The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832

by Taylor, Alan

  47 Coleman, St. George Tucker, 83–94 (Frances B. R. Tucker to St. George Tucker quotes on 90 and 91); P. Hamilton, Making and Unmaking, 51–52, 68.

  48 St. George Tucker to Richard Rush, Oct. 27, 1813, in Coleman, “Randolph and Tucker Letters,” 218–19; Coleman, St. George Tucker, 96–98; [G. Tucker], Letters from Virginia, 122 (“have something”).

  49 Cullen, St. George Tucker, 75; P. Hamilton, Making and Unmaking, 78–80, 93 (St. George Tucker quote), 108.

  50 Brugger, Beverley Tucker, 11; Coleman, St. George Tucker, 104–8; P. Hamilton, Making and Unmaking, 93.

  51 Beeman, Old Dominion, 28–35; 42–44; Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 73; D. P. Jordan, Political Leadership, 9–16, 66, 209–10; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 126–27.

  52 Beeman, Old Dominion, xi, 39–41; D. P. Jordan, Political Leadership, 13–14, 23; McDonell, Politics of War, 524; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 126–27.

  53 Beeman, Old Dominion, 28, 53; Evans, “Topping People,” 192; Thomas Mann Randolph (governor) quoted in D. P. Jordan, Political Leadership, 14; McDonell, Politics of War, 519 (Jefferson quote), 524–26; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 126–27.

  54 Einhorn, “Patrick Henry’s Case,” 549–73; McCoy, “James Madison and Visions,” 244; Patrick Henry quoted in Shalhope, John Taylor, 33 (“unbounded power”), in Waldstreicher, Slavery’s Constitution, 144 (“might lay”), and in Beeman, Old Dominion, 7–8 (“This government”); Morton, Robert Carter, 60; Cullen, St. George Tucker, 60; S. Dunn, Dominion of Memories, 134–45.

  55 D.B. Davis, Problem of Slavery, 125–26; Shalhope, John Taylor, 50–57; McCoy, “James Madison and Visions,” 226–32, 244–47; A. Rothman, Slave Country, 4–5; Van Cleve, “Founding a Slaveholders’ Union,” 122, 129–131; Beeman, Old Dominion, 3–13; S. Dunn, Dominion of Memories, 135–37; Waldstreicher, Slavery’s Constitution, 3–19, 141–45.

  56 S. G. Tucker, Dissertation on Slavery, 1–2; M. Mason, “Necessary but Not Sufficient,” 11–31; Patrick Henry quoted in L. K. Ford, Deliver Us from Evil, 23 (“as repugnant”) and in Deyle, Carry Me Back, 26 (“the general inconveniency”).

  57 Allen, “David Barrow’s Circular Letter,” 446–47 (“The holding”), 450 (“doing”); L. K. Ford, Deliver Us from Evil, 25–26.

  58 Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 428–34 (William Spencer, Methodist, quote on 428); Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts, 103; R. Parkinson, Tour in America, vol. 2:433.

  59 Weems quoted in J. Davis, Travels, 335–36; Roberts and Roberts, Moreau de St. Mery’s American Journey, 306; W. D. Jordan, White over Black, 418–19.

  60 L. K. Ford, Deliver Us from Evil, 35; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 21–27.

  61 Wolf, Race and Liberty, xi–xii, 6.

  62 Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 71; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 143; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 489–90; Nicholls, “Passing through This Troublesome World,” 65–68.

  63 Wolf, Race and Liberty, xi–xii, 6; Berlin, Many Thousands Gone, 279–80.

  64 R. S. Dunn, “Black Society,” 74; Morton, Robert Carter, 251, 260–65, 266–67 (Carter and anonymous angry neighbor quote). For similar criticism of Warner Mifflin for freeing his slaves, see McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 156. For Carter’s Morattico Baptist church, see Sobel, World They Made Together, 191.

  65 Robert Pleasants, “Memorial,” to the governor and Council of State, ca. 1790, Pleasants Family Papers, RABC, box 13, folder 18, HL.

  66 John Randolph to Tudor Randolph, Dec. 13, 1813, Grinnan Family Papers, box 3, SSCL-UVA; Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 22–27; P. Hamilton, Making and Unmaking, 99–103; Kierner, Scandal at Bizarre, 5–7, 28–32, 37–42, 49–61.

