USA > Massachusetts > Notes on the history of slavery in Massachusetts > Part 4
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death ! Our anfwer, hereunto is, that we do acknow- ledge, that rule, Deut. 24: 16, to be morall, and there- fore perpetually binding, viz., that in a particular act of wickednefs, though capitall, the crime of the parent doth not render his child a fubject to punifhment by the civill magiftrate; yet, upon ferious confideration, we humbly conceive that the children of notorious traitors, rebells, and murtherers, efpecially of fuch as have bin principal leaders and actors in fuch horrid villanies, and that againft a whole nation, yea the whole Ifrael of God, may be involved in the guilt of their parents, and may, falva republica, be adjudged to death, as to us feems evident by the fcripture inftances of Saul, Achan, Haman, the children of whom were cut off, by the fword of Juftice for the tranfgreffions of their parents, although concerning fome of thofe children, it be manifeft, that they were not capable of being co-acters therein. Samuel Arnold, John Cotton."
September 7th, 1670.
The Rev. Increafe Mather, of Bofton, offers thefe fentiments on the queftion, in a letter to Mr. Cotton, October 30, 1676.
" If it had not been out of my mind, when I was writing, I fhould have faid fomething about Philip's fon. It is neceffary that fome effectual courfe fhould be taken about him. He makes me think of Hadad, who was a little child when his father, (the Chief ' Sachem of the Edomites) was killed by Joab; and, had not others fled away with him, I am apt to think, that David would have taken a courfe, that Hadad fhould never have proved a fcourge to the next generation."
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The Rev. James Keith, of Bridgewater, took a different view of the fubject, and gave more benignant interpretations. In a letter to Mr. Cotton of the fame date with Dr. Mather's, he fays, "I long to hear what becomes of Philip's wife and his fon. I know there is fome difficulty in that pfalm, 137, 8, 9, though I think it may be confidered, whether there be not fome fpecialty and fomewhat extraordinary in it. That law, Deut. 24: 16, compared with the commended example of Amafias, 2 Chron. 25 : 4, doth fway much with me, in the cafe under confideration. I hope God will direct thofe whom it doth concern to a good iffue. Let us join our prayers, at the throne of grace, with all our might, that the Lord would fo difpofe of all public motions and affairs, that his Jerufalem in this wildernefs may be the habitation of juftice and the mountain of holinefs ; that fo it may be, alfo, a quiet habitation, a tabernacle that fhall not be taken down."
The queftion thus ferioufly agitated would not, in modern times, occur in any nation in Chriftendom. Principles of public law, fentiments of humanity, and the mild influence of the Gofpel, in preference to a recurrence of the Jewifh difpenfation, fo much regarded by our anceftors in their deliberations and decifions,1 would forbid the thought of inflicting punifhment on children for the offences of a parent. It is gratifying to learn, that, in this inftance, the meditated feverities were not carried into execution, but that the merciful
1 In this difcuffion, however, both fcripture rule and example were in favour of the prifoner. The cafe quoted by Mr. Keith from 2 Chronicles is directly in point. " But he flew not their children, but did as it is writ- ten in the law in the book of Mofes," &c.
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fpirit manifefted in Mr. Keith's fuggeftions pre- vailed. In a letter from Mr. Cotton to his brother Mather, on the 20th of March following, on another fubject, there is this incidental remark : 'Philip's boy goes now to be fold.'" Davis's Morton's Memorial, Appendix, pp. 353-5.
In the winter of 1675-6, Major Waldron, a Com- miffioner, and Magiftrate for a portion of territory claimed by Maffachufetts (now included in that of Maine), iffued general warrants for feizing every Indian known to be a manflayer, traitor, or confpirator. Thefe precepts, which afforded every man a plaufible pretext to feize fufpected Indians, were obtained by feveral fhipmafters for the moft fhameful purpofes of kidnapping and flave-trading. One with his veffel lurked about the fhores of Pemaquid, and notwith- ftanding warning and remonftrance, fucceeded in kid- napping feveral of the natives, and, carrying them into foreign parts, fold them for flaves. Similar outrages were committed farther eaft upon the Indians about Cape Sable, " who never had been in the leaft manner guilty of any injury done to the Englifh." Hubbard adds to his account of this affair, " the thing alleadged is too true as to matter of Fact, and the perfons that did it, were lately committed to prifon in order to their further tryal." If the careful refearch of Maffa- chufetts antiquarians can difcover any record of the trial, conviction and juft punifhment of thefe offenders, it will be an honorable addition to their hiftory-far more creditable than the conftant reiteration of the ftory of " the negro interpreter " in 1646, which has been fo long in fervice, "to bear witnefs againft ye
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haynos and crying finn of man-ftealing," in behalf of "The Gen"all Corte" of Maffachufetts. Hubbard's Narrative, 1677, pp. 29, 30. Williamfon's Maine, I., 53I.
