Never Caught

by Erica Armstrong Dunbar

I have learned so very much from Dawn, more than I ever thought possible at this stage in my life. Dawn Davis believed in me and in Ona’s story, and her patience and heavy editor’s pen helped me to rethink the way that I write and present history. The first time that I sat in her office I knew that she was the one. Smart, fierce, and forthright, Dawn is a force and I thank her for helping me to share Ona Judge Staines with the world. This is a collective win for black women’s history.

  About the Author

  Erica Armstrong Dunbar is the Blue and Gold Distinguished Professor of Black Studies and History at the University of Delaware. She received her BA from the University of Pennsylvania and her PhD in American history from Columbia University. In 2008 she published A Fragile Freedom: African American Women and Emancipation in the Antebellum City with Yale University Press. In 2011, she was appointed the first director of the Program in African American History at the Library Company of Philadelphia. She has been the recipient of Ford, Mellon, and Social Science Research Council fellowships and is an Organization of American Historians Distinguished Lecturer. She lives just outside of Philadelphia with her husband and son.

  MEET THE AUTHORS, WATCH VIDEOS AND MORE AT

  SimonandSchuster.com

  authors.simonandschuster.com/Erica-Armstrong-Dunbar

  Facebook.com/37INKBOOKS

  @37INKBOOKS

  Also by Erica Armstrong Dunbar

  A Fragile Freedom: African American Women and Emancipation in the Antebellum City

  We hope you enjoyed reading this 37 Ink/Atria eBook.

  * * *

  Join our mailing list and get updates on new releases, deals, bonus content and other great books from 37 Ink/Atria and Simon & Schuster.

  CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP

  or visit us online to sign up at

  eBookNews.SimonandSchuster.com

  Notes

  Foreword

  nearly six thousand people: I have drawn from the works of Nash and Soderlund’s Freedom by Degrees and Nash’s Forging Freedom, 143. Census records indicate that there were 6,436 black people living in Philadelphia by 1800. That number had more than tripled in just ten years.

  the capital moved to Philadelphia: Lawler, “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” 5–95. Also see Nash, The Forgotten Fifth: African Americans in the Age of Revolution, 61.

  the “first lady”: The term “first lady” was not used until the middle of the nineteenth century; however, I use the term throughout the text to refer to Martha Washington.

  recorded narratives of an eighteenth-century Virginia fugitive: Scholars have unearthed evidence about the lives of fugitives such as Harry Washington, who escaped slavery through his service to the British during the American Revolution. See Cassandra Pybus’s Epic Journeys of Freedom: Runaway Slaves of the American Revolution and Their Global Quest for Liberty (New York: Beacon Press, 2006) and Egerton’s Death or Liberty: African Americans and Revolutionary America.

  Chapter One

  “It rain’d Hail’d snow’d and was very Cold”: Theodore J. Crackel, The Papers of George Washington Digital Edition (University of Virginia Press, Rotunda, 2008) accessed June 7, 2014, http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/founders/GEWN-01-03-02-0003-0013-0011. Original source: Diaries (11 March 1748–13 December 1799), vol. 3 (1 January 1771–5 November 1781).

  “in better health and spirits”: Crackel, The Papers of George Washington Digital Edition, accessed June 9, 2014, http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/founders/GEWN-02-09-02-0185. Original source: Colonial Series (7 July 1748–15 June 1775), vol. 9 (8 January 1772–18 March 1774).

  only one living child: For more on the early life of Martha Dandridge Custis, see Joseph E. Fields’s “Worthy Partner”: The Papers of Martha Washington (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1994), xx.

  breaking the news of his stepdaughter’s death: Crackel, The Papers of George Washington Digital Edition, accessed June 9, 2014, http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/founders/GEWN-02-09-02-0185. Original source: Colonial Series (7 July 1748–15 June 1775), vol. 9 (8 January 1772–18 March 1774).

  one of the wealthiest widows in the colony of Virginia: See “Complete Inventory of the Estate of Daniel Parke Custis” and “Account of Land and Acreage” in Fields, “Worthy Partner,” 61–76.

