CHAPTER IV.

THE BREAKING UP OF SLAVERY--MANUMISSION.

In Pennsylvania the disintegration of slavery began as soon as slavery was established, for there were free negroes in the colony at the beginning of the eighteenth century.[166] Manumission may have taken place earlier than this, for in 1682 an owner made definite promise of freedom to his negro.[167] The first indisputable case now known, however, occurred in 1701, when a certain Lydia Wade living in Chester County freed her slaves by testament.[168] In the same year William Penn on his return to England liberated his blacks likewise.[169] Judging from the casual and unexpected references to free negroes which come to light from time to time, it seems probable that other masters also bestowed freedom. At any rate the status of the free negro had come to be recognized about this time as one to be protected by law, for when in 1703 Antonio Garcia, a Spanish mulatto, was brought to Philadelphia as a slave, he appealed to the provincial Council, and presently was set at liberty.[170] In 1717 the records of Christ Church mention Jane, a free negress, who was baptized there with her daughter.[171]

This freeing of negroes at so early a time in the history of the colony is sufficiently remarkable. It might be expected that manumission would have been rare; and, indeed, the records are very few at first. Nevertheless a law passed in 1725-1726 would indicate that the practice was by no means unusual.[172]

It is not possible.to say what was the immediate cause of the passing of that part of the act which refers to manumission. It may have been the growth of a class of black freemen, or it may have been the desire to check manumission;[173] but it was probably neither of these things so much as it was the practice of masters who set free their infirm slaves when the labor of those slaves was no longer remunerative.[174] This practice together with the usual shiftlessness of most of the freedmen makes the resulting legislation intelligible enough. It provided that thereafter if any master purposed to set his negro free, he should obligate himself at the county court to secure the locality in which the negro might reside from any expense occasioned by the sickness of the negro or by his inability to support himself. If a negro received liberty by will, recognizance should be entered into by the executor immediately. Without this no negro was to be deemed free. The security was fixed at thirty pounds.[175]

Whatever may have been the full purpose of this statute, there can be no question that it did check manumission to a certain extent. A standing obligation of thirty pounds, which might at any moment become an unpleasant reality, when added to the other sacrifices which freeing a slave entailed, was probably sufficient to discourage many who possessed mildly good intentions. Several times it was protested that the amount was so excessive as to check the beneficence of owners:[176] and on one occasion it was computed that the thirty pounds required did not really suffice to support such negroes as became charges, but that a different method and a smaller sum would have secured better results.[177] The burden to owners was no doubt felt very grievously during the latter half of the eighteenth century, when manumission was going on so actively, and it is known that the Assembly was asked to give relief.[178] Nevertheless nothing was done until 1780 when the abolition act swept from the statute-books all previous legislation about the negro, slave as well as free.[179]

In spite of the obstacles created by the statute of 1725-1726, the freeing of negroes continued. In 1731 John Baldwin of Chester ordered in his will that his negress be freed one year after his decease. Two years later Ralph Sandiford is said to have given liberty to all of his slaves. In 1742 Judge Langhorne in Bucks County devised freedom to all of his negroes, between thirty and forty in number. In 1744 by the will of John Knowles of Oxford, negro James was to be made free on condition that he gave security to the executors to pay the thirty pounds if required. Somewhat before this time John Harris, the founder of Harrisburg, set free the faithful negro Hercules, who had saved his life from the Indians. In 1746 Samuel Blunson manumitted his slaves at Columbia. During this period negroes were occasionally sent to the Moravians, who gave them religious training, baptized them, and after a time set them at liberty. During the following years the records of some of the churches refer again and again to free negroes who were married in them, baptized in them, or who brought their children to them to be baptized.[180] At an early date there was a sufficient number of free black people in Pennsylvania to attract the attention of philanthropists; and it is known that Whitefield as early as 1744 took up a tract of land partly with the intention of making a settlement of free negroes.[181] Up to this time, however, manumission probably went on in a desultory manner, hampered by the large security required, and practised only by the most ardent believers in human liberty. The middle of the eighteenth century marked a great turning-point.

The southeastern part of Pennsylvania, in which most of the negroes were located, was peopled largely by Quakers, who in many localities were the principal slave-owners, and who at different periods during the eighteenth century probably held from a half to a third of all the slaves in the colony. But they were never able to reconcile this practice entirely with their religious belief and from the very beginning it encountered strong opposition. As this opposition is really part of the history of abolition in Pennsylvania it will be treated at length in the following chapter. Here it is sufficient to say that from 1688 a long warfare was carried on, for the most part by zealous reformers who gradually won adherents, until about 1750 the Friends' meetings declared against slavery, and the members who were not slave-owners undertook to persuade those who still owned negroes to give them up.

