt
payments.[87]
As may be surmised no great number of slaves was exported from
Barbadoes or Jamaica on this contract. Only one ship arrived at
Barbadoes from Cadiz desiring to secure one thousand slaves, but the
company's factors could obtain only eight hundred. Lord Willoughby
carefully reported that he had complied with his Majesty's command not
to exact any export duty for these slaves.[88] In Jamaica fewer
Negroes are known to have been sold on this contract to Spanish ships
which came from Cartagena.[89] There may have been other instances of
sales not recorded, but it is certain that the war interfered to such
an extent that the number of Negroes sold to Grillo fell far short of
what the contract called for. In order to keep the agreement intact
the company resolved, March 23, 1666, to lay the situation before the
king, and to ask him to permit Grillo's agents to buy sufficient
Negroes in the plantations to make up the required number, and that no
export duties be charged on them.[90] The king complied with the
company's request, and the desired orders were sent to the governors
of Jamaica and Barbadoes.[91] Some trouble had arisen in Jamaica,
however, between Grillo's agents and Governor Modyford. Since the
company believed that Grillo's agents were primarily to blame for
this, it resolved in the future to deliver Negroes only at Barbadoes
in return for ready money.[92]
This was virtually the end of the contract. In 1667 the company spoke
of the agreement as having been broken by the Grillos, and that it was
under no further obligation to carry out its terms. Altogether, it
declared, that no more than 1,200 Negroes had been delivered to
Grillo's agents.[93] Thus this project which the company at first
asserted would bring into the English kingdom 86,000 pounds of Spanish
silver per year[94] ended in this insignificant fashion.
Although the Grillo contract and the other attempts to begin a slave
trade with the Spanish colonies had proved much less successful than
the Company of Royal Adventurers had hoped, a great deal had been
accomplished toward bringing to light the fundamental difficulties of
this trade. In the first place not much could be accomplished in the
way of developing this trade so long as the Spanish government
maintained its attitude of uncompromising hostility toward all
foreigners notwithstanding the fact that the Spanish colonists would
gladly have welcomed the slave traders. Furthermore, although the
English government had signified its willingness to disregard the
restrictions of the Navigation Acts in this instance, the hostile
attitude assumed by the planters toward the trade in slaves to the
Spanish colonies also had to be taken into consideration. Whenever the
planters were able to do so they endeavored to prevent the exportation
to the Spanish colonies of slaves which they maintained were very much
needed on their own plantations.
This opposition to the trade in Negroes to the Spanish colonies was
only one of the several ways in which the colonists manifested their
hostility toward the mercantile element in general and the Company of
Royal Adventurers in particular. Freedom of trade with all the world
seemed very desirable to the planters who regarded the restrictions of
the Navigation Acts as gross favoritism and partiality to the rising
mercantile class. The monopoly of supplying the colonies with slaves,
conferred upon the Company of Royal Adventurers, was most cordially
hated on account of the great degree of dependence placed upon slave
labor in the plantations. As a result of this conflict of interests
the planters early resorted to numerous devices such as the laws for
the protection of debtors, to embarrass the company in the exercise of
its monopoly. Since the company had received its exclusive privileges
by a charter from the crown the English planters in the West Indies
soon found that their trouble with the Company of Royal Adventurers
brought them also into direct conflict with the king. In this way the
planters enjoyed the distinction of being among the first to begin the
opposition which later, in the Great Revolution, resulted in the
overthrow of James II and the royal prerogative.
GEORGE F. ZOOK.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] These were people of the rougher and even criminal classes of the
parent country who, in return for their ocean passage, agreed to work
for some planter during a specified number of years, usually seven.
[2] C. S. P., Col., 1674-1675, Addenda, p. 86, articles agreed on by
Lord Willoughby and Sir George Ayscue and others, January 11, 1652.
[3] C. S. P., Col., 1661-1668, p. 14, petitions of merchants and
planters, March 1, 1661.
[4] C. S. P., Col., 1661-1668, pp. 29, 30, 45, 46, 47, petitions from
Barbadoes, May 11, July 10, 12, 1661.
[5] _Ibid._, p. 117, minutes of the council and assembly of Barbadoes,
December 18, 1662.
[6] The pieces of eight were to be accepted at four shillings each,
and 2,400 pounds of muscovado sugar were to be accepted in exchange
for a slave.
[7] Answer of the Company of Royal Adventurers of England ... to the
Petition ... exhibited ... by Sir Paul Painter, His Royal Highness
(the duke of York) and others to Lord Willoughby, January 10, 1662/3.
[8] C. O. 1: 18, ff. 85, 86, Modyford and Colleton to the Royal
Adventurers, March 20, 1664.
[9] A. C. R., 75: 13, 14, J5.
[10] _Ibid._, 75: 20.
[11] On January 2, 1665, the company estimated the entire debt which
was owing to it in all the plantations at £49,895. S. P., Dom.,
Charles II, 110, f. 18, petition of the Royal Adventurers to the king.
[12] P. C. R., Charles II, 4: 177, 190-192, August 3, 24, 1664.
[13] C. O. 1: 19, ff. 234-238, proceedings of the court of admiralty
in Barbadoes, June 17, 24, 1665.
[14] _Ibid._, f. 232, petition of the Royal Adventurers to Arlington,
September 14, 1665.
[15] P. C. R., Charles II, 5: 402, Privy Council to Willoughby, April
6, 1666.
[16] C. O. 1: 20, f. 209, Willoughby to Privy Council, July 16, 1666.
[17] _Ibid._, f. 335, petition of the Royal Adventurers to the king,
December 7, 1666.
[18] P. C. R., Charles II, 6: 231, December 7, 1666.
[19] _Ibid._, 7: 162, 163, Privy Council to Willoughby, January 31,
1668.
[20] C. O. 1: 22, f. 191, Willoughby to Privy Council, May 30, 1668.
[21] _Ibid._, 20, f. 149, Willoughby to the king, May 32, 1666.
[22] _Ibid._, 21, f. 170, Willoughby to the king, July, 1667.
[23] C. O. 1: 21, f. 222, Willoughby to Williamson, September 17,
1667.
[24] _Ibid._, f. 209, petition of the representatives of Barbadoes to
the king, September 5, 1667. This document and Willoughby's letter of
September 17, 1667, also urge very strongly that the bars of the
Navigation Acts be let down in order to permit servants to be imported
from Scotland.
[25] The petition and these answers are printed in a pamphlet
entitled, "Answer of the Company of Royal Adventurers of England
trading into Africa, to the Petition and Paper of certain Heads and
Particulars thereunto relating exhibited to the Honourable House of
Commons by Sir Paul Painter." As to the assertion that the planters
refused to ship their products in the company's ships there seems to
be no very good evidence on either side. Sometimes the company's
vessels were sent home from Barbadoes empty. Upon such occasions the
agents always said that there were no goods with which to load them.
[26] C. O. 1: 22, f. 42, answer of Sir Ellis Leighton, secretary of
the Royal Adventurers, to the petition from Barbadoes of September 5,
1667; C. O. 1: 22, f. 43, proposal of the Royal Adventurers concerning
the sale of Negroes in Barbadoes, January, 1668
[27] C. O. 1: 22, f. 204, address of the merchants and planters of
Barbadoes now in London, read at the committee of trade, June 16,
1668.
[28] _Ibid._, 23, f. 69, address of the representative of Barbadoes to
the king, August 3, 1668.
[29] _Ibid._, f. 42, account of affairs in Barbadoes by Lord
Willoughby, July 22, 1668.
[30] P. C. R., Charles II, 8: 294, May 12, 1669.
[31] _Ibid._, 8: 402, August 27, 1669.
[32] _Ibid._, 8: 424, September 28, 1669.
[33] C. O. 1: 27, f. 24, John Reid to Arlington, August 2, 1671.
[34] A. C. R., 75: 106, 108, 109, September 11, November 10, 1671.
[35] These numbers and prices are gleaned from page three of the
Barbadoes ledger. A. C. R., 646.
[36] Answer of the Company of Royal Adventurers ... to the Petition
... exhibited ... by Sir Paul Painter.
[37] C. O. 29: 1, f. 116, Willoughby to the Lords of the Council, July
9, 1668.
[38] _Ibid._, 1: 25, f. 62, memorial of some principal merchants
trading to the plantations, 1670.
[39] _Ibid._, 18, f. 86, Modyford and Colleton to (the Royal
Adventurers); C. O. 1: 20, f. 168, Michael Smith to Richard Chaundler,
June 11, 1666.
[40] _Ibid._, 22, f. 89, Willoughby to Arlington, March 2, 1668.
[41] _Ibid._, 17, f. 219, Renatus Enys to Bennet, November 1, 1663.
[42] _Ibid._, 29: 1, f. 116, Willoughby to the Lords of the Council,
July 9, 1668.
[43] _Ibid._, 1: 22, f. 53, proposals of the inhabitants of Antigua to
Governor Willoughby, January 31, 1668.
[44] C. S. P., Col. 1669-1674, p, 204, William Byam to Willoughby,
1670?; C. O. 1: 25, f. 138, Byam to Willoughby, n. d.
[45] C. S. P., Col., 1675-1676, Addenda, p. 125, Cornelius Burough to
the Admiralty Commissioners, November 28, 1658.
[46] _Ibid._, 1661-1668, p. 36, narrative of the buying of a shipload
of Negroes, June 14, 1661.
[47] C. O. 1: 16, f. 77, Captain Richard Whiting to the officers of
his Majesty's navy, March 10, 1662; C. O. 1: 17, f. 236, petition of
Colonel Godfrey Ashbey and others to the king, 1663.
[48] _Ibid._, 18, f. 58, instructions to Colonel Modyford, governor of
Jamaica, February 18, 1664.
[49] C. O. 1: 18, f. 81, declaration of Sir Thomas Modyford, March 2,
1664.
[50] _Ibid._, f. 135, Modyford to Bennet, May 10, 1664.