After the death of King Philip, fome of the In- dians from the weft and fouth of New England who had been engaged in the war, endeavored to conceal themfelves among their brethren of Penacook who had not joined in the war, and with them of Offapy and Pigwackett who had made peace.
By a "contrivance" (as Mather calls it) which favors ftrongly of treachery, four hundred of thefe Indians were taken prifoners, one half of whom were declared to have been acceffories in the late rebellion; and being "fent to Bofton, feven or eight of them, who were known to have killed any Englifhmen, were condemned and hanged ; the reft were fold into flavery in foreign parts."
Some of thofe very Indians, who were thus seized and fold, afterwards made their way home, and found opportunity to fatisfy their revenge during the war with the French and Indians known as King William's War. Belknap, I., 143, 245. Mather's Magnalia, Book VII., 55 (699).
I.V.
AT firft, the number of flaves in Maffachufetts was comparatively fmall, and their increafe was not large until towards the clofe of the feventeenth century. Edward Randolph, in 1676, in an anfwer to feveral
Slavery in Mafachufetts. 49
heads of inquiry, &c., ftated that there were "not above 200 flaves in the colony, and thofe are brought from Guinea and Madagafcar." He alfo mentioned that fome fhips had recently failed to thofe parts from Maffachufetts. Hutchinfon's Collection of Papers, PP. 485, 495. Governor Andros reported that the flaves were not numerous in 1678-" not many fervants, and but few flaves, proportionable with free- men." N. Y. Col. Doc., III., 263.
In May, 1680, Governor Bradftreet anfwered certain Heads of Inquiry from the Lords of the Com- mittee for Trade and Foreign Plantations. Among his ftatements are the following :
" There hath been no company of blacks or flaves brought into the country fince the beginning of this plantation, for the fpace of fifty years, onely one fmall Veffell about two yeares fince, after twenty months' voyage to Madagafcar, brought hither betwixt forty and fifty Negroes, moft women and children, fold here for Iol., 15l. and 20/. apiece, which ftood the mer- chant, in near 40l. apiece: Now and then, two or three Negroes are brought hither from Barbadoes and other of his Majeftie's plantations, and fold here for about twenty pounds apiece. So that there may be within our Government about one hundred or one hundred and twenty. There are a very few blacks borne here, I think not above [five] or fix at the moft in a year, none baptized that I ever heard of. . . " M. H. S. Coll., III., viii., 337.
The following century changed the record. Many " companies" of flaves were " brought into the coun- try," and the inftitution flourifhed and waxed ftrong.
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Judge Sewall referred to the " numeroufnefs " of the flaves in the province in 1700. Gov. Dudley's report to the Board of Trade, in 1708, gave four hundred as then in Bofton, one half of whom were born there; and in one hundred other towns and villages one hundred and fifty more-making a total of five hundred and fifty. He ftated that negroes were found unprofitable, and that the planters there pre- ferred white fervants "who are ferviceable in war pres- ently, and after become planters." From January 24, 1698, to 25 December, 1707, two hundred negroes arrived in Maffachufetts.
Gov. Shute's information to the Lords of Trade, in 1720, Feb. 17, gave the number of flaves of Maffa- chufetts at 2,000, including a few Indians. He added that, during the fame year, thirty-feven male and fix- teen female negroes were imported, with the remark, " No great difference for feven years laft paft." Felt, Coll. Amer. Stat. Affoc., I., 586.
In 1735, there were 2,600 negroes in the Province. In 1742, there were 1, 514 in Bofton alone. Douglafs, I., 531. Thefe are probably very imperfect efti- mates, as it is well known that regular enumerations of the population were confidered very objectionable by the people of the Bay. Some recalled the number- ing of Ifrael by David, and perhaps all were jealous of the poffible defigns of the Government in England in obtaining accurate information of their numbers and refources. It is a curious fact that the firft cenfus in Maffachufetts, was a cenfus of negro flaves.