The feeling among some of the Friends was extraordinary at this time. They went from one slaveholder to another expostulating, persuading, entreating. It was then that the saintly John Woolman did his work; but he was only the most distinguished among many others. It is hardly possible to read over the records of any Friends' meeting for the next thirty years without finding numerous references to work of this character; and in more than one journal of the period mention is made of the obstacles encountered and the expedients employed.[182]

The results of their efforts were far-reaching. Many Friends who would have scrupled to buy more slaves, and who were convinced that slave-holding was an evil, yet retained such slaves as they had, through motives of expediency, and also because they believed that negroes held in mild bondage were better off than when free. Against this temporizing policy the reformers fought hard, and aided by the decision of the Yearly Meeting that slaveholders should no longer participate in the affairs of the Society, carried forward their work with such success that within one more generation slavery among the Friends in Pennsylvania had passed away.

During the period, then, from 1750 to 1780 manumission among the Friends became very frequent. Many slaves were set free outright, their masters assuming the liability required by law. Others were manumitted on condition that they would not become chargeable.[183] Some owners gave promise of freedom at the end of a certain number of years, considering the service during those years an equivalent for the financial obligation which at the end they would have to assume.[184] Often the negro was given his liberty on condition that at a future time he would pay to the master his purchase price.[185] In 1751 a writer said that numerous negroes had gained conditional freedom, and were wandering around the country in search of employment so as to pay their owners. The magistrates of Philadelphia complained of this as a nuisance.[186]

Just how many slaves gained their freedom during this period it is impossible to say. The church records mention them again and again; and they become, what they had not been before, the occasion of frequent notice and serious speculation.[187] Other people began now to follow the Friends' example,[188] and the belief in abstract principles of freedom aroused by the Revolutionary struggle gave further impetus to the movement.[189] In every quarter, now, manumissions were constantly being made.[190] Any estimate as to how many negroes, servants and free, there were in Pennsylvania by 1780 must be largely a conjecture, but it is perhaps safe to say that there were between four and five thousand.[191]

The act of 1780, which put an end to the further growth of slavery in Pennsylvania, marked the beginning of the final work of the liberators. Coming at a time when so many people had given freedom to their slaves, and passing with so little opposition in the Assembly as to show that the majority of Pennsylvania's people no longer had sympathy with slavery, it was the signal to the abolitionists to urge the manumission of such negroes as the law had left in bondage. The task was made easier by the fact that not only was the value of the slave property now much diminished, but a man no longer needed to enter into surety when he set his slaves free. Doubtless many whose religious scruples had been balanced by material considerations, now saw the way smooth before them, or arranged to make the sacrifice cost them little or nothing at all. During this period manumission took on a commercial aspect which formerly had not been so evident. This was brought about in several ways.

Sometimes negroes had saved enough to purchase their liberty.[192] Many, as before, received freedom upon binding themselves to pay for it at the expiration of a certain time.[193] In this they often received assistance from well-disposed people, in particular from the Friends, who had by no means stopped the good work when their own slaves were set free.[194] At times the entire purchase money was paid by some philanthropist.[195] Frequently one member of a negro family bought freedom for another, the husband often paying for his wife, the father for his children.[196] Furthermore it had now become common to bind out negroes for a term of years, and many owners who desired their slaves to be free, found partial compensation in selling them for a limited period, on express condition that all servitude should be terminated strictly in accordance with the contract. By furthering such transactions the benevolent tried to help negroes to gain freedom.[197] Occasionally the slave liberated was bound for a term of years to serve the former master.[198] Even at this period, however, negroes continued to be manumitted from motives of pure benevolence. Some received liberty by the master's testament, and others were held only until assurance was given the master that he would not become liable under the poor law.[199]

As the result of the earnest efforts that were made slavery in Pennsylvania dwindled steadily. In the course of a long time it would doubtless have passed away as the result of continued individual manumission. As a matter of fact, it had become almost extinct within two generations after 1750. This was brought about by work that affected not individuals, but whole classes, and finally all the people of the state; which was designed to strike at the root of slavery and destroy it altogether. This was abolition.

FOOTNOTES:

[166] It is of course possible that some of these negroes had been servants, and that their period of service was over.

