Aspects of Slavery and Freedom Seeking in North Carolina
Water-Watermen and the American War for Independence
Black pilots played a major role during the American Revolution. As many Black people saw war as the opportunity to escape slavery, they often sided with the British (Black people, enslaved and free, fought on the side of freedom and chose which side offered them the best opportunity to gain their freedom).
As the British pushed further into North Carolina, more enslaved people fled or sought the aid of the British. They typically did not fight but performed other duties. As the British sought the aid of Black people, George Washington and the Continental Army who once rejected aid from blacks amended their stance on black troops, despite the fact that blacks fought for the Continental army on their own volition. Bunker hill is a testament to this fact. A number of Black people helped the American (contentia) army, and several black seamen and pilots helped to capture British vessels.Not all slaves did align with the patriot side as volunteers. Some slaves were confiscated from white loyalists and sold to help the patriots through labor. For instance, “a slave name ‘Jacob,’ belonging to the loyalist Thomas McKnight, was sent to one of the back counties to the iron works;” however, Jacob ran away from this forced labor.
Confiscating slaves to perform iron work in places such as Chatham county was common, but it encouraged the enslaved to take advantage of the situation. Slaveholders also hired out slaves to the army, and some slaves such as Jacob took advantage of the situation. John Walker hired out five slaves to help military officers in Wilmington. However, after giving a little aid and showing obedience and commitment, they vanished.
In John Walker’s petition, he sought compensation for his slave Galloway, who was “a Valluable Tradesman” killed in 1780 as an outlawed runaway, “lurking in Swamps, Woods, and other obscure Places, committing Injuries to the Inhabitants of this State.”
As one historian noted, “Two wars of liberation were taking place concurrently in which black and white objectives sometimes converged but just as often diverged.”
British officers and Governor Josiah Martin thought it was a unique strategy to arm slaves, “a slave uprising occurred in July 1775 at the joining of Pitt, Beaufort, and Craven.” The goal of the insurrection was to extinguish all life in the county without any exception of those who supported slavery. The plot was discovered, and 40 blacks were jailed. It is said that the leaders behind the plot comprised a slave pilot named Merrick, a runaway slave, and a white sea captain. Media link
As punishment, “5 blacks were whipped, several received ‘80 lashes each’ and had their ears cropped.” Merrick not only shows the mobility of slave pilots and boatmen but also their intelligence and wherewithal of North Carolina waterways. Pilots and boatmen not only knew how to travel past the ‘hazardous shallows and swirling currents of North Carolina waters’ but also news for enslaved people. It would not be farfetched to say they were some of the biggest recruits for both sides of the revolutionary war for blacks living within the coastal region.
Enslaved blacks understood that they would have to look to themselves for freedom, despite the efforts of Quakers and few fair slaveholders to help their cause. Thus, many blacks seized the opportunity to flee. Before and after, the American Revolutionary War disrupted the routine of life and created disorder, not only to fight but also seek refuge and freedom through flight. Some enslaved came together and marooned (see petition HERE), whereas some other slaves took to flight.
NEWBERN, April 3. TEN DOLLARS REWARD. RUN away from this place a negro fellow named SALEM, about 5 feet 9 inches high, lusty and well made, speaks good English, and is used to the river trade; had on when he went away a green jacket, dirty trousers, blue stockings, new shoes, white metal buckets, and a chip has; he is supposed to have down the river, as he took with him a small boat marked on the stern, H.S. Whoever brings the said slave and back to Newbern, shall have the above reward. FRANCES BATCHELOR.Escapes:
CRAVEN, August 1, 1777. RUNAWAY FROM the Subscriber in May last, a dark Mulatto Man Slave called BEN, is a lusty well-made Fellow, about 50 years of Age, has had one of his Thighs broke, so that one Leg is much smaller than the other, his Knee is stiff, which causes him to halt very much in his Walk, is well known on Pamplico River, as he formerly belonged to one Mr. Warwick, of that Place. I have Reason to be believe he is now lurking about that Neighbourhood, as some Applications have been made for the Purchase of him. I will give a Reward of Twenty Dollars to any Person who apprehends the said Runaway, and delivers him at my House or Ten Dollars to whoever secures in any public Jail in this State, so that I get him again. William BRYAN. N.B. The Gentleman who applied in my Absence to purchase Ben, not leaving his Name, obliges me to give an Answer to his Application in this public Manner: I will take 200 l. Proc. for him, and not less. W.B.
SPRINGFIELD, Jan. 10. FIVE DOLLARS reward. Run away from the subscriber on Sunday night, the 28th instant, a negro women named Carolina, the property of Robert Calf a minor, is supposed to be harbored by the negroes of Col. John Pattern in Beaufort County. Whoever takes up and brings to me the said slave at Springfield, four miles about Newbern, shall receive the above reward and reasonable charges paid. ISSAC PATRIDGE.
An estimated 100,000 slaves ran away during the American Revolutionary War. Thus, this is sometimes referred to as the first Great Migration. Closely following this actions and the controversy over slavery during the constitutional convention, the fugitive slave law was passed in 1793.
The pattern here is that, when possible, enslaved people fled, either to the British or the free territory. As freedom seeking increased before, during, and after the American revolution, several were caught and re-enslaved, in particular, those who fought for the British.
“Throughout the 1780s and 1790s countless free blacks were taken up by county sheriffs under the 1777 act to prevent ‘domestic insurrections.’ these negroes were sold back into slavery for passing as free supposed to have been manumitted by their former owners.”