  67 Richard Randolph’s will quoted and analyzed in Dawidoff, Education of John Randolph, 49; Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 27, 35–36; Kierner, Scandal at Bizarre, 72, 85–89.

  68 Old Dick quoted in J. Davis, Travels, 425. See also, McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 118.

  69 Critic of manumission quoted in W. D. Jordan, White over Black, 580–81; Birkbeck, Notes on a Journey, 14; Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 9; Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves, 432; W. C. Bruce, John Randolph, vol. 2:129; R. Parkinson, Tour in America, vol. 2:446; St. George Tucker to Jeremy Belknap, June 29, 1795, in Belknap, “Queries,” 407; James Madison to Edward Coles, Sep. 3, 1819, in Hunt, Writings of James Madison, vol. 8:455.

  70 Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 8–11; L. K. Ford, Deliver Us from Evil, 68; Nicholls, “Passing through This Troublesome World,” 59–68; Roberts and Roberts, Moreau de St. Mery’s American Journey, 60; St. G. Tucker, Dissertation on Slavery, 9.

  71 Petitions from Mecklenberg, Amelia, and Pittsylvania Counties quoted in Schmidt and Wilhelm, “Early Proslavery Petitions,” 139 (“We risked,” “the Enemies,” and “the Horrors”); McDonell, Politics of War, 490–92; McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 142; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 93–95; D. B. Davis, Problem of Slavery, 303–4.

  72 Schmidt and Wilhelm, “Early Proslavery Petitions,” 135–36; R. S. Dunn, “Black Society,” 80–81; Wolf, Race and Liberty, 94–95, 129 (Francis Asbury quote); Sobel, World They Made Together, 207–9; Raboteau, “Slave Church,” 198–200; J. Lewis, “Problem of Slavery,” 285–86; Scully, Religion, 8. For a radical Baptist who felt marginalized and obliged to leave Virginia, see Allen, “David Barrow’s Circular Letter,” 440–51.

  73 Drescher, Abolition, 147–49, 160–62; Hickey, “America’s Response,” 362–64; Roberts and Roberts, Moreau de St. Mery’s American Journey, 49; Sidbury, “Saint Domingue in Virginia,” 531–52.

  74 L. K. Ford, Deliver Us from Evil, 26, 547n40; Chernow, Washington, 710; Thomas Jefferson to St. George Tucker, Aug. 28, 1797, quoted Egerton, Gabriel’s Rebellion, 14.

  75 Thomas Evans to John Cropper, Dec. 6, 1796 (“the revolutionary storm”), quoted in D. P. Jordan, Political Leadership, 122; D. P. Jordan, “John Randolph of Roanoke,” 399.

  76 St. George Tucker quoted in Brewer, “Entailing Aristocracy,” 307; Jefferson quoted in Grossberg, “Citizens and Families,” 14.

  77 Historians used to argue that entail had become an anachronism that applied to few estates; but in the most recent and careful study, Holly Brewer demonstrates that three-fourths of the Tidewater Virginia lands were subject to entail in 1776. See Brewer, “Entailing Aristocracy,” 307–46; Grossberg, “Citizens and Families,” 3–27; McGarvie, “Transforming Society,” 1393–1425.

  78 Brewer, “Entailing Aristocracy,” 327–28, 341; St. George Tucker quoted in McGarvie, “Transforming Society,” 1397.

  79 Stanton and Bear, Jefferson’s Memorandum Books, vol. 1:354n90.

  80 Grossberg, “Citizens and Families,” 3–5; Brewer, “Entailing Aristocracy,” 315, 341–45. For the bourgeois nature of the revolution, see also G. S. Wood, Radicalism of the American Revolution.

  81 St. George Tucker to Jeremy Belknap, Nov. 27, 1795, in Belknap, “Queries,” 421; R. B. Davis, Jeffersonian America, 142–43 (quoted words of Sir Augustus John Foster, visiting diplomat), 163; Ball, Fifty Years in Chains, 45–52; Torrey, Portraiture of Domestic Slavery, 15. A quantitative study of nine Tidewater and Piedmont counties reveals that the number of elite planters who held more than 100 slaves peaked in 1776 and declined thereafter. See R. S. Dunn, “Black Society,” 67.

  82 John Randolph to Josiah Quincy, Mar. 22 and July 1, 1814, in E. Quincy, Life of Josiah Quincy, 351 (“Nothing”), 354 (“They whose fathers”); Randolph quoted in Dawidoff, Education of John Randolph, 88–89 (“The old families”); Kirk, John Randolph, 80.