[51] _Ibid._, f. 208, report of the Privy Council on Jamaica affairs,
August 10, 1664.
[52] A. C. R., 75: 89.
[53] Add. MSS., 12,430, f. 31, Beeston, Journal, February 1, 1664/5.
[54] C. O. 1: 19, f. 31, Lynch to Bennet, February 12, 1665; _ibid._,
f. 189, John Style to (Bennet), July 24, 1665.
[55] A. C. R., 869, entries from January 1, 1665/6 to December 31,
1666; _ibid._, 870: 62.
[56] A. C. R., 75: 14, 89.
[57] C. O. 1: 25, f. 127, Modyford to Arlington, (September 20, 1670).
[58] C. S. P., Col., 1669-1674, p. 107, additional propositions made
to the Privy Council about Jamaica by Charles Modyford by order of Sir
Thomas Modyford, (September 28, 1670).
[59] C. O. 1: 14, f. 56, proposal by Lord Marlborough, 1663.
[60] _Ibid._, 17, f. 28, Thomas Modyford? to his brother, March 30,
1662.
[61] _Ibid._, f. 29, Thomas Modyford? to his brother, April 30, 1662.
[62] C. O. 1: 17, ff. 29, 30, Thomas Modyford to his brother, May 26,
1662.
[63] _Ibid._, f. 32, Thomas Modyford to his brother, September 3, 13,
1662.
[64] _Ibid._, f 32, Thomas Modyford to his brother, September 13,
1662.
[65] _Ibid._, f. 20, petition of the Royal Adventurers to the king,
January, 1663.
[66] C. O. 1: 17, f. 136, instructions to Lord Willoughby, June 16,
1663.
[67] _Ibid._, f. 227 (the king to the governors of Barbadoes and
Jamaica). March 30, 1663. That there was some trouble in deciding just
what provisions to make regarding the Spanish trade appears from
several unsigned and undated letters to Willoughby with conflicting
provisions, but they nearly all mention the exception made in favor of
the Royal Company in the letter of March 13, 1663. C. O. 1: 17, f. 22;
C. O. 1: 17, ff. 24, 25; C. O. 1: 17, ff. 26, 27; P. C. R., Charles
II, 3: 336-338.
[68] C. O. 1: 17, ff. 225, 226, petition of the Royal Adventurers to
the king, November, 1663.
[69] Willoughby made a restitution of the £320 in March, 1664. C. O.
1: 18, f. 86, Modyford and Colleton to (the Royal Adventurers), March
31, 1664.
[70] C. O. 1: 19, f. 124, Willoughby to the king, May 20, 1665.
[71] C. O. 1: 16, f. 112, additional instructions to Lord Windsor,
governor of Jamaica, April 8, 1662.
[72] C. S. P., Col., 1661-1668, p. 106, minutes of the council of
Jamaica, August 20, 1662.
[73] A full description of privateering by the English against the
Spaniards from the year 1660 to 1670 may be found in an article by
Miss Violet Barbour in the American Historical Review, XVI: 529-566.
[74] C. S. P., Col., 1661-1668, p. 125 (the king to the governors of
Barbadoes and Jamaica), March 13, 1663.
[75] C. O. 1: 17, f. 199, Sir Charles Lyttleton, deputy governor, to
Bennet, October 15, 1663.
[76] _Ibid._, 18, f. 137, Modyford to the governor of Santo Domingo,
April 30, 1664.
[77] _Ibid._, f. 139, Modyford's instructions to Colonel Cary and
Captain Perrott, May 2, 1664.
[78] C. O. 1: 18, ff. 152, 153, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Lynch to
Bennet. May 25, 1664.
[79] C. S. P., Col., 1661-1668, p. 215, the king to Modyford, June 15,
1664.
[80] _Ibid._, p. 220, proclamation by Sir Thomas Modyford, governor of
Jamaica, June 15, 1664.
[81] _Ibid._, p. 228, minutes of the council of Jamaica, August 19-22,
1664.
[82] C. S. P., Dom., 1663-1664, p. 168, Richard White to Captain Weld,
June 11, 1663.
[83] As this contract cannot be discovered it is difficult to say just
when it was made or what were its conditions. Georges Scelle in his
book, La Traité Nègriere aux Indes de Castille, 1: 524, gives the date
of this contract as February 28, 1663, and says it was for 35,000
Negroes which were to be delivered at the rate of 5,000 per year. This
may be true, but on the other hand the company distinctly declares in
one place that the contract was for the annual delivery of 3,500
Negroes per year. C. O. 1: 19, ff. 7, 8, brief narrative of the trade
and present condition of the Royal Adventurers, 1664/5.
[84] C. O. 1: 17, f. 189, memorial of Sir Ellis Leighton to the duke
of York, 1663.
[85] _Ibid._, ff. 244, 247; A. C. R., 75: 48.
[86] A. C. R., 75: 15, August 5, 1664.
[87] _Ibid._, 75: 34, May 26, 1665.
[88] C. O. 1: 18, f. 165, Willoughby to the king, June 17, 1664.
[89] Add. MSS., 12,430, f. 31, Beeston, Journal, April 8, 1665.
[90] A. C. R., 75: 43, March 23, 1665/6.
[91] P. C. R., Charles II, 5: 396, March 30, 1666.
[92] A. C. R., 75: 46; Add. MSS., 12,430, f. 31, Beeston, Journal,
February 7, 1664/5.
[93] Answer of the Company of Royal Adventurers ... to the Petition
... exhibited ... by Sir Paul Painter.
[94] C. O. 1: 19, ff. 7, 8, brief narrative of the trade and present
condition of the Royal Adventurers, 1664/5.
BOOK REVIEWS
_Below the James. A Plantation Sketch._ By WILLIAM CABELL BRUCE. The
Neale Publishing Company, New York, 1918. Pp. 157.
This book is, as its title imports, a plantation sketch dealing with
that sort of life in Virginia just after the Civil War. While it is a
mere story and hardly a dramatic one, it throws light on the Negro as
a constituent part of the southern society of that day. As a student
at Harvard before the War a southerner comes into contact with a
fellow student from Massachusetts, to whom he becomes bound by such
strong ties that the four years of bloody conflict between the
sections are not sufficient to sever this connection. Some years after
this upheaval friend thinks of friend and soon the northerner finds
himself on his way to visit the southern friend.
Coming to the South at the time when the Negroes as a new class in
their different situation were endeavoring to readjust themselves
under difficult circumstances, the observations of the traveler are of
much value to the historian. He not only saw much to admire in the
colonial seats of prominent southerners like Patrick Henry and John
Randolph, but showed an appreciation of the simple life of the
Negroes. Their new position as freemen taking a part in the
government, the rôle of the carpetbagger, and the undesirable
conditions of that régime play some part in the story.
As to the Negroes themselves, however, the most interesting
revelations are those dealing with the inner life of the blacks. In
the language used to impersonate the blacks the reader sees a
philosophy of life; in their mode of living appears the virtue of a
noble peasantry; and in their worship of divinity there is the
striving of a righteous people willing to labor and to wait. In this
respect the book is valuable. We have known too little of the
plantation, too little of the life of the Negro before the Civil War,
too little of how he during the Reconstruction developed into
something above and beyond the hewer of wood and drawer of water.
While not primarily historical then and falling far short of being an
historical novel, this book is unconsciously informing and therefore
interesting and valuable to the student of Negro life and history.
* * * * *
_The Emancipated and Freed in American Sculpture. A Study in
Interpretation._ By FREEMAN HENRY MORRIS MURRAY. Murray Brothers,
incorporated, Washington, D. C., 1916. Pp. 228.
This work is to some extent a compilation of matter which on former
occasions have been used by the author in lectures and addresses
bearing on the Negroes in art. There is in it, however, much that is
new, for even in this formerly used material the author has
incorporated additional facts and more extensive comment. This work is
not given out as the last word. It is one of a series to appear under
the caption of the "Black Folk in Art" or an effort to set forth the
contributions of the blacks to art in ancient and modern times. This
work itself is, as the author calls it, "A Study in Interpretation."
His purpose, he says, is to indicate as well as he can, what he thinks
are the criteria for the formation of judgment in these matters. Yet
his interpretation is to be different from technical criticism, as his
effort is primarily directed toward intention, meaning and effect.
This thought is the keynote to the comments on the various sculptures
illustrated in the work. While one may not agree with the author in
his arrangement and may differ from his interpretation, it must be
admitted that the book contains interesting information and is a bold
step in the right direction. It is a portraiture of freedom as a
motive for artistic expression and an effort to symbolize this desire
for liberation to animate the citizenry in making. It brings to light
numerous facts as to how the thought of the Negro has been dominant in
the minds of certain artists and how in the course of time race
prejudice has caused the pendulum to swing the other way in the
interest of those who would forget what the blacks have thought and
felt and done.
The many illustrations constitute the chief value of the work. There
appears _The Greek Slave_ by Hiram Powers, _Freedom_ on the dome of
the Capitol, _The Libyan Sibyl_ by W. W. Story, _The Freedman_ by J.
I. A. Ward, _The Freedwoman_ by Edmonia Lewis, _Emancipation_ in
Washington by Thomas Ball, _Emancipation_ in Edinburgh, Scotland, by
George E. Bissell, _Emancipation_ panel on the Military Monument in
Cleveland by Levi T. Scofield, _Emancipation_ by Meta Warrick Fuller,
_The Beecher Monument_ in Brooklyn by J. I. A. Ward, _Africa_ by
Randolph Rogers, _Africa_ by Daniel C. French, _The Harriet Tubman
Tablet, The Frederick Douglass Monument_ in Rochester, _The Attucks
Monument_ in Boston by Robert Kraus, _The Faithful Slaves Monument_ in
Fort Mill, South Carolina, _l'Africane_ by E. Caroni, _l'Abolizione_
by R. Vincenzo, _Ethiopia_ and _Toussaint L'Ouverture_ by Anne
Whitney, _The Slave Auction_, _The Fugitive's Story_, _Taking the Oath
and Drawing Rations_, _The Wounded Scout_, and _Uncle Ned's School_ by
John Rogers, _The Slave Memorial_ by Augustus Saint-Gaudens, and _The
Death of Major Montgomery_.