In 1754, an account of property in the Province liable to taxation being required, Gov. Shirley fent a
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fpecial meffage to the Houfe of Reprefentatives, in which he faid :
" There is one part of the Eftate, viz., the Negro Slaves, which I am at a lofs how to come at the knowl- edge of, without your affiftance." Journal, p. 119.
On the fame day, November 19, 1754, the Legis- lature made an order that the Affeffors of the feveral towns and diftricts within the Province, forthwith fend into the fecretary's office the exact number of the negro flaves, both males and females, fixteen years old and upwards, within their refpective towns and dis- tricts. Ib.1
This enumeration, as corrected by Mr. Felt, gives an aggregate of 4,489. The census of Negroes in 1764-5, according to the fame authority, makes their number 5,779, in' 1776, 5,249; in 1784, 4,377, in 1786, 4,371 ; and in 1790 (by the United States census) 6,001.2
The royal inftructions to Andros, in 1688, as
1 There is a curious illuftration of " the way of putting it" in Maffa- chufetts, in Mr. FELT's account of this " cenfus of flaves," in the Collections of the American Statistical Affociation, Vol. I., p. 208. He fays that the General Court paffed this order "for the purpofe of having an accurate account of flaves in our Commonwealth, as a Subject in which the people were becoming much interefted, relative to the cause of liberty!" There is not a particle of authority for this fuggeftion-fuch a motive for their action never exifted anywhere but in the imagination of the writer himfelf !
2 It is to be regretted that we have no official authorities on the fubject of the changes in this clafs of population during the period from 1776 to 1784. There is a moft extraordinary, if not incredible, ftatement made by the Duke de la Rochefoucault Liancourt in his Travels through the United States . . . in the years 1795, 1796, and 1797, of which a tranflation was publifhed in London in 1799. In that work, Vol. II., page 166, he fays, " It is to be obferved, that, in 1778, the general cenfus of Maffachu- fetts included eighteen thoufand flaves, whereas the fubfequent cenfus of 1790 exhibits only fix thoufand blacks."
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Governor of New England, required him to "pafs a law for the reftraining of inhuman feverity which may be ufed by ill mafters or overfeers towards the Chriftian fervants or flaves ; wherein provifion is to be made that the wilful killing of Indians and Negroes be punifhed with death, and a fitt penalty impofed for the maiming of them." N. Y. Col. Doc., III., 547. The reader will note the diftinction in thefe inftructions between the Christian fervants or flaves, and the Indians and Negroes. It points to a feature of flavery in Maffachufetts, at that time, which we propofe to notice in another portion of thefe notes.
The Law of 1698, Chapter 6, forbids trading or trucking with any " Indian, molato or negro fervant or flave, or other known diffolute, lewd, and diforderly perfons, of whom there is juft caufe of fufpicion." Such perfons were to be punifhed by whipping for fo trading with money or goods improperly obtained.
The Law of 1700, Chapter 13, was enacted to pro- tect the Indians againft the exactions and oppreffion which fome of the Englifh exercifed towards them "by drawing them to confent to covenant or bind themfelves or children apprentices or fervants for an unreafonable term, on pretence of or to make fatisfac- tion for fome fmall debt contracted or damage done by them." Other fimilar acts were afterwards paffed in 1718 and 1725, the latter having a claufe to protect them againft kidnapping.
In 1701, the Reprefentatives of the town of Bofton were " defired to promote the encouraging the bring- ing of white fervants, and to put a period to Negroes being flaves." Drake's Boston, 525. M. H. S. Coll., II.,
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viii., 184. We have no knowledge of the efforts made under this inftruction of the town of Bofton, but they failed to accomplifh anything. Indeed, the very next enactment concerning flavery was a ftep back- ward inftead of an advance towards reform-a meafure which turned out to be a permanent and effective barrier againft emancipation in Maffachufetts.
The Law of 1703, Chapter 2, was in reftraint of the " Manumiffion, Difcharge, or Setting free" of " Molatto or Negro flaves." Security was required againft the contingency of thefe perfons becoming a charge to the town, and " none were to be accounted free for whom fecurity is not given ;" but were " to be the proper charge of their refpective mafters or miftreffes, in cafe they ftand in need of relief and . fupport, notwithftanding any manumiffion or inftru- ment of freedom to them made or given," etc.1 A practice was prevailing to manumit aged or infirm flaves, to relieve the mafter from the charge of fup- porting them. To prevent this practice, the act was
1 Jonathan Sewall, writing to John Adams, February 31, 1760, puts the following cafe:
" A. man, by will, gives his negro his liberty, and leaves him a legacy. The executor confents that the negro fhall be free, but refufeth to give bond to the felectmen to indemnify the town againft any charge for his fupport, in cafe he fhould become poor, (without which, by the province law, he is not manumitted,) or to pay him the legacy.