  Betty was approximately twenty-one years old: See “List of Artisans and Household Slaves in the Estate c. 1759” in Crackel, The Papers of George Washington Digital Edition, accessed April 26, 2014, http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/founders/GEWN-02-06-02-0164-0025. Original source: Colonial Series (7 July 1748–15 June 1775), vol. 6 (4 September 1758–26 December 1760). The date of this document is still uncertain; however, Betty is listed as a twenty-one-year-old dower slave and seamstress.

  sexual relations with his slaves: A number of scholars have contributed to the growing literature surrounding rape and sexual power in early America. Sharon Block’s Rape and Sexual Power in Early America, Jennifer Morgan’s Laboring Women: Reproduction and Gender in New World Slavery and Clare Lyons’s Sex among the Rabble are extremely helpful texts.

  the poet Frances Ellen Watkins Harper wrote: See Houston Baker’s Long Black Song: Essays in Black American Literature and Culture (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1990), 70. No other children were listed with Betty on the slave inventory lists from the Custis estate. If by 1759 Betty had children other than Austin, they were either deceased or had been sold away.

  The highest-valued mother-and-child pair: Fields, “Worthy Partner,” 61.

  hired white weaver named Thomas Davis: I am indebted to the many years of research conducted by research historian Mary Thompson at the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington. Thompson has pored over the records of the estate for decades and was generous with her time and research with me as I completed this book. My analysis regarding the family ties of Ona Judge is in alignment with Thompson’s beliefs. I would also like to thank Molly Kerr, Digital Humanities Program manager at the library, for all of her time and thoughtfulness as we went about the difficult work of the genealogy of the enslaved. I believe that Thomas Davis, a white hired weaver who worked at Mount Vernon, fathered at least two of Betty’s children. Their textile skills would have placed the slave and servant in direct contact with each other. It is almost impossible to know the exact birth dates of Betty’s children. Washington did not keep vital statistics for all of his slaves and therefore did not record their births. There were two extant inventories produced for Washington’s slaves: one in 1786 and another in 1799. The 1786 inventory lists the approximate ages of Betty’s children as does the inventory from 1799.

  knowledge of expert weaving: See Julie Matthaei’s An Economic History of Women in America, 43–63. Also see Laurel Thatcher Ulrich’s A Midwife’s Tale and The Age of Homespun, 75-174.

  a daughter named Ona Maria Judge: We do not know the exact month in which Ona Judge was born. We know that Judge was born sometime around 1773–1774.

  She would be called Oney: “Oney” was the diminutive of Ona, a nickname that appears in numerous places throughout George Washington’s letters, ledgers, and slave inventories. In her interviews that appear in abolitionist newspapers much later in her life, she refers to herself as Ona Maria Judge or Ona Staines. I have chosen to use the name that she called herself and not the diminutive that so often appears in the records and secondary sources.

  “Baltimore or any port in America”: George Washington Papers, Library of Congress, 1741–1799, ser. 4. General Correspondence, 1697–1799, Andrew Judge and Alexander Coldclough, 8 July 1772, Printed Indenture.

  Andrew Judge entered into service: See David W. Galenson’s “The Rise and Fall of Indentured Servitude in the Americas: An Economic Analysis” in Journal of Economic History 44, no. 1 (March 1984): 1–26.

  creating the blue uniform worn by Washington: Lund Washington’s Mount Vernon Account Book, 1772–86, f. 32, ViMtvL, http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washin
gton/02-10-02-0113. According to Lund Washington, in November of 1774 Judge made “1 Suite Regimentals” for George Washington.

  the birth of a daughter: Aside from Andrew Judge, no other person with the same last name lived at Mount Vernon or the surrounding area. Andrew Judge’s arrival in 1772 and Ona Judge’s birth sometime between 1773 and 1774 make the strongest of cases that the two were related. Descriptions of Ona Judge fashion her as interracial with a light complexion and bushy hair.

  Andrew Judge lived in his own home: “Heads of Families, Virginia,” Heads of Families at the First Census of the United States Taken in the Year 1790: Records of the State Enumerations, 1782 to 1785: Virginia (Washington: BPO, 1908). The home in which Judge lived was either purchased outright or on land that was rented.