* * * * *
_The Question Before Congress. A consideration of the Debates and
final action by Congress upon various Phases of the Race Question in
the United States._ By GEORGE W. MITCHELL. The A. M. E. Book Concern,
Philadelphia, 1918. Pp. 237.
This book contains little which has not been extensively treated in
various other works of standard authors. It goes over the ground
covered in books easily accessible in most local libraries. Yet there
is in it something which the historian does not find in these other
works. It is this same drama of history as it appears to an
intelligent man of color well read in the history of this country
although lacking the attitude of a scientific investigator. Whether he
has written an accurate book is of little value here. These facts are
already known. He has enabled the public to know the Negro's reaction
on these things and that in itself is a contribution to history.
As to exactly what the author has treated little needs to be said. He
begins with the slavery question in the Federal Convention of 1787
which framed the Constitution of the United States. Then comes the
treatment of the slave trade, the debate on the Missouri Compromise,
the exclusion of abolition literature from the mails, the attack on
the right of petition, the exodus of antislavery men from the South,
the murder of Lovejoy, the coming of Giddings to Congress, the Wilmot
Proviso, the formation of the Free Soil party, antislavery men in
Congress, the effort to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia,
the slavery question in California, the Fugitive Slave Act, the Kansas
Nebraska trouble, the organization of the Republican Party, the Dred
Scott Decision, John Brown's Raid and the election of Abraham Lincoln.
Then follows a discussion of facts still more familiar. The author
takes up the upheaval of the Civil War and the difficulty with which
the Negroes effected a readjustment because of the large number of
refugees. He next discusses the rôle of the Negro in politics during
the Reconstruction period, the outrages which followed and the failure
of the carpetbagger régime. The remaining portion of the book is
devoted to the treatment of the Negroes in freedom and the problem of
social justice. In fact, almost every phase of Negro political history
from the formation of the Union to the present time has been treated
by the author.
* * * * *
_Negro Population: 1790-1915._ By JOHN CUMMINGS, Ph.D., Expert Special
Agent, Bureau of Census. Washington, Government Printing Office, 1918.
Pp. 844.
This volume is unique in that never before in the history of the
Bureau of the Census has it devoted a whole volume to statistics
bearing on the Negro. This work, moreover, is more important than the
average census report in that it covers a period of 125 years. The
compiler has used not only previously published documents but various
unpublished schedules, tables and manuscripts which give this work a
decidedly historical value. Never before has the public been given so
many new figures concerning the development and progress of the
Negroes in this country. It is a cause of much satisfaction then that
these facts are available so that many questions which have hitherto
been puzzling because of the lack of such statistics may now be easily
cleared up.
What the work comprehends is interesting. It is a statistical account
of the "growth of the Negro population from decade to decade; its
geographical distribution at each decennial enumeration; its migratory
drift westward in the early decades of the last century, when Negroes
and whites were moving forward into the East and West South Central
States as cultivators of virgin soil; its drift northward and
cityward, and in more recent decades southward out of the "black
belt," in response to the universal gravity pull of complex economic
and social forces; its widespread dispersion on the one hand, and on
the other its segregation with reference to the white population; its
sex and age composition and marital condition; its fertility, as
indicated by the proportion of children to women of child-bearing age
in different periods--again, under social conditions varying from the
irresponsible relations of slavery to the more exacting institutions
of freedom; its intermixture with other races, as shown by the
increase in the proportion mulatto; its annual mortality in the
registration area; its educational progress since emancipation, in so
far as it can be measured by elementary schooling and by increasing
literacy; its criminality, dependency, and physical and mental
defectiveness--those characteristics of individual degeneracy which
Negroes manifest in common with other racial classes in all civilized
communities; finally, its economic progress, as indicated by
increasing ownership of homes, by entrance into skilled trades and
professions, and primarily and fundamentally by the rapid development
of Negro agriculture."
Although this report goes as far back as 1790 most of the facts herein
assembled bear on the life of the Negro since emancipation. This is
not due, however, to the tendency to neglect the early period, but to
the fact that earlier in our history statistics concerning Negroes
were not considered valuable. It is only recently that public
officials have directed attention to the importance of keeping these
records and in many parts of the South certain statistics regarding
Negroes are not yet considered worth while. The United States
Government, however, as this volume indicates, has taken this matter
seriously and from such volumes as this the public will expect more
valuable information.
NOTES
To increase our circulation and the membership of the Association the
management has employed as Field Agent Mr. J. E. Ormes, formerly
connected with the business department of Wilberforce University. Mr.
Ormes will appoint agents to sell books and solicit subscriptions to
the JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY. He will also organize clubs for the
study of Negro life and history.
Any five persons desiring to prosecute studies in this field
intensively may organize a club and upon the payment of two dollars
each will be entitled not only to receive free of further charge the
JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY, but may call on the Director for such
instruction as can be given by mail. Members will be supplied with a
quarterly outline study of the current numbers of the JOURNAL OF NEGRO
HISTORY and with a topical outline of the contents of the back
numbers.
Clubs will be left free to work out their own organization and plans.
The management, however, follows the plan of a group working under the
simplest restrictions. There should be elected a president, a
secretary, a treasurer, and an instructor. The last named official
should be the most intelligent and the best informed member of the
group.
* * * * *
E. Payen's _Belgique et Congo_ and P. Daye's _Les Conquetes
Africaniques des Belge_ have been published by Berger-Levrault in
Paris.
The Cornhill Publishing Company has brought out _Twenty-five Years in
the Black Belt_ by W. J. Edwards.
P. A. Means has published through Marshall Jones _Racial Factors in a
Democracy_.
The following significant articles have appeared in recent numbers of
periodicals: _The Worth of an African_, by R. Keable in the July
number of the International Review of Missions; _How Germany treats
the Natives_ by Evans Lewis and M. Montgomery-Campbell; _Germany and
Africa_ by Ethel Jollie in the June number of the United Empire;
_International Interference in African Affairs_ by Sir. H. H. Johnson
in the April number of the Journal of Comparative Legislation and
International Law; _The Native Question in British East Africa_ in the
April number of the Contemporary Review; and _The Christian Occupation
of Africa_ in the Proceedings of the African Conference.
THE JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY
VOL. IV--JULY, 1919--NO. 3
THE EMPLOYMENT OF NEGROES AS SOLDIERS IN THE CONFEDERATE ARMY
The problem of arming the slaves was of far greater concern to the
South, than to the North. It was fraught with momentous consequences
to both sections, but pregnant with an influence, subtle yet powerful,
which would affect directly the ultimate future of the Confederate
Government. The very existence of the Confederacy depended upon the
ability of the South to control the slave population. At the outbreak
of the Civil War great fear as to servile insurrection was aroused in
the South and more restrictive measures were enacted.[1]
Most of the Negro population was living in the area under rebellion,
and in many cases the slaves outnumbered the whites. To arm these
slaves would mean the lighting of a torch which, in the burning, might
spread a flame throughout the slave kingdom. If the Negro in the midst
of oppression had been in possession of the facts regarding the war,
whether the slaves would have remained consciously faithful would have
been a perplexing question.[2]
The South had been aware of its imminent danger and with its
traditional methods strove to prevent the arming of the Negroes. With
the memories of Negro insurrections ever fresh in the public mind,
quite a change of front would be required to bring the South to view
with favor such a radical measure. The South, however, was not alone
in its unwillingness to employ Negroes as soldiers. For the first two
years of the war, the North represented by President Lincoln and
Congress refused to consider the same proposal. In the face of
stubborn opposition loyal Negroes had been admitted into the Engineer
and Quartermaster Departments of the Union armies, but their
employment as soldiers under arms was discountenanced during the first
years of the war.
In the North this discrimination caused much discontent among the
Negroes but those living in the States in rebellion did not understand
the issues in the war, and of necessity could not understand until the
Union forces had invaded the hostile sections and spread the
information which had gradually developed the point of view that the
war was for the extermination of the institution of slavery. It may be
recalled that during the opening days of the war, slaves captured by
the Union forces were returned to their disloyal masters. Here there
is sufficient evidence in the concrete that slavery was not the avowed
cause of the conflict.[3] If there was this uncertain notion of the
cause of the war among northern sympathizers, how much more befogged
must have been the minds of the southern slaves in the hands of men
who imagined that they were fighting for the same principles involved
in our earlier struggle with Great Britain! To the majority of the
Negroes, as to all the South, the invading armies of the Union seemed
to be ruthlessly attacking independent States, invading the beloved
homeland and trampling upon all that these men held dear[4].
The loyalty of the slave while the master was away with the fighting
forces of the Confederacy has been the making of many orators of an
earlier day, echoes of which we often hear in the present[5]. The
Negroes were not only loyal in remaining at home and doing their duty
but also in offering themselves for actual service in the Confederate
army. Believing their land invaded by hostile foes, they were more
than willing under the guidance of misguided southerners to offer
themselves for the service of actual warfare. So that during the early
days of the war, Negroes who volunteered were received into the
fighting forces by the rebelling States, and particularly during those
years in which the North was academically debating the advisability
of arming the Negro.[6]
In the first year of the war large numbers were received into the
service of the Confederate laboring units. In January, a dispatch from
Mr. Riordan at Charleston to Hon. Percy Walker at Mobile stated that
large numbers of Negroes from the plantations of Alabama were at work
on the redoubts. These were described as very substantially made,
strengthened by sand-bags and sheet-iron.[7] Negroes were employed in
building fortifications, as teamsters and helpers in army service
throughout the South.[8] In 1862, the Florida Legislature conferred
authority upon the Governor to impress slaves for military purposes,
if so authorized by the Confederate Government. The owners of the
slaves were to be compensated for this labor, and in turn they were to
furnish one good suit of clothes for each of the slaves impressed. The
wages were not to exceed twenty-five dollars a month.[9] The
Confederate Congress provided by law in February, 1864, for the
impressment of 20,000 slaves for menial service in the Confederate
army.[10] President Davis was so satisfied with their labor that he
suggested, in his annual message, November, 1864, that this number
should be increased to 40,000[11] with the promise of emancipation at
the end of their service.