Query. Can he recover the legacy, and how ?
John Adams, in reply, after illuftrating in two cafes the legal principle that the intention of the teftator, to be collected from the words, is to be obferved in the conftruction of a will, applied it to the cafe prefented as follows, viz. :
" The teftator plainly intended that his negro fhould have his liberty and a legacy ; therefore the law will prefume that he intended his executor fhould do all that without which he could have neither. That this in-
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paffed. C. f. Parfons. Winchendon vs. Hatfield in error, IV Mafs. Reports, 130. This act was ftill in force as late as June, 1807, when it was reproduced in the revifed laws, and continued until a much later period to govern the decifions of courts affecting the fettle- ment of town paupers. An unfuccefsful attempt to repeal it, will be found duly noticed in a fubfequent portion of thefe notes.
The Law of 1703, Chapter 4, prohibited Indian, Negro and Molatto fervants or flaves, to be abroad after nine o'clock, etc.
The Law of 1705, Chapter 6, " for the better pre- venting of a Spurious and Mixt Iffue, &c. ; " punifhes Negroes and Molattoes for improper intercourfe with ยท whites, by felling them out of the Province. It alfo
demnification was not in the teftator's mind, cannot be proved from the will any more than it could be proved, in the firft cafe above, that the tes- tator did not know a fee fimple would pafs a will without the word heirs ; nor than, in the fecond cafe, that the devife of a truft, that might continue for ever, would convey a fee fimple without the like words. I take it, therefore, that the executor of this will is, by implication, obliged to give bonds to the town treafurer, and, in his refufal, is a wrong doer ; and I can- not think he ought to be allowed to take advantage of his own wrong, fo much as to allege this want of an indemnification to evade an action of the cafe brought for the legacy by the negro himfelf.
But why may not the negro bring a fpecial action of the cafe againft the executor, fetting forth the will, the devife of freedom and a legacy, and then the neceffity of indemnification by the province law, and then a refufal to indemnify, and, of confequence, to fet free and to pay the legacy ?
Perhaps the negro is free at common law by the devife. Now, the province law feems to have been made only to oblige the mafter to main- tain his manumitted flave, and not to declare a manumiffion in the mafter's lifetime, or at his death, void. Should a mafter give a negro his freedom, under his hand and feal, without giving bond to the town, and fhould after- wards repent and endeavor to recall the negro into fervitude, would not that inftrument be a fufficient difcharge againft the mafter ?" Adams' Works, 1., 51, 55.
.
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punifhes any Negro or Molatto for ftriking a Chris- tian, by whipping at the difcretion of the Juftices be- fore whom he may be convicted. It alfo prohibits mar- riage of Chriftians with Negroes or Molattoes-and impofes a penalty of Fifty Pounds upon the perfons joining them in marriage. It provides againft un- reafonable denial of marriage to Negroes with thofe of the fame nation, by any Mafter-"any Law, Ufage, or Cuftom, to the contrary notwithftand- ing."
This provifo againft the unreafonable denial of marriage to negroes is very interefting. Legiflation againft the arbitrary exercife and abufe of authority proves its exiftence and the previous practice. It was as true then as it is now that the inftitution of flavery was inconfiftent with the juft rules of Chriftian morality.
In Pennfylvania, five years before, William Penn had propofed to his Council, " the neceffitie of a law [among others] about ye marriages of negroes." The fubject was referred to a committee of both houfes of the legiflature, and refulted in a Bill in the Affembly, " for regulating Negroes in their Morals and Marriages, etc.," " which was twice read and rejected. Penn. Col. Rec., I., 598. 606. Votes of Afembly, I., 120, 12I. This propofition of Penn was in accordance with the views of George Fox, whofe teftimony in regard to the treatment of flaves, given at Barbadoes in 1671, is elfewhere referred to in these notes. In his " Gofpel Family Order, being a fhort difcourfe concerning the Ordering of Families, both of Whites, Blacks, and Indians," he particularly enforced the neceffity of
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Notes on the History of
looking after the marriages of the blacks, to see that there was fome order and folemnity in the manner, and that the marriages fhould be recorded, and fhould be binding for life. See The Friend, Vol. XVII. 29, 4to., Phil. 1843.