  Ona and her siblings, including Philadelphia: Although there are suggestions that Philadelphia was also the daughter of Andrew Judge, I have not been able to track down any slave inventories or records that refer to Philadelphia as “Philadelphia Judge.” Philadelphia’s manumission papers and obituary do not refer to her as “Judge.” While there are existing family letters at the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington from descendants of Philadelphia that name her as “Philadelphia Judge,” I have found nothing else that cites her as such. For a complete list of Washington’s slave inventories of 1786 and 1799, see “[Diary entry: 18 February 1786],” Founders Online, National Archives (http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/01-04-02-0003-0002-0018 [last update: 2015-03-20]). Source: Donald Jackson and Dorothy Twohig, eds., The Diaries of George Washington, vol. 4, 1784–30 June 1786 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1978), 276–83, and “Washington’s Slave List, June 1799,” Founders Online, National Archives (http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/06-04-02-0405 [last update: 2015-03-20]). Source: W. W. Abbot, ed., The Papers of George Washington, Retirement Series, vol. 4, April–December 1799 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1999), 527–42.

  The name is both African and Gaelic: Evelyn Gerson’s master’s thesis, “A Thirst for Complete Freedom: Why Fugitive Slave Ona Judge Staines Never Returned to Her Master, President George Washington” (Cambridge: Harvard University, 2000), notes that the name “Ona” emerged from three African tribal languages. See Newbell Niles Puckett and Murray Heller’s Black Names in America: Origins and Usage (Boston: G.K. Hall 1975), 429–30. The text suggests that although the name “Ona” has its roots in African languages, it was used by white women. Nineteenth-century records show that both men and women were named Ona.

  House for Families: The “Quarters [or House] for Families” were eventually torn down in the 1790s. By the early 1790s until George Washington’s death, the majority of the slaves at the Mansion House lived in the buildings that flanked the Greenhouse. Some slaves lived in rooms above the kitchen building as well as individual cabins.

  Childhood for enslaved girls and boys was fleeting: For more on childhood and slavery, see Marie Jenkins Schwartz’s Born in Bondage: Growing Up Enslaved in the Antebellum South (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009). Although this text focuses upon childhood and enslavement in the nineteenth century, it is extremely helpful in lending context to Ona Judge’s life in late eighteenth-century Virginia. Chapter three, titled “Young Children in the Quarter,” offers a nuanced interpretation of challenges faced by enslaved children.

  Chapter Two

  unanimously elected to serve as president: See Gordon Wood’s Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different (New York: Penguin, 2006), 46–47.

  “President of the United States of America”: Letter from John Langdon to George Washington, 6 April 1789, Manuscript, George Washington Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress [Digital ID# us0071].

  “to borrow money upon interest”: Letter to Richard Conway, 4 March 1789, in The Papers of George Washington, Presidential Series, vol. 1 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987), 361–62.

  Seven slaves would accompany the Washingtons: As noted before, the absence of a birth record for Ona Judge only allows us to speculate about her exact age. It is probable that she was either fifteen or sixteen years of age when the Washingtons moved to New York.

  things connected to the running of the house: Gerson, “A Thirst for Complete Freedom,” 53.

  “I bade adieu to Mount Vernon”: “[Diary entry: 16 April 1789],” Founders Online, National Archives (http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/01-05-02-0005-0001-0001 [last update: 2015-12-30]). Source: Donald Jackson and Dorothy Twohig, eds., The Diaries of George Washington, vol. 5, July 1786–December 1789 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1979), 445–47.

  “to render service to my country”: Ibid.

  Washington’s journey north took him through Philadelphia: Kaminski and McCaughn, A Great and Good Man, 104.

  “quiet entry devoid of ceremony”: George Washington to George Clinton, 25 March 1789. The Papers of George Washington Digital Edition.

  “Rooms in a Tavern”: Ibid.

  3 Cherry Street: Chernow, Washington: A Life, 564.

  a population of about thirty thousand people: White, Somewhat More Independent, 4. The 1790 census reported 31,229 people living in New York City.

  The streets of New York: Ibid. For more on race, slavery, and freedom in New York during the Early National Period, see Leslie Harris’s In the Shadow of Slavery and Graham Russell Hodges’s Root & Branch.