Before the outbreak of the war and the beginning of actual
hostilities, the local authorities throughout the South had permitted
the enrollment for military service of organizations formed of free
Negroes, although no action had been taken or suggested by the
Confederate Government. It is said that some of these troops remained
in the service of the Confederacy during the period of the war, but
that they did not take part in any important engagements.[12] There
may be noted typical instances of the presence of Negroes in the State
Militia. In Louisiana, the Adjutant-General's Office of the Louisiana
Militia issued an order stating that "the Governor and the
Commander-in-Chief relying implicitly upon the loyalty of the free
colored population of the city and State, for the protection of their
homes, their property and for southern rights, from the pollution of a
ruthless invader, and believing that the military organization which
existed prior to February 15, 1862, and elicited praise and respect
for the patriotic motives which prompted it, should exist for and
during the war, calls upon them to maintain their organization and
hold themselves prepared for such orders as may be transmitted to
them."[13]
These "Native Guards" joined the Confederate forces but they did not
leave the city with these troops, when they retreated before General
Butler, commanding the invading Union army. When General Butler
learned of this organization after his arrival in New Orleans, he sent
for several of the most prominent colored men of the city and asked
why they had accepted service "under the Confederate Government which
was set up for the purpose of holding their brethren and kindred in
eternal slavery." The reply was that they dared not to refuse; that
they had hoped, by serving the Confederates, to advance nearer to
equality with the whites; and concluded by stating that they had
longed to throw the weight of their class with the Union forces and
with the cause in which their own dearest hopes were identified[14].
An observer in Charleston at the outbreak of the war noted the
preparation for war, and called particular attention to "the thousand
Negroes who, so far from inclining to insurrections, were grinning
from ear to ear at the prospect of shooting the Yankees[15]." In the
same city, one of the daily papers stated that on January 2, 150 free
colored men had gratuitously offered their services to hasten the work
of throwing up redoubts along the coast[16]. At Nashville, Tennessee,
April, 1861, a company of free Negroes offered their services to the
Confederate Government and at Memphis a recruiting office was
opened[17]. The Legislature of Tennessee authorized Governor Harris,
on June 28, 1861, to receive into the State military service all male
persons of color between the ages of fifteen and fifty. These soldiers
would receive eight dollars a month with clothing and rations. The
sheriff of each county was required to report the names of these
persons and in case the number of persons tendering their services was
not sufficient to meet the needs of the county, the sheriff was
empowered to impress as many persons as were needed[18]. In the same
State, a procession of several hundred colored men marching through
the streets attracted attention. They marched under the command of
Confederate officers and carried shovels, axes, and blankets. The
observer adds, "they were brimful of patriotism, shouting for Jeff
Davis and singing war songs."[19] A paper in Lynchburg, Virginia,
commenting on the enlistment of 70 free Negroes to fight for the
defense of the State, concluded with "three cheers for the patriotic
Negroes of Lynchburg."[20]
Two weeks after the firing on Fort Sumter, several companies of
volunteers of color passed through Augusta on their way to Virginia to
engage in actual war. Sixteen well-drilled companies of volunteers and
one Negro company from Nashville composed this group.[21] In November
of the same year, a military review was held in New Orleans.
Twenty-eight thousand troops passed before Governor Moore, General
Lowell and General Ruggles. The line of march covered over seven miles
in length. It is said that one regiment comprised 1,400 free colored
men.[22] _The Baltimore Traveler_ commenting on arming Negroes at
Richmond, said: "Contrabands who have recently come within the Federal
lines at Williamsport, report that all the able-bodied men in that
vicinity are being taken to Richmond, formed into regiments, and armed
for the defense of that city."[23]
During February, 1862, the Confederate Legislature of Virginia was
considering a bill to enroll all free Negroes in the State for service
with the Confederate forces.[24] The Legislatures of other States
seriously considered the measure. Military and civil leaders, the
Confederate Congress and its perplexed War Department debated among
themselves the relative value of employing the Negroes as soldiers.
Slowly the ranks of those at home were made to grow thin by the calls
to the front. In April, 1862, President Davis was authorized to call
out and place in service all white men between the ages of eighteen
and thirty-five; in September the ages were raised to include the
years of thirty-five and forty-five; and finally in February, 1864,
all male whites between the years of seventeen and fifty were made
liable to military service. The Negroes were liable for impressment in
the work of building fortifications, producing war materials, and the
like.[25]
The demand became so urgent for men that quite a controversy arose
over the advisability of employing the Negroes as soldiers. Some said
that the Negro belonged to an inferior race and, therefore, could not
be a good soldier; that the Negro could do menial work in the army,
but that fighting was the white man's task. Those who supported the
idea in its incipiency always urged the necessity of employing Negroes
in the army. A native Georgian supported the employment of these
troops in a letter to the Secretary of War, recommending freedom after
the war was over to those who fought, compensation to the owners and
the retention of the institution of slavery by continuing as slaves
"boys and women, and exempted or detailed men." The statement
concludes with "our country requires a quick and stringent remedy.
Don't stop for reforms."[26]
In November, 1864, Jefferson Davis in his message to the Confederate
Congress recognized that the time might come when slaves would be
needed in the Confederate army: "The subject," said he, "is to be
viewed by us, therefore, solely in the light of policy and our social
economy. When so regarded, I must dissent from those who advise a
general levy and arming of slaves for the duty of soldiers. Until our
white population shall prove insufficient for the armies we require
and can afford to keep the field, to employ as a soldier the Negro,
who has merely been trained to labor, and as a laborer under the white
man, accustomed from his youth to the use of firearms, would scarcely
be deemed wise or advantageous by any; and this is the question before
us. But should the alternative ever be presented of subjugation or of
the employment of the slave as a soldier, there seems no reason to
doubt what should be our decision."[27] In the same month, J. A.
Seddon, Secretary of War, refused permission to Major E. B. Briggs of
Columbus, Georgia, to raise a regiment of Negro troops, stating that
it was not probable that any such policy would be adopted by
Congress.[28]
In response to an inquiry from Seddon, the Secretary of War, as to the
advisability of arming slaves, General Howell Cobb presented the point
of view of one group of the Confederates, when he opposed the measure
to arm the Negroes. "I think," said he "that the proposition to make
soldiers of our slaves is the most pernicious idea that has been
suggested since the war began ... you cannot make soldiers of slaves
or slaves of soldiers. The moment you resort to Negro soldiers, your
white soldiers will be lost to you, and one secret of the favor with
which the proposition is received in portions of the army is the hope
when Negroes go into the army, they (the whites) will be permitted to
retire. It is simply a proposition to fight the balance of the war
with Negro troops. You can't keep white and black troops together and
you can't trust Negroes by themselves.... Use all the Negroes you can
get for all purposes for which you need them but don't arm them. The
day you make soldiers of them is the beginning of the end of the
revolution. If slaves make good soldiers, our whole theory of slavery
is wrong."[29] General Beauregard, Commander of the Department of
Georgia, South Carolina and Florida, wrote to a friend in July, 1863,
that the arming of the slaves would lead to the atrocious consequences
which have ever resulted from the employment of "a merciless servile
race as soldiers."[30] General Patton Anderson declared that the idea
of arming the slaves was a "monstrous proposition revolting to
southern sentiment, southern pride and southern honor."[31]
The opposite point of view was expressed by the group of southerners
led by General Pat Cleburne who in a petition presented to General
Joseph E. Johnson by several Confederate Officers wrote: "Will the
slaves fight?--the experience of this war has been so far, that
half-trained Negroes have fought as bravely as many half-trained
Yankees."[32] J. P. Benjamin, Secretary of State, urged that the slave
would be certainly made to fight against them, if southerners failed
to arm them for southern defense. He advocated also the emancipation
of those who would fight; if they should fight for southern freedom.
According to Benjamin, they were entitled to their own. In keeping
with the necessity of increasing the army, the editor of a popular
newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina, was besought to commence a
discussion on this point in his paper so that "the people might learn
the lesson which experience was sternly teaching."[33]
In a letter to President Davis, another argued that since the Negro
had been used from the outset of the war to defend the South by
raising provisions for the army, that the sword and musket be put in
his hands, and concluding the correspondent added: "I would not make a
soldier of the Negro if it could be helped, but we are reduced to this
last resort."[34] Sam Clayton of Georgia wrote: "The recruits should
come from our Negroes, nowhere else. We should away with pride of
opinion, away with false pride, and promptly take hold of all the
means God has placed within our reach to help us through this
struggle--a war for the right of self-government. Some people say that
Negroes will not fight. I say they will fight. They fought at Ocean
Pond (Olustee, Fla.), Honey Hill and other places. The enemy fights us
with Negroes, and they will do very well to fight the Yankees."[35]
The pressure to fill the depleted ranks of the Confederate forces
became greater as the war continued. It was noted above that Congress
and the State legislatures had called into service all able-bodied
whites between the ages of seventeen and fifty years; later the ages
were extended both ways to sixteen and sixty years. Grant remarked
that the Confederates had robbed "the cradle and the grave" in order
to fill the armies[36]. Jefferson Davis began to see the futility of a
hypothetical discussion as to the advisability or values in the use of
Negroes as soldiers and in a letter to John Forsythe, February, 1865,
stated "that all arguments as to the positive advantage or
disadvantage of employing them are beside the question, which is
simply one of relative advantage between having their fighting element
in our ranks or in those of the enemy."[37]
A strong recommendation for the use of Negroes as soldiers was sent to
Senator Andrew Hunter at Richmond by General Robert E. Lee, in
January, 1865. "I think, therefore," said he, "we must decide whether
slavery shall be extinguished by our enemies and the slaves be used
against us, or use them ourselves at the risk of the effects which may
be produced upon our social institutions. My own opinion is that we
should employ them without delay. I believe that with proper
regulations they may be made efficient soldiers. They possess the
physical qualifications in a marked degree. Long habits of obedience
and subordination coupled with the moral influence which in our
country the white man possesses over the black, furnish an excellent
foundation for that discipline which is the best guaranty of military
efficiency. Our chief aim should be to secure their fidelity. There
have been formidable armies composed of men having no interest in the
cause for which they fought beyond their pay or the hope of plunder.