  83 Kirk, John Randolph, 27–28. For Jefferson’s sale of his wife’s entailed property see Stanton and Bear, eds., Jefferson’s Memorandum Book, vol. 1:354n90.

  84 Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 125–27; Brewer, “Entailing Aristocracy,” 339–40; Deyle, Carry Me Back, 35–36; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 522; McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 27–30.

  85 Stanton, “‘Those Who Labor for My Happiness,’” 150; Deyle, Carry Me Back, 28; Richard Blow to Geor
ge Blow, Feb. 5, 1819, quoted in J. Lewis, Pursuit of Happiness, 142–43; R. Parkinson, Tour in America, vol. 2:431–32; Jefferson quoted in, Norton, Gutman, and Berlin, “Afro-American Family,” 185; Randolph, Speech, 17 (“grand menagerie”).

  86 Deyle, Carry Me Back, 31–33; R.S. Dunn, “After Tobacco,” 346; R.S, Dunn, “Black Society,” 67; Walsh, “Rural African Americans,” 327, 339, where Walsh observes, “After the war [slaves] had a great deal more to fear . . . as slaveowners became more preoccupied with short-term returns” and so sold more slaves “and the new owner was less often a relative or neighbor of their former master.” In Mathews County, Virginia, in 1812, exactly half of the taxpayers (361 of 722) owned slaves, but 289 (80 percent) of the masters owned no more than five slaves. See Mathews County personal tax return, 1812, LV.

  87 Armistead Smith to William Patterson Smith, Feb. 12, 1814, WPSP, box 1, SC-DUL.

  88 Hughes, “Slaves for Hire,” 260–86.

  89 Hughes, “Slaves for Hire,” 265; Zaborney, “Slave Hiring,” 85–102.

  90 This analysis relies on the close and careful study of the John Tayloe III estate (especially the home plantation known as Mount Airy) conducted by Richard S. Dunn. See R.S. Dunn, “Tale of Two Plantations,” 43–51. See also Bailor, “John Taylor of Caroline,” 300; Walsh, “Rural African Americans,” 329–31. For the slave expression (“put you”), see Wiencek, Master of the Mountain, 10.

  91 J. B. Lee, Price of Nationhood, 258–61.

  92 Kulikoff, “Uprooted Peoples,” 149; Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves, 429–30; R.S. Dunn, “Black Society,” 59; Steward, Twenty-Two Years a Slave, 47; Fedric, Slave Life in Virginia and Kentucky, ix. For the advertisements for runaways, see Sidbury, Ploughshares into Swords, 29, 31.

  93 Deyle, “‘Abominable’ New Trade,” 833–34; Deyle, Carry Me Back, 16–21, 38; Kulikoff, “Uprooted Peoples,” 149–51; Jordan, White over Black, 321; John Campbell to Maria Campbell, Dec. 12, 1812, CFP, box 2, DUL-SC.

  94 John Randolph quoted in Kirk, John Randolph, 169. L. K. Ford, Deliver Us from Evil, 4; Deyle, Carry Me Back, 24–26; John Randolph to James Lloyd, Dec. 15, 1814, in Kirk, John Randolph, 258; Richard D. Bayly to John Cropper, Jan. 6, 1805 (“I am”), John Cropper Papers, Section 1, VHS.

  95 Deyle, Carry Me Back, 34–35; Grimes, Life of William Grimes, 33 (“It grieved me”), 43 (“It is not uncommon”); Old Dick quoted in J. Davis, Travels, vol. 2:154; Gudmestad, Troublesome Commerce, 8 (“destroyed”). Schermerhorn, Money over Mastery, 65.

  96 Torrey, Portraiture of Domestic Slavery, 42–43 (“Thus her family”); Gudmestad, Troublesome Commerce, 35–36.

  97 St. George Tucker to Jeremy Belknap, Nov. 27, 1795, in Belknap, “Queries,” 421, James Madison to Robert Walsh, Mar. 2, 1819, in Hunt, Writings of James Madison, vol. 8:426–27; Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Cooper, Sep. 10, 1814, in PTJ-RS, vol. 7:651; Wyllie, ed., “Observations,” 398–99; Herndon, William Tatham, 105; Torrey, Portraiture of Domestic Slavery, 17–18.