No Chriftian man or woman, Quaker or Puritan, could fail to be fhocked at the loofenefs of all such ties and relations under the flave fyftem. One folitary witnefs againft flavery in Maffachufetts in 1700, re- ferred to the well known " Temptations Mafters were under to connive at the Fornication of their Slaves, left they fhould be obliged to find them Wives or pay their Fines." Sewall, 1700. The laws againft the irregular commerce of the sexes were an awkward part of a fyftem which eftablifhed and protected flavery, and marriage (fuch as it was) faved the expenfe of conftant fines to mafters and miftreffes for delinquent flaves.
But what protection was there for the married ftate or fanction of marital or parental rights and duties ? This law did not and could not protect or fanction either, and muft have been of little practical value to the flaves. Governed by the humor or intereft of the mafter or miftrefs, their marriage was not a matter of choice with them, more than any other action of their life. Who was to judge whether the denial of a mafter or miftrefs was unreafonable or not? And what remedy had the flave in cafe of denial ?1 The owner of a valuable female flave was to
1 The cafe of The Inhabitants of Stockbridge vs. The Inhabitants of Weft Stockbridge-regarding the fettlement of a negro pauper (who had been a foldier in the American Army of the Revolution) prefents a decifion of the
:
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confider what all the rifks of health and life were to be, and whether the increafe of ftock would reimburfe the lofs of fervice.1
The breeding of flaves was not regarded with favor.2 Dr. Belknap fays, that " negro children were confidered an incumbrance in a family; and when weaned, were given away like puppies." M. H. S. Coll., I., iv., 200. They were frequently publicly ad- vertifed "to be given away,"-fometimes with the additional inducement of a fum of money to any one who would take them off.
At the fame time there is no room for doubt that there were public and legalized marriages among flaves in Maffachufetts, fubfequently to the paffage of this act of 1705. Mr. Juftice Gray ftates that, " the fubfe- quent records of Bofton and other towns fhow that their banns were publifhed like thofe of white perfons.3
Supreme Judicial Court of Maffachufetts in 1817, not only recognizing the fact of the abfolute legal continuance of flavery in that State in the years 1770 -1777 ; but fettling a point of law which is interefting in this connection. At that time " no contract made with the flave was binding on the mafter ; for the flave could have maintained no action against him, had he failed to fulfil his promife [a promife to emancipate] which was an undertaking merely voluntary on his part." Mafs. Reports, XIV., 257.
1 A Bill of Sale of a Negro Woman Servant in Bofton in 1724, recites that " Whereas Scipio, of Bofton aforefaid, Free Negro Man and Laborer, purpofes Marriage to Margaret, the Negro Woman Servant of the faid Dorcas Marfhall [a Widow Lady of Bofton] : Now to the Intent that the faid Intended Marriage may take Effect, and that the faid Scipio may Enjoy the faid Margaret without any Interruption," etc., fhe is duly fold, with her apparel, for Fifty Pounds. N. E. Hift. and Gen. Reg., XVIII., 78.
2 So early as the poet Hefiod, married flaves, whether male or female, were eftermed inconvenient. Works and Days, line 406, alfo 602-3.
. 3 Mr. Charles C. Jones, of Georgia, in his work on the Religious Inftruc- tion of the Negroes in the United States, publifhed at Savannah, in 1842, gives, pp. 34, 35, memoranda of four inftances of the kind, which he ob-
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In 1745, a negro flave obtained from the Governor and Council a divorce for his wife's adultery with a white man. In 1758, it was adjudged by the Superior Court of Judicature, that a child of a female flave 'never married according to any of the forms pre- fcribed by the laws of this land,' by another flave, who 'had kept her company with her mafter's con- fent,' was not a baftard." Quincy's Reports, 30, note. This judgment indicates liberal views with regard to the law of marriage as applied to flaves, although we fufpect there was fpecial occafion for the exercife of charity and mercy which might deprive it of any authority as a leading cafe.
It is perfectly well known that it was practically fettled in Maffachufetts that baptifm was not emanci- pation-although there is no evidence in their ftatutes to