But it is certain that the surest foundation upon which the fidelity
of an army can rest, especially in a service which imposes hardships
and privations, is the personal interest of the soldier in the issue
of the contest. Such an interest we can give our Negroes by giving
immediate freedom to all who enlist, and freedom at the end of the war
to the families of those who discharge their duties faithfully
(whether they survive or not), together with the privilege of residing
at the South. To this might be added a bounty for faithful
service."[38] This was an influential word, coming as it did from the
Commander-in-Chief of the Confederate forces. The Confederate Congress
did not act immediately upon this suggestion, but even if this had
been done, the measure would have been enacted too late to be of any
avail.[39]
The Confederate Senate refused on February 7, 1865, to pass a
resolution calling on the committee on military affairs to report a
bill to enroll Negro soldiers. Later in the same month the Senate
indefinitely postponed the measure.[40] As the House and Senate met in
secret session much of the debate can not be found. General Lee wrote
Representative Barksdale of Mississippi another letter in which the
employment of Negro soldiers was declared not only expedient but
necessary. He reiterated his opinion that they would make good
soldiers as had been shown in their employment in the Union
armies.[41] With recommendations from General Lee and Governor Smith
of Virginia, and with the approval of President Davis an act was
passed by the Congress, March 13, 1865, enrolling slaves in the
Confederate army.[42] Each State was to furnish a quota of the total
300,000.[43] The Preamble of the act reads as follows:
"An Act to increase the Military Force of the Confederate States: The
Congress of the Confederate States of America so enact, that, in order
to provide additional forces to repel invasion, maintain the rightful
possession of the Confederate States, secure their independence and
preserve their institution, the President be, and he is hereby
authorized to ask for and accept from the owners of slaves, the
services of such number of able-bodied Negro men as he may deem
expedient, for and during the war, to perform military service in
whatever capacity he may direct...." The language used in other
sections of the act seems to imply also that volunteering made one a
freedman.[44]
After the passage of the measure by the Confederate Congress, General
Lee coöperated in every way with the War Department in facilitating
the recruiting of Negro troops.[45] Recruiting officers were appointed
in each State. Lieutenant John L. Cowardin, Adjutant, 19th Batallion,
Virginia Artillery was ordered to proceed on April 1, 1865, to
recruiting Negro troops according to the act. On March 30, 1865,
Captain Edward Bostick was ordered to raise four companies in South
Carolina. Others were ordered to raise companies in Alabama, Florida,
and Virginia.[46] Lee and Johnson, however, surrendered before this
plan could be carried out. If the Confederate Congress could have
accepted the recommendation in the fall of 1864, the war might have
been prolonged a few months, to say the least, by the use of the Negro
troops. It was the opinion of President Davis, on learning of the
passage of the act, that not so much was accomplished as would have
been, if the act had been passed earlier so that during the winter the
slaves could have been drilled and made ready for the spring campaign
of 1865.
Under the guidance of the local authorities, thousands of Negroes were
enlisted in the State Militias and in the Confederate Army. They
served with satisfaction, but there is no evidence that they took part
in any important battles. The Confederate Government at first could
not bring itself to acknowledge the right or the ability of the man
who had been a slave to serve with the white man as a soldier.
Necessity forced the acceptance of the Negro as a soldier. In spite of
the long years of controversy with its arguments of racial
inferiority,[47] out of the muddle of fact and fancy came the
deliberate decision to employ Negro troops. This act, in itself, as a
historical fact, refuted the former theories of southern statesmen.
The Negro was thus a factor in both the Union and Confederate armies
in the War of the Rebellion. These facts lead to the conclusion that
the Negro is an American not only because he lives in America, but
because his life is closely connected with every important movement in
American history.
CHARLES H. WESLEY.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Davis, _The Civil War and Reconstruction in Florida_, p. 220.
[2] For summary of such, legislation to prevent this, see J.C. Kurd,
_The Law of Freedom and Bondage in the United States_, Vol. II. In
Florida, 1827, a law was enacted to prevent trading with Negroes. In
1828, death was declared the penalty for inciting insurrection among
the slaves and in 1840 there was passed an act prohibiting the use of
firearms by Negroes. In Virginia as early as 1748 there was enacted a
measure declaring that even the free Negroes and Indians enlisted in
the militia should appear without arms; but in 1806 the law was
modified to provide that free Negroes should not carry arms without
first obtaining a license from the county or corporation court. One
who was caught with firearms in spite of this act was to forfeit the
weapon to the informer and receive thirty-nine lashes at the
whipping-post. Hening, _Statutes-at-Large_, Vol. V, p. 17; Vol. XVI,
p. 274.
[3] General W. S. Harney, commanding in Missouri, responded to the
claims of slaveholders for the return of runaway slaves with the
words: "Already, since the commencement of these unhappy disturbances,
slaves have escaped from their owners and have sought refuge in the
camps of the United States troops from the Northern States, and
commanded by a Northern General. They were carefully sent back to
their owners." General D. C. Buell, commanding in Tennessee, in reply
to the same demands stated: "Several applications have been made to me
by persons whose servants have been found in our camps; and in every
instance that I know of, the master has removed his servant and taken
him away." William Wells Brown, _The Negro in the Rebellion_, pp.
57-58.
[4] Secretary Seddon, War Department, wrote: "They [the Negroes] have,
besides, the homes they value, the families they love, and the masters
they respect and depend on to defend and protect against the savagery
and devastation of the enemy."--_Official Rebellion Records_, Series
IV, Vol. Ill, pp. 761-762.
[5] Governor Walker of Florida, himself a former slaveholder, said
before the State legislature in 1865 that "the world had never seen
such a body of slaves, for not only in peace but in war they had been
faithful to us. During much of the time of the late unhappy
difficulties, Florida had a greater number of men in her army than
constituted her entire voting population. This, of course, stripped
many districts of their arms-bearing inhabitants and left our females
and infant children almost exclusively to the protection of our
slaves. They proved true to their trust. Not one instance of insult,
outrage, or indignity has ever come to my knowledge. They remained at
home and made provisions for the army." John Wallace, _Carpet-Bag Rule
in Florida_, p. 23.
[6] "For more than two years, Negroes had been extensively employed in
belligerent operations by the Confederacy. They had been embodied and
drilled as rebel soldiers and had paraded with white troops at a time
when this would not have been tolerated in the armies of the
Union."--Greely, _The American Conflict_, Vol. II, p. 524.
"It was a notorious fact that the enemy were using Negroes to build
fortifications, drive teams and raise food for the army. Black hands
piled up the sand-bags and raised the batteries which drove Anderson
out of Sumter. At Montgomery, the Capital of the Confederacy, Negroes
were being drilled and armed for military duty."--W. W. Brown, _The
Negro in the Rebellion_, p. 59.
[7] _Ibid._, Vol. II, p. 521.
[8] Jones, _A Rebel War Clerk's Diary_, Vol. I, p. 237; Schwab, _The
Confederate States of America_, p. 194.
[9] _Laws of Florida, 12th Session, 1862_, Chap. 1378.
[10] _Confederate War Department, Bureau of Conscription_, Circular
No. 36, December 12, 1864. _Off. Reds. Reb._, Series IV, Vol. III, p.
933.
[11] _Off. Reds. Reb._, Series IV, Vol. Ill, p. 780. Journals of
Congress, IV, 260.
[12] Washington, _The Story of the Negro_, Vol. II, p. 321.
[13] _Order No. 426. Adjutant-General's Office, Headquarters Louisiana
Militia, March 24, 1862._ _Cf._ Brown, _The Negro in the Rebellion_,
pp. 84-85.
[14] Parton, _History of the Administration of the Gulf_, 1862-1864;
_General Butler in New Orleans_, p. 517.
[15] Greely, _The American Conflict_, p. 521.
[16] _The Charleston Mercury_, January 3, 1861.
[17] The announcement of the recruiting read: "Attention, volunteers:
Resolved by the Committee of Safety that C. Deloach, D. R. Cook and
William B. Greenlaw be authorized to organize a volunteer company
composed of our patriotic free men of color, of the city of Memphis,
for the service of our common defense. All who have not enrolled their
names will call at the office of W. B. Greenlaw & Co." F. W. Forsythe,
Secretary. F. Titus, President. Williams, _History of the Negro_, Vol.
II, p. 277.
[18] Greely, _The American Conflict_, Vol. II, p. 521.
[19] _Memphis Avalanche_, September 3, 1861.
[20] Greely, _The American Conflict_, Vol. II, p. 522.
[21] _Ibid._, p. 277.
[22] _Ibid._, Vol. II, p. 522.
[23] _The Baltimore Traveler_, February 4, 1862.
[24] Greely, _The American Conflict_, Vol. II, p. 522.
[25] Schwab, _The Confederate States of America_, p. 193. Moore,
_Rebellion Records_, Vol. VII, p. 210. Jones, _Diary_, Vol. I, p. 381.
[26] An indorsement from the Secretary of War reads: "If all white men
capable of bearing arms are put in the field, it would be as large a
draft as a community could continuously sustain, and whites are better
soldiers than Negroes. For war, when existence is staked, the best
material should be used."--_Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. III,
pp. 693-694.
[27] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. III, p. 799.
[28] _Ibid._, Series IV, Vol. III, p. 846. J. A. Seddon to Maj. E. B.