  Unsettled and displeased: Martha Washington wrote to a handful of family and friends, describing her unhappiness with the transition to New York and a longing for Mount Vernon. See Martha Washington, “Letter, Martha Washington to Mercy Otis Warren, December 26, 1789,” in Martha Washington, Item #25, accessed July 29, 2014, http://www.marthawashington.us/items/show/25 and “Letter, Martha Washington to Fanny Bassett Washington, October 23, 1789,” in Martha Washington, Item #13, accessed July 29, 2014, http://marthawashington.us/items/show/13.

  “Black Sam as Steward”: Tobias Lear to George Augustine Washington, 3 May 1789, George Washington Manuscript Collection, Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library, Duke University.

  awaiting the arrival of the first lady: Ibid.

  “Everything appeared to be in confusion”: Robert Lewis, “Journal of a Journey from Fredericksburg, Virginia to New York, May 13–20, 1789,” Digital Collections from George Washington’s Mount Vernon, http://cdm16829.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p16829coll14/id/45/rec/2.

  “these poor wretches seemed greatly agitated”: Ibid.

  Austin’s wife, Charlotte: Charlotte was a seamstress at Mount Vernon and married to Austin. Charlotte had at least five children: Billy, Timmy, Elvey, Jenny, and Eliza.

  New York enacted a new comprehensive slave law: See Harris, In the Shadow of Slavery, 70–71 and Joanne Pope Melish, Disowning Slavery, 64–72.

  public sentiment regarding African slavery: See Harris’s In the Shadow of Slavery, chapters 3–4.

  William Lee was a teenager: Washington recorded the purchase of a teenage boy named “Mulatto Will” from Mary Lee for the sum of sixty-one pounds.

  dressing his master’s hair: See Douglas R. Egerton’s Death or Liberty: African Americans and Revolutionary America: 4–5.

  “fearless horseman”: Ibid., 5.

  “calling himself William Lee”: Ibid., 7.

  Thomas be allowed to travel to and live with Lee: Egerton, Death or Liberty, 7–8.

  “broke the pan of his knee”: Ibid.

  Black postilions and footmen: Edgar J. McManus, Black Bondage in the North (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1973), 17.

  caps worn by Giles and Paris: Decatur and Lear, Private Affairs of George Washington, 169. This specific request occurred in November of 1790.

  with her old friend Mary Morris: Martha Washington, Martha Washington to Frances B. Washington, 8 June 1789, Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, http://www.gilderlehrman.org/collections/treasure
s-from-the-collection/martha-washington-first-lady’s-grandchildren-were-her-top-.

  1,800 free blacks: Nash and Soderlund, Freedom by Degrees, 18. The 1790 census, tax assessment list, manumission lists, and Constables’ returns counted the total population of Philadelphia (including Southwark and Northern Liberties) as 44,096, of whom 301 were enslaved and 1,849 were free blacks.

  The eighteenth-century poster: Description of a Slave Ship (London), 1789, Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library, https://blogs.princeton.edu/rarebooks/2008/05/219-years-ago-description-of-a/.

  Franklin penned several essays: For more on Benjamin Franklin and his views on slavery, see David Waldstreicher’s Runaway America.

  moon sailed in front of the sun: Nasa.gov solar eclipse of May 24, 1789. Although myth has it that Banneker predicted an eclipse in April of 1789, NASA reports that the eclipse occurred on May 24, 1798, and was only seen from the region surrounding Papua, New Guinea.

  left Philadelphia and headed for New York: Martha Washington to Frances B. Washington, 8 June 1789.

  Chapter Three

  Embree would face charges: See Graham Russel Hodges’s Root & Branch, 166. Taken from the New York City Manumission Society Reports, 1785–95, New York Manumission Society Papers, New York Historical Society, and People v. Lawrence Embree (November 5, 1789), New York City Mayor’s Court Records, 1789–90, New York Public Library.

  African Free Schools for black children: See Harris’s In the Shadow of Slavery, 49, and see Christine Pawley’s Reading Places: Literacy, Democracy, and the Public Library in Cold War America (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2010), 49. Also see Elizabeth McHenry’s Forgotten Readers, 31–32.

  well-known nineteenth-century black leaders: “Examination Days: The New York African Free School Collection,” New York Historical Society, accessed April 20, 2015, https://www.nyhistory.org/web/africanfreeschool/#.