  98 Gov. Henry Lee to Robert Goode, May 17, 1792, quoted in Sidbury, “Saint Domingue in Virginia,” 539. For marital disruption by sales, see also Schermerhorn, Money over Mastery, 14–15.

  99 Berlin, Many Thousands Gone, 265–66; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 503–8; Schermerhorn, Money over Mastery, 11–15. Sobel, World They Made Together, 108.

  CHAPTER TWO: NIGHT AND DAY

  1 Benjamin Faulkner’s Phil, quoted by Griff, a fellow slave, in the trial of Phil, King and Queen County, July 21, 1813, JBEP, reel 5514, LV.

  2 Stanley, “James Carter’s Account,” 337–38.

  3 ibid.

  4 ibid., 337.

  5 Jefferson quoted and explained in Stanton, “‘Those Who Labor for My Happiness,’” 148–50, 159–60. For efforts by other planters to unite couples, see Chernow, Washington, 112; Egerton, Gabriel’s Rebellion, 16; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 527; Walsh, “Work and Resistance,” 112–13; R. S. Dunn, “Tale of Two Plantations,” 43–46; William Munford to Sarah Munford, Dec. 29, 1809, Munford-Ellis Family Papers, box 1, SC-DUL.

  6 Grimes, Life of William Grimes, 50; John Randolph quoted in W. C. Bruce, John Randolph, vol. 2:693; Morton, Robert Carter, 113; Chernow, Washington, 117; Gudmestad, Troublesome Commerce, 42–44.

  7 Lobb, Uncle Tom’s Story, 15 (“threats”); John Peterkin, journal, July 5, 1818 (“an invincible repugnance” and “Going away”), WLCL-UM; [G. Tucker], Letters from Virginia, 33.

  8 Henry St. George Tucker to St. George Tucker, Feb. 17 (“Poor little fellow”) and Mar. 1, 1804, in Coleman, Virginia Silhouettes, 9–10; P. Hamilton, Making and Unmaking, 109, 153–54.

  9 D. C. Barraud, deposition, Nov. 2, 1827, RG 76, entry 190, box 3, case 194 (Elizabeth J. Nimmo), USNA-CP; Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 129; Fithian, Journal and Letters, 184–85 (“List” and “Thank you”), 199; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 530–32, 558.

  10 Unnamed slave woman quoted in Fedric, Slave Life in Virginia, 15; Ball, Fifty Years in Chains, 39.

  11 Ely, Israel on the Appomattox, 105; McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 67–70; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 512–5; A. Rothman, Slave Country, 4; Stanton, “‘Those Who Labor for My Happiness,’” 149, 169 (visitor quoted: “they were almost sure”); Pybus, “Thomas Jefferson and Slavery,” 270–71 (includes Peter Fossett quotation).

  12 Dew, “David Ross,” 189–209 (Ross quote on 201, “less understanding”); Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 347–48.

  13 Dew, “David Ross,” 220–23; Thomas P. Bouldin, “Account of Sales of the Slaves of David Ross,” July 21–23, 1817, RG 76, entry 85, box 5, folder 42, USNA-CP.

  14 Widow McCroskey to St. George Tucker, Nov. 23 (“Every day”) and Dec. 3, 1803 (“What a scene”), in Coleman, Virginia Silhouettes, 11–13, 14.

  15 Chernow, Washington, 802–3; Walsh, “Rural African Americans,” 328, 331–32; Whitman, Price of Freedom, 75; Steward, Twenty-Two Years a Slave, 49; Lobb, Uncle Tom’s Story, 18–20 (“a great calamity” and “the frantic terror”).

  16 John H. Cocke to Joseph C. Cabell, Apr. 29, 1814, JCC&CFP (38-111), box 10, SSCL-UVA; R. S. Dunn, “After Tobacco,” 346–53, 362; R. S. Dunn, “Tale of Two Plantations,” 55–57; Federic, Slave Life, 13; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 171–74; Shalhope, John Taylor, 108–11, 141–42; Stanton, “‘Those Who Labor for My Happiness,’” 150–55; Walsh, “Work and Resistance,” 106–10; Walsh, “Rural African Americans,” 337; Morton, Robert Carter, 110–13; J. Taylor, Arator, 132 (“Slaves are”), 139–40 (“an object of terror”).