Briggs, Nov. 24, 1864.
[29] _Ibid._, Series IV, Vol. III, p. 1009.
[30] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series I, Vol. XXVIII, Pt. 2, p. 13.
[31] _Ibid._, Series I, Vol. LII, Pt. 2, p. 598.
[32] Davis, _Civil War and Reconstruction in Florida_, p. 226.
[33] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. III, pp. 959-960.
[34] _Ibid._, p. 227.
[35] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. III, pp. 1010-1011.
[36] Rhodes, _History of the United States since the Compromise of
1850_, Vol. IV, p. 525.
[37] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. VIII, p. 1110.
[38] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. VIII, p. 1013.
[39] Williams, _Negro Troops in the War of the Rebellion_, Journals of
Congress, Vol. IV, pp. 572-573.
In the _American Historical Review_, January, 1913, N.W. Stephenson
has an article upon "The Question of Arming the Slaves." The article
is concerned particularly with the debate in the Confederate Congress
upon this perplexing question and with the psychology of the
statements made by President Davis, Secretary Benjamin, General Lee
and by various Congressmen. The author has searched the Journals of
the Confederate Congress, newspaper files and personal recollections
and gives conclusions which show that "the subject was discussed
during the last winter of the Confederate regime," and by inference
the dissertation shows that the fear of the consequences of arming the
slaves was alike in the minds of all southern people. The treatise is
a study in historical psychology; and, as in similar works by men of
the type of the author, the point of view of the South and of the
Confederacy is presented and the Negro and his actual employment as a
soldier is neglected. The author contends that a few southern leaders
attempted to force the arming of the blacks upon an unwilling southern
public. He neglects the evidence contained in the action of local
authorities in arming the Negroes who were free and their attitude
concerning those who were slaves. He neglects also the sentiment of
southern leaders who favored the measure. The Journals of the
Confederate Congress, therefore, will be more valuable to those
desiring information concerning the debates on this question.
[40] _Journal of Congress of Confederate States_, Vol. IV, p. 528 and
Vol. VII, p. 595; Jones, _Diary_, Vol. II, p. 431.
[41] _Richmond Dispatch_, February 24, 1865; Jones _Diary_, Vol. II,
p. 432.
[42] _Journal of Congress of Confederate States_, Vol. VII, p. 748.
[43] _Richmond Examiner_, December 9, 1864--Gov. Smith's Message.
Jones, _Diary_, Vol. II, p. 43; pp. 432-433. Schwab, _The Confederate
States of America_, p. 194.
[44] _Off. Reds. Rebell., Series_ IV, Vol. III, p. 1161.
_Ibid._, Series III, Vol. V, pp. 711-712; Davis, _Confederate
Government_, Vol. II, p. 660.
[45] Rhodes, _History of U. S._, Vol. V, 1864-1865, p. 81.
[46] _Off. Reds. Rebell._, Series IV, Vol. III, pp. 1193-1194 and
Appendix.
[47] _Cf. Southern Correspondence throughout the Rebellion Records._
THE LEGAL STATUS OF FREE NEGROES AND SLAVES IN TENNESSEE
In 1790, the free colored population of Tennessee was 361, while the
slave numbered 3,417.[1] In 1787, three years previous, Davidson
County, which then, as now, comprised the most important and thickly
settled part of the Cumberland Valley, had a population of 105 Negroes
between the ages of 1 and 60.[2] Nashville was just a rough community
in the wilderness with a few settlers from the older districts of the
East, living in several hewed and framed log-houses and twenty or more
rough cabins. The census of 1790 gives Davidson County 677 Negroes, a
figure which compared with the 3,778 Negroes in the entire State at
that enumeration, means that this frontier region had already grown
important enough to draw to it nearly one-fifth of the Negro
population of the commonwealth. In 1800, there were in the State
13,893 Negroes, of whom 3,104, or nearly one fourth, were in Davidson
County. Thereafter, although the ratio between the county and State
did not increase in favor of the county, still it kept up so that by
1850 Davidson had the largest Negro population of any county in the
State. During the decade 1850-60 Shelby County, containing the
important center, Memphis, gained the ascendency in number of Negro
inhabitants, which it has since that time maintained. The likely cause
of this shifting was the steady growth of cotton-raising districts and
their rapid expansion toward the West and South. A general
intimidation of the Negroes of Nashville and vicinity occurred in
1856, probably having some influence on the decline of population for
that period in question. This cause, however, is not sufficient to
explain the constant superiority of numbers in the Southwestern
Tennessee region thereafter.
As slavery expanded from this small territory into all parts of the
State, the attitude of the people of the Commonwealth with respect to
the nation and slavery at various times may be shown. After Tennessee
had been ceded to the United States in 1790 by North Carolina, she had
a most unusual method of throwing off her territorial government for
nearly three months in 1796, and existed in absolute independence for
that period before being admitted into statehood by the Federal
Government.[3] Nevertheless in the period of the Civil War this State
was the last to secede and the first to comply with the terms of
readmission. With respect to slavery the early attitude of Tennessee
toward the national government was peculiar. The cession act of North
Carolina provided: "That no regulation made or to be made by Congress
shall tend to emancipate slaves."[4] Probably because of this fact
Lincoln did not mention Tennessee in the Emancipation Proclamation.
Yet Tennessee did have a strong anti-slavery sentiment, beginning with
the outspoken protest of some of the King's Mountain heroes, also
expressing itself in the work of many petitioners to the State
legislature in the period 1800-1820. Then in 1834, in the State
constitutional convention of that year, the anti-slavery feeling
developed to proportions little appreciable at the present day, since
we know the general opposition to such feeling and sentiment. Any
antagonism to a so strongly fixed social convention then meant unusual
courage in the midst of a majority of persons of adverse opinion.
The burning question of human rights for the black inhabitants of the
State still became more ardent as the years passed, and the signs of
its greater intensity were clearly seen in the Anti-Slavery Convention
which met in London in 1843. The chronicle of proceedings contains a
speech of Joshua Leavitt of Boston, who made the interesting
statement that "The people of East Tennessee, a race of hardy
mountaineers, find their interests so little regarded by the dominant
slave-holders of other parts of the state that they are taking
measures to become a separate state. They are holding anti-slavery
meetings, and meetings of political associations with great freedom,
discussing their questions, rousing up the people and showing how
slavery curses them, in order to bring them to the point of
action."[5] At this time it was well known that both Tennessee and
Kentucky were "exporting slaves largely."[6]
In 1820, Elihu Embree,[7] at Jonesboro, Tennessee, the county seat of
Washington County, in the far eastern section, began to publish _The
Emancipator_, an abolition journal. Later, there came from this same
county a man who easily became the leader of anti-slavery sentiment in
the Constitutional Convention of 1834 at Nashville, Matthew
Stephenson. It may have been that as a young man Stephenson was fired
with the zeal of Embree. The period of Embree's activity was also one
of large interest in the North and South in behalf of emancipation. In
this same year the Missouri Compromise was passed in the national
legislature. The concessions made both by pro-slavery and anti-slavery
adherents at this time show the relative strength of the two forces
and the remarkable fact is that there could be such near-equality of
fighting strength on both sides.[8] Tennessee seems to have had an
epitome of this national situation within her borders. Not only the
zealous work of Embree indicates this, but the general feeling of the
people of eastern Tennessee toward slavery. It is interesting here to
point out that _The Emancipator_ was the first abolition journal in
the United States.[9]
The outcome of this anti-slavery feeling in Tennessee was that when
the State Constitutional Convention met at Nashville in 1834 to
consider important changes in the Constitution of 1796, there was such
an outburst of sentiment against slavery that it was only with
considerable resistance of the pro-slavery convention delegates that
the State did not abolish it by providing for the gradual emancipation
of slaves over a period of twenty years, when all should have been
emancipated.[10] So significant is the public opinion of that time in
Tennessee history, and so well calculated to give large insight into
the Negro's condition then in the State, that it will hardly be amiss
in this paper to enter into a somewhat detailed discussion of the work
of the convention, and the sentiments there displayed.
The legal enactments of the slave code of Tennessee prior to 1834 will
give us the right perspective here. One of the earliest enactments of
the commonwealth was the absolute denial to slaves of the right to own
property. Property held by them, such as horses, cattle, or anything
of personal value was to be sold and one half of the proceeds given to
the informer, the other half to the county.[11] Another law forbade
the slave to go about armed unless he was the huntsman of the
plantation. Small penalties were provided.[12] Still another made it
unlawful for slaves to sell "any article whatever without permission
from owner or overseer." The penalty for breaking this law was a
maximum of "39 lashes on his, her, or their bare backs."[13] Many
other matters were rigidly prescribed in the early statutes, chiefly
concerning the slave's right to go or not to go from place to place,
and to conduct himself under certain circumstances. Among slaves
perjury was punished by mutilation and whipping. The brutality of the
former was all the more disgusting because defended by law.[14] The
slaying of a black or mulatto slave, however, was actually deemed
murder and made punishable with death. It has not yet been
ascertained, as far as the writer knows, whether any white citizen of
Tennessee was ever indicted under the provision of this law. We do
have a case of a famous old slave-holder in a community not far from
Nashville being tied to his gate post and severely whipped by his
neighbors, because of his brutal murder of one of his slaves.[15]
In the early laws the "hiring of one's own time," for a slave, was
expressly forbidden. This practice was that of the master's allowing a
slave to purchase his time for a certain amount of money, usually paid
per annum. The law forbidding it was later rather generally evaded,
although we cannot be sure of the evasion during the years 1796-1834.
But during the later decades of the period under discussion,
especially from 1840-60, there is absolute agreement among the
testimonies of ex-slaves that evasion was the rule and not the
exception. Various forms of this law were later enacted, but the
penalties were usually light, and it may have been this fact together
with the case of evasion that caused the disregard of it to become
general. An ex-slave of Wilson County explains that the usual method
of evasion was the declaration of the employer of the slave that he
had hired the slave from the slave's master. Sometimes the owner would
pretend to keep the wages of the slave, but really was holding them at
the slave's disposal. In this way numbers of slaves bought themselves.