[167] "Where As William Clark did buy ... An negor man Called and knowen by the name of black Will for and during his natrill Life; never the Less the said William Clark doe for the Incourigment of the sd neagor servant hereby promise Covenant and Agree; that if the said Black Will doe well and Truely sarve the said William Clark ... five years ... then the said Black Will shall be Clear and free of and from Any further or Longer Sarvicetime or Slavery ... as wittnes my hand this Thurteenth day of ... June Anno; Din; 1682." MS. Ancient Rec. of Sussex Co., 1681-1709, p. 116.

[168] "My will is that my negroes John and Jane his wife shall be set free one month after my decease." Ashmead, _History of Delaware County_, 203.

[169] "I give to ... my blacks their freedom as is under my hand already" ... MS. Will of William Penn, Newcastle on Delaware, 30th 8br, 1701. This will, which was left with James Logan, was not carried out. Penn's last will contains no mention of his negroes. He frequently mentions them elsewhere. _Cf._ MS. Letters and Papers of William Penn (Dreer), 29 (1689), 35 (1690); _Pa. Mag._, XXXIII, 316 (1690); MS. Logan Papers. II, 98 (1703). _Cf._ also Penn. MSS., Official Correspondence, 97.

[170] _Col. Rec._, II, 120.

[171] Jane "a free negro woman" ... MS. Rec. Christ Church, 46.

[172] "Whereas 'tis found by experience that free negroes are an idle, slothful people and often prove burdensome to the neighborhood and afford ill examples to other negroes" ... "An Act for the better regulating of Negroes in this Province." _Stat. at L._, IV, 61.

[173] "Our Ancestors ... for a long time deemed it policy to obstruct the emancipation of Slaves and affected to consider a free Negro as a useless if not a dangerous being" ... Letter of W. Rawle (1787), in MS. Rec. Pa. Soc. Abol. Slavery.

[174] _Votes and Proceedings_, II, 336, 337.

[175] "An Act for the better regulating of Negroes in this Province." _Stat. at L._, IV, 61 (1725-1726).

[176] "This is however very expensive for they are obliged to make a provision for the Negro thus set at liberty, to afford him subsistence when he is grown old, that he may not be driven by necessity to wicked actions, or that he may be at anybody's charge, for these free Negroes become very lazy and indolent afterwards." Kalm, _Travels_, I, 394 (1748).

[177] _Cf. Votes and Proceedings, 1767-1776_, p. 30. The author of _Brief Considerations on Slavery, and the Expediency of Its Abolition_ (1773) argued that the public derived benefit from the labor of adult free negroes, and that the public should pay the surety required. By an elaborate calculation he endeavored to prove that a sum of about five shillings deposited at interest by the community each year of the negro's life after he was twenty-one, would amply suffice for all requirements. Pp. 8-14 of the second part, entitled "An Account Stated on the Manumission of Slaves." He says "As the laws stand at present in several of our northern governments, the act of manumission is clogged with difficulties that almost amount to a prohibition." _Ibid._, 11.

[178] _Votes and Proceedings, 1767-1776_, p. 696.

[179] _Stat. at L._, X, 72.

[180] Martin, _History of Chester_, 480; Watson, _Annals_, II, 265; _Pa. Mag._, VII, 82; Davis, _History of Bucks County_, 798; MS. in Miscellaneous Collection, Box 10, Negroes; Morgan, _Annals of Harrisburg_, 11; Smedley, _History of the Underground Railroad in Chester_, etc., 27; _Pa. Mag._, XII, 188; XXIX, 363, 365; MS. Rec. Christ Church, 46, 352, 356, 379, 400, 403, 404, 440, 441, 455, 475, 4126, 4330, 4356; MS. Rec. First Reformed Church, 4126, 4248; MS. Rec. St. Michael's and Zion, 97.

[181] _Cf._ Conyngham's "Historical Notes," in _Mem. Hist. Soc. Pa._, I, 338.

[182] See below, p. 74.

[183] MS. Miscellaneous Papers, 1684-1847, Chester Co., 101 (1764).

[184] They were generally held longer than apprentices or white servants--until twenty-eight or thirty years of age, but many of the Friends protested against this. MS. Diary of Richard Barnard, 24 5 mo., 1782; M.S. Minutes Exeter Monthly Meeting, Book B, 354 (1779).

[185] "I do hereby Certify that Benjamin Mifflin hath given me Directions to sell his Negro man Cuff to himself for the Sum of Sixty Pounds if he can raise the Money having Repeatedly refused from Others seventy Five Pounds and upwards for him." MS. (1769) in Misc. Coll., Box 10, Negroes.

[186] _Pa. Gazette_, Mar. 5, 1751.