  17 R. S. Dunn, “Tale of Two Plantations,” 51n23; Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves, 409–10; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 218–19, 326; Morton, Robert Carter, 93–94; Roberts and Roberts, Moreau de St. Mery’s American Journey, 305.

  18 Loux, “John Hartwell Cocke, Jr.,” 330–31; John H. Cocke, “Standing Rules for the Government of Slaves on a Virginia Plantation,” JCC&CFP (38-111), box 11, SSCL-UVA.

  19 John H. Cocke, “Standing Rules for the Government of Slaves on a Virginia Plantation,” JCC&CFP (38-111), box 11, SSCL-UVA; J. Taylor, Arator, 138–40.

  20 John H. Cocke to Joseph C. Cabell, Apr. 29, 1814 (“on one of my River hills”), and Cocke, “Standing Rules for the Government of Slaves on a Virginia Plantation” (“Arrangement”), JCC&CFP (38-111), boxes 10 and 11, SSCL-UVA: Cocke to Cabell, July 5 and Sep. 18, 1815 (“Overseers”), JCCFP (38-111-c), box 4, SSCL-UVA.

  21 Joseph C. Cabell to John H. Cocke, July 24, 1812 (“conceited”), and Cocke to Cabell, July 24, 1812, JCCFP (38-111-c), box 8, SSCL-UVA; Cabell to Cocke, July 5, 1813, and July 11, 1816, JCCFP (38-111-c), boxes 9 and 11, SSCL-UVA; Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph, Apr. 19, 1772, quoted in Stanton, “‘Those Who Labor for My Happiness,’” 160; Shalhope, John Taylor, 140–41; Sobel, World They Made Together, 60; Grimes, Life of William Grimes, 36–37; Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves, 409–10; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 326–28, 333; Morton, Robert Carter, 93–95, 112.

  22 John Randolph quoted in W. C. Bruce, John Randolph, vol. 2:702
–5.

  23 Walsh, “Work and Resistance,” 109–10, 118 (overseer James Eagle quote on 118); Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves, 389–92; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 329; Sidbury, Ploughshares into Swords, 25. R. Parkinson, Tour in America, vol. 2:419–22.

  24 R. Parkinson, Tour in America, vol. 2:419–22; Joseph C. Cabell to St. George Tucker, July 31, 1810, TCP, reel M-25, SCSL-CWM. For disincentives to slave enterprise, see W. C. Bruce, John Randolph, vol. 2:118–19; R. B. Davis, Jeffersonian America, 149; R. S. Dunn, “Tale of Two Plantations,” 65; Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves, 411; McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 23–24, 70–71, 138–40.

  25 Steward, Twenty-Two Years a Slave, 14–17, 24; Ball, Fifty Years in Chains, 59; Roberts and Roberts, Moreau de St. Mery’s American Journey, 59; trial of Isaac, Sep. 1, 1812, JBEP, reel 5505, LV; [G. Tucker], Letters from Virginia, 100–101. A few overseers devised still more sadistic modes of torture. See Fithian, Journal and Letters, 51.

  26 Thomas Chrystie to Philip Croxton, May 19, 1811, Thomas Chrystie Papers, box 1, VHS.

  27 Frey, Water from the Rock, 236; McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 64–65; J. D. Rothman, Notorious in the Neighborhood, 141; Lobb, Uncle Tom’s Story, 14–15; St. George Tucker to Jeremy Belknap, June 29, 1795, in Belknap, “Queries,” 409; St. G. Tucker, Dissertation on Slavery, 8–9, 32–35; Morton, Robert Carter, 113–14; Wyllie, “Observations,” 400–401; Saunders, “Crime and Punishment,” 42–43.

  28 Zachary Shackleford et al. to James Barbour, Oct. 12, 1813, JBEP, reel 5516, LV; Frances Baylor to Barbour, Nov. 23, 1814, John Baylor to Barbour, Nov. 26, 1814, and F. Baylor to Barbour, Dec. 7, 1814, in JBEP, reel 5524, LV; McColley, Slavery and Jeffersonian Virginia, 65–66; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 289, 314–15; J. D. Rothman, Notorious in the Neighborhood, 135; Schwarz, Twice Condemned, 210–11, 216.

  29 Schwarz, Twice Condemned, 215–16, 231–40; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 394–95; Saunders, “Crime and Punishment,” 35–41; St. George Tucker to Jeremy Belknap, June 29, 1795, in Belknap, “Queries,” 405.