There were other laws affecting masters in regard to their treatment
of their slaves and privileges of the latter. One provided that if the
slave should steal food or clothing because ill-fed or destitute of
apparel, the master should pay for the stolen property.[16] By the
provisions of another, slaves were allowed to give testimony in trials
of other slaves; the jurors, however, had to be "housekeepers" and
"owners of slaves."[17] The beating or abuse of a slave without
sufficient cause (no indication given as to what were the limits of
"sufficient cause") was an indictable offence, and the person
committing a crime of this sort was liable to the same penalties as
for the commission of a similar offense on the body of a white
person.[18]
Various laws of the early codes, 1813, 1819, 1829, restricting the
slave from selling or vending articles under conditions apart from
desire or knowledge of his owner are all evidence of his complete
subjection by law to the will of his master, even in the smallest
things and affairs of personal life, and disposal of belongings. Great
care was taken to state specifically in these early laws that there
should be no sale of liquor or any intoxicant to slaves.[19]
The provisions concerning larger questions of a slave's activity and
privilege are all interesting, and it will be of value to regard,
first of all, that for bringing slaves into the State. Slaves were not
to be brought into Tennessee unless for use, or procured by descent,
devise, or marriage.[20] This enactment was made in 1826, and prepared
the way for far more severe measures later. The idea of all
legislation of this nature argues clearly the discouragement of
slavery as a prevailing institution, by means of preventing fresh
importations for sale. Tennessee was not to be, if it could be
prevented, a slave market, like Mississippi.
A citizen holding slaves might petition the county court and
emancipate a slave. Bond and security were required of the owner, and
the slave thus set at liberty became free to go where he chose
provided that, if he became a pauper, he should be brought to the
county in which he had been set free, and there taken care of at
public expense.[21] But occasionally there would arise a situation
which required special enactment of the legislature as in the
instance of one, Pompey Daniels, a slave, who died before the
emancipation of his two children, Jeremiah and Julius, whom he had
purchased. This required a special act of the legislature, as there
seems to have been no law covering such a case.[22] Years before, in
1801, there was enacted a law, giving power of emancipation to the
owner, as we have just seen before, but not to any slave who might
essay to deliver another from bondage.[23]
Once free, the Negro's status was rather precarious in some respects.
He was required to have papers filled out by the clerk of the county
in which he lived, specifying personal details and information
intended to identify the person thoroughly. He must without fail have
these emancipation records with him at any time and place in order to
prove his freedom. In 1831 a law was passed which made it obligatory
for the slave to leave upon his emancipation, and persons intending to
emancipate their slaves were then compelled to give bond for their
speedy removal.[24] Another clause of the same law stipulates that
free Negroes should not be allowed to enter the State.[25] Fine and
imprisonment were specified as penalties for remaining in the State as
long as twenty days. This was a reaction from the provisions of State
laws of 1825 when free colored persons immigrating into the State
might have papers of freedom registered there, when proof of their
absolute freedom had been made. Before the enactment of 1831, the
increase of free Negroes was not so actively discouraged by the State,
and many having their residence there, the laws concerning this class
were quite as important and nearly as well detailed as the provisions
of the slave code.
Among the early laws is one exacting a penalty of $500 fine for
selling a "free person of color."[26] A free person imported and sold
as a slave under the law might recover double the price of his sale
from the seller, who might be held until he should give bond.[27] This
marks a high degree of feeling of justice toward the freeman, and yet
it is worthy of notice that this was not always adequate to obtaining
actual justice. Record is given of three young colored men, seamen and
free, "carried to Mobile and New Orleans in the steamer _New Castle_
and taken ashore by the captain to the city prison on pretext of
getting hemp for the vessel, but really taken by the captain to the
city prison as his slaves and sold by the jailor to three persons who
carried them into Tennessee."[28] It is further stated that these
unfortunates remained in slavery. One, however, was freed by the
diligent work of the Friends, who had agents in the South busy
gathering information concerning slavery, and planning means of
combating it.
The free person of color was exempted from military duty and from the
payment of a poll-tax. In accordance with an amendment to the Public
Works act of 1804, he was expected to give service on public roads and
highways just as other citizens.[29] It is doubtful whether any
freeman of color voted under the constitution of 1796, but it seems to
have been possible. The new constitution of 1834 restricted the right
of voting to "free men who should be competent witnesses against a
white man in a court of justice." In the courts free Negroes were
legal witnesses in certain cases among their own people, but might
themselves be testified against by slaves, even, if the defendants
were only freedmen.[30] Otherwise slaves were not allowed to be
witnesses against free men of color. Writs of error were granted to
both freemen and slaves.
There were numerous small observances regarding the personal conduct
of freemen. Life was at best for them a strange and circumscribed
affair. They were "neither bond nor free," and probably suffered more
from the provisions of the law and their ambiguous position than did
their slave brothers. The freeman was not to entertain any slave over
night in his home, or on the Sabbath. A small fine was the
penalty.[31] Intermarriage of free persons and slaves without consent
of the master of the slave was strictly forbidden. Breach of this law,
also, was punishable by fine. There were penalties for whites and free
Negroes alike for being in "unlawful assembly" with slaves. The word
"unlawful" here seems to have had a special judicial meaning,
signifying primarily for the purpose of instigating rebellion or
insurrection. A law providing for voluntary enslavement of a free
person of color, to any person whom he might choose, introduces a most
interesting situation which probably indicates that there were more
than a few free Negroes who preferred slavery to the condition of a
creature living in a sort of limbo between freedom and bondage.
By an act of the legislature in 1819, encouragement was given to
European immigrants to come into the State, with the idea that they
would become home builders and land-tillers, and make good citizens.
The colored population already had a general reputation for thrift,
but the sentiment of racial sympathy in the white population just then
favored more the immigrant. For a period the tide of public opinion
was on this side, and it was considered best for the Negro to be taken
in charge by the Tennessee Colonization Society. The State
appropriated $10 for every black man removed from the State, an
expense finally sanctioned by a law of 1833.[32]
Two years prior to the year of the Tennessee Constitutional Convention
of 1834, Virginia in her State Legislature, had witnessed an exciting
scene of debate on the question of slavery. In the District of
Columbia, also, there was sent to Congress in the session of 1827-28 a
petition requesting the "prospective abolition" of slavery in that
district, and the repeal of certain laws authorizing the sale of
runaways. Similarly in Tennessee the outbreak of antislavery
sentiment, long fostered in the eastern part of the State, came into
the Convention of 1834. The few details presented here concerning the
convention show conclusively that there was a strong, even violent
opposition to human slavery in the State. Certain representatives of
counties from East Tennessee were conspicuous for their protest
against the system, and maintained their convictions despite the
failure to win their point at that time.
Many memorialists in the State had addressed the legislature on the
question of emancipation both pro and con prior to the convention, and
finally, in the convention, on June 18, Wm. Blount of Montgomery
County, Northern Tennessee, offered a memorial that on the subject of
slavery the General Assembly should have no power or authority to pass
laws for the emancipation of slaves without the consent of their
owners or without paying their owners.[33] The memorial further prayed
that, the legislature should not discourage the foreign immigration
into the State and that certain laws providing for the owners of
slaves to emancipate them should be made with the restriction that
beforehand such manumitted persons should be assuredly prevented from
becoming a charge to any county.
There were presented other memorials respecting the slave population
at this time. Hess, of Gibson and Dyer counties, wanted no
emancipation of slaves except by individual disposition of their
masters as the latter saw fit, or at least never unless the price of
the slave was paid, provided the master did not freely give
manumission, and the good of the State seemed to demand the liberation
of the slave. But memorials of a different sentiment also were coming
in. On May 26, McNeal presented a memorial of sundry citizens of
McMinn County, asking for the emancipation of slaves in Tennessee, and
on the same date, Senter of Rhea County also brought a petition from
"sundry citizens" of his district asking for emancipation.[34] On the
28th, a memorial was given by Stephenson of Washington County from
citizens unhesitatingly favoring emancipation. It was read and tabled.
On May 30, Stephenson introduced a resolution to have a committee of
thirteen, one from each congressional district "appointed to take in
consideration the propriety of designating some period from which
slavery shall not be tolerated in this state, and that all memorials
on that subject that have or may be presented to the convention be
referred to said committee to consider and report thereon."[35] This
resolution passed without trouble.
Stephenson was conspicuous for adherence to emancipation principles.
It will be observed that he came from Washington County, in the far
eastern portion of the State, the region already famous for its
declaration of enmity toward slavery within Tennessee borders
especially. An article in the _Knoxville Register_ of the year 1831,
just a few years prior to this Nashville Convention, denounces slavery
in no uncertain terms, but also grows bitter at the thought of free
men of color even remaining in the State. "Shall Tennessee" it asks,
"be made the receptacle of the vicious and desperate slave as well as
the depraved and corrupting free man of color?"[36]
But while a great number of those of East Tennessee probably wanted
the abolition of slavery in order to rid the State of all people of
color, there were those who through their delegates expressed their
opinions otherwise in this convention, as has been intimated in the
three memorials from "sundry citizens" of Washington and McMinn and
Rhea Counties. Finally, the report of the Committee of Thirteen was
given by John A. McKinney, of Hawkins County. It will be noted as an
exception to the rule that this representative of an eastern county
did not vigorously stand for the emancipation of the slave, but in his
report spoke at length to attempt the justification of the system
prevailing at that time in the State. Some of the most interesting
points of his argument are: that slavery is an evil, but hard to
remove, that the physiognomy of the slave is the great barrier to
successful adjustment socially as far as white citizens think and
feel, that the condition of the free man of color is tragic, that
beset with temptations, and denied his oath in a court of justice, he
is unable to have wrongs of whites against him redressed, that any
interference with slavery at this time would cause a speedy removal of
Tennessee population since slave-owners would seek other States with
their slaves, and that if Tennessee should free all her slaves, there
would be a greater concentration of all the slaves of the United
States, giving slaves more advantage in case of uprising.