[187] _Cf._ Benezet, _Some Historical Account of Guinea_, 134, 135, where he laments the difficulties under which free negroes labor. Also same author, _A Mite Cast into the Treasury_, 13-17, where he argues that negro servants should not be held longer than white apprentices.

[188] "Die mährischen Brüder folgten diesem rühmlichen Beispiel; so auch Christen von den übrigen Bekenntnissen." Ebeling, in _Erdbeschreibung_, etc., IV, 220.

[189] _Cf._ preamble to the act of 1780. _Stat. at L._, X, 67, 68. A negro twenty-one years old was manumitted because "all mankind have an Equal Natural and Just right to Liberty." MS. Extracts Rec. Goshen Monthly Meeting, 415 (G. Cope).

[190] MS. General Quarter Sessions of the Peace, Phila. Co., 1773-1780. Franklin, Letter to Dean Woodward, Apr. 10, 1773, in _Works_ (ed. Sparks), VIII, 42.

[191] In 1751 the number of negroes in Pennsylvania, including Delaware, was thought to be 11,000. _Cf._ above, p. 12. The negroes in Pennsylvania alone by 1780 probably did not exceed the same number. Of these 6,000 were said to be slaves. _Cf._ above, _ibid._ In some places by this time manumission was nearly complete. _Cf._ W. J. Buck, in _Coll. Hist. Soc. Pa._, I, 201.

[192] MSS. Misc. Coll., Box 10, Negroes.

[193] MS. Rec. Pa. Soc. Abol. Sl., I, 19, 27, 29, 43, 67, and _passim_.

[194] A MS. dated Phila., 1769, contains a list of persons who had promised to contribute towards purchasing a negro's freedom. Among the memoranda are: "John Head agrees to give him Twenty Shillings and not to be Repaid ... John Benezet twenty Shillings ... Christopher Marshall /7/6.... If he can raise with my Donation enough to free him I agree to give him three pounds and not otherwise I promise Saml Emlen jur ... Joseph Pemberton by his Desire [Five _erased_] pounds £3." MS. Misc. Coll., Box 10, Negroes.

[195] Misc. MSS. 1744-1859. Northern, Interior and Western Counties, 191 (1782).

[196] In 1779 a negro of Bucks County to secure the freedom of his wife gave his note to be paid by 1783. In 1782, having paid part, he was allowed to take his wife until the next payment. In 1785 she was free. MS. Rec. Pa. Soc. Abol. Sl., I, 27-43. In 1787 negro Samson had purchased his wife and children for ninety-nine pounds. _Ibid._, I, 67. James Oronogue, who had been hired by his master to the keeper of a tavern, gained by his obliging behavior sixty pounds from the customers within four years' time, and at his master's death was allowed to purchase his freedom for one hundred pounds. He paid besides fifty pounds for his wife. _Ibid._, I, 69. When Cuff Douglas had been a slave for thirty-seven years his master promised him freedom after four years more. On the master agreeing to take thirty pounds in lieu of this service, Douglas hired himself out, and was free at the end of sixteen months. He then began business as a tailor, and presently was able to buy his wife and children for ninety pounds, besides one son for whom he paid forty-five pounds. _Ibid._, I, 72. Also _ibid._, I, 79, 91.

[197] "Wanted to purchase, a good Negro Wench.... If to be sold on terms of freedom by far the most agreeable." _Pa. Packet_, Aug. 22, 1778. In 1791 Caspar Wistar bought a slave for sixty pounds "to extricate him from that degraded Situation" ..., his purpose being to keep the negro for a term of years only. MS, Misc. Coll., Box 10, Negroes. Numerous other examples among the same MSS.

[198] "I, John Lettour from motives of benevolence and humanity ... do ... set free ... my Negro Girl Agathe Aged about Seventeen Years. On condition ... that she ... bind herself by Indenture to serve me ... Six years".... MS. _ibid. Cf._ MS. Abstract Rec. Abington Monthly Meeting, 372 (1765).

[199] "I Manumit ... my Negro Girl Abb when she shall Arrive to the Age of Eighteen Years ... (on Condition that the Committee for the Abolition of slavery shall make entry according to Law ... so as to secure me from any Costs or Trouble on me or my Estate on said Negro after the age of Eighteen Years) ... Hannah Evans." MS. Misc. Coll., Box 10, Negroes. _Cf._ _Stat. at L._, X, 70. At times this might become an unpleasant reality. _Cf._ MS. State of a Case respecting a Negro (Ridgway Branch).