Since the slave population in 1830 was 142,530, a fair estimate for
1834 would be 150,000, and this host of newly-made freedmen, thought
he, would jeopardize the social safety of the white population of
Tennessee, and incite the slave inhabitants of adjoining States to
sedition. Slavery would not always exist, he believed, but Tennessee
could abolish it then without dire results. Colonization was
difficult, but possible and practicable.
This report was given on June 19. A few days later a motion was made
by a Bedford County delegate to strike out that part of the report
referring to the condition of the free man of color as "tragic." This
did not prevail. Still later Stephenson in a set speech protested
vigorously against the acceptance of the report of the Committee of
Thirteen. He declared that the report was "an apology for slavery,"
and did not show the convention willing to discharge its duty to the
memorialists, and to the people whose protests could not there be
heard. His principal argument was that the principles guiding this
committee in its decision were subversive of the principles of true
republicanism; that they were also against the principles of the
Bible. Since the committee had admitted the evil of slavery, he
contended, the failure to find a remedy is unworthy of the
representatives of the people of the State. He maintained that there
is no soundness in the argument that because of the physical
differences, the black man should be deprived of the "common rights of
man," and that it is not better to have slavery distributed over a
large area of country than to concentrate it, if slavery is an evil,
since the spread of any evil cannot be better than its limitation.[37]
As an indirect blow at any possible suffrage right of any persons of
color under the new constitution, Marr, delegate from Weakley and
Obion, introduced a resolution at this time intended to restrict
suffrage permanently and definitely to white males, specifically
prohibiting all "mulattoes, negroes, and Indians." This was referred
to the committee of the whole, but, oddly enough, failed of
adoption.[38] The intermittent debate on the subject of emancipation,
led on the one side by Stephenson, and on the other by McKinney, was
resumed a few days later when the latter gave an additional report. He
stated that the memorials with their signatures had been examined and
the names attached to them had numbered 1804 in all. 105 purported to
be slave-holders, said he, but by inquiry the committee had
ascertained that the aggregate number of slaves in their possession
was not greater than 500. He admitted that there were several counties
from which memorials had come, but charged that there had been a
signing of more than one memorial in some counties by the same
persons, so that there was a doubling of names without a proportional
increase of individual signers. He depreciated Stephenson's statement
that these memorials had come from almost every part of the State as
ill-founded; for the sixteen counties of Tennessee which had sent
representatives with memorials favorable to the idea of emancipation
were not from widely scattered portions of the State. Only five
extended westward beyond the longitude of Chattanooga, and there were
none of the more western counties represented. The two sections of the
State seemed to bear no hostility toward each other, but decidedly
disagreed on the slavery question. The question was largely an
economic one with the Tennesseans of the Mississippi Valley. Cotton
was coming into greater and greater importance every year. It could,
they thought, be most profitably raised by large groups of workmen
whose labor was cheap. The slave was the logical person, and they
fastened on him the burden.
Lest the impression has been made that the only portion of the State
from which the sentiment of an anti-slavery nature came was East
Tennessee, it will be well to refer to the vigorous speech of Kincaid,
a delegate from Bedford County, who flung a parting reply to the
friends and sympathizers of the Committee of Thirteen which had
succeeded in thwarting any official action upon the matter proposed by
the memorialists.[39] Bedford County, in the central portion of the
State, represented both economically and socially a type of citizen
different from that of the mountaineer stock. Yet Kincaid fearlessly
defended the plain human rights of the colored population in his
speech as much as Stephenson had done, and scathingly denounced the
Committee of Thirteen for its attitude toward slavery.
The pro-slavery faction, however, successfully contended that the
emancipation party had no definite plan for emancipation, as those in
Washington County and other districts were divided in their ideas on
this subject. There were about thirty memorials besides the one from
this county, one half of them asking that all children born in the
State after 1835 should be free and that all slaves should be freed in
1855 and sent out of the State. The other half of the memorials
favored making the slaves free in 1866 and having them colonized. As
a matter of fact, Tennessee did emancipate its slaves three years
earlier than this date. By the Committee of Thirteen these statements
were given to show that there could be no virtue in acting in accord
with the wishes of the memorialists, as they were hopelessly divided
in their recommendations. The report of the committee was tabled, but
the debate was by no means ended. Further detail is not of use to us
here save to point out that there was no vote in the matter and that
Stephenson bitterly upbraided the convention as a whole, stating that
it had not made an effort to answer the prayer of the memorialists.
The survey of this prolonged and unprofitable struggle shows how
divided were the people of Tennessee on the question of abolishing
slavery.[40]
Later in the convention there occurred some incidents which throw
light on the situation of the Negro. The Bill of Rights in the amended
constitution, sec. 26, provided: "That free white men of this state
have a right to keep and bear arms in their own defence."[41] A
delegate from Sevier County objected to the word "white" and moved
that it be stricken from the record. Another member from Green County
moved that the word "citizens" be inserted instead of "free white
men," but this was rejected by a vote of 19 to 30, Stephenson and and
others from East Tennessee voting with the ayes, and the Committee of
Thirteen with others defeating the motion. A resolution was then
brought forward by a delegate from Dyer County intended to prohibit
the general assembly from having power to pass laws for the
emancipation of slaves without consent of owners.[42] Immediately a
memorialist sympathizer moved to lay this on the table until January,
1835. His effort was lost, and the resolution passed. Thus was the day
completely won for the anti-emancipation faction.
There had been considerable discussion as to the status of free men of
color, and although one provision of the constitution seemed to give
the right of suffrage to all free men, yet there was a restriction
limiting the privilege of voting to those who were "competent
witnesses in a court of justice against a white person."[43] One
commentator upon his unusual provision observes that one cannot tell
how many Negroes were entitled to vote under this provision.[44] But
whatever present-day students may make of this, it was recognized by
the members of this convention that the free Negro had no suffrage
right, for near the close of the convention there was submitted a
resolution providing that since "free men of color were denied
suffrage by the constitution," the apportionment of senators and
representatives from their respective districts should be based on the
white population alone.[45] The revised constitution contains this
provision, but with different wording.
The general tendency of the whole body of legal enactments in the
period 1834-65 was toward restricting the slave more and more, and at
the same time, eliminating the element known as free Negroes. Probably
this had an effect upon the percentage of free Negroes in the total
population as seen in the years 1820 and 1850. The national percentage
for these years in question was in each case six tenths of one per
cent.[46] But as the total Negro population increased despite the
migration southward from Tennessee, the ratio for Tennessee in 1820
was 3 per cent, and for 1850, 2.4 per cent, a period of greater
repression, showing decrease, although very slight.
A general law of 1839 forbade the slave to act as a free person, that
is, to hire his own time from his master, or to have merchandisable
property and trade therewith.[47] Runaways were to be punished by
being made to labor on the streets or alleys of towns, as well as by
imprisonment. Several laws show the tendency to class free Negroes
with slaves by stating that all capital offences for slaves were also
capital offences for free Negroes.[48] Another plainly provides that
all offences made capital in the code of that time for slaves, should
also be capital for "free persons of color."[49] Further, "no free
person of color might keep a grocery or tippling house" under pain of
a heavy fine. It will be seen that the attitude thus was plainly more
and more adverse to the free Negro. An act of 1842 had made it
possible to amend all laws relating to "free persons of color," and
this was freely done.[50]
Free Negroes of "good character," either resident in the State prior
to 1836 or having removed to the State before that year, and
preferring, in their respective county courts, petitions to remain in
the same, might do so, but otherwise must leave the State under severe
penalties of imprisonment and hard labor, as provided under the law of
1831, prior to the new constitution. The subjects of this legal
provision were to renew this court proceeding every three years, under
the same penalty for failing to perform the renewal.[51] The laws of
registry of free Negroes were kept in force and made, if anything,
more rigid. One provision of these enactments was that there should be
in the registration papers specification of any "peculiar physical
marks on the person" so registered.[52] This practice, defended by
law, is exceedingly interesting to the student who compares it with
what has long been common knowledge regarding the practices of
slave-buyers in the markets. And here we have a measure of the
complete humiliation of the "free person of color," for every free
Negro or mulatto residing in any county of the State was compelled to
undergo this examination before officers of the county court and be
duly registered thereafter as a free person.[53]
As might be expected, the law of 1831 was followed up by enactments
strictly requiring the emancipation of slaves, when allowed by the
State, to be followed closely by the removal of the freedmen from the
State. Also instructions for the transportation of certain Negroes to
Africa were given in the same code. Those who had acquired freedom
after 1836, or who should do so, together with slaves successfully
suing for freedom, also free Negroes unable to give bond for good
behavior although having right to reside in the State, were all to be
transported to Africa, unless they went elsewhere out of the State,
according to provision by law.[54]
The word "mulatto" is found often in the laws of this period, showing
that this type was becoming an important factor in the race relations
of white and black. As far as is known, there is no way of obtaining
even the approximate proportion of white mothers to white fathers, but
because of the overwhelming evidence by personal testimony of
ex-slaves as to the relations of the masters and overseers of
plantations to the slave women, and the corresponding power of the
dominant race to prevent, at least in large degree, similar physical
marriages between Negroes and the women of their race, we may be said
rightly to infer that the proportion of white mothers of colored
offspring to white fathers was then, as it has always been, very
small. In Maryland, according to Brackett, the child of a white father
and a mulatto slave could not give testimony in court against a white
person, whereas the child of a white mother and a black man would be
disqualified in this regard only during his term of service.[55] "A
free mulatto was good evidence," says he, "against a white
person."[56] The mulatto of Tennessee had no such social or legal
position as either of these cases indicate, although here again
personal testimony brings to light notable exceptions of the social
behavior of individuals in certain localities, where this type, that
is, the colored offspring of white motherhood, was regarded as a
separate class, above the ordinary person of color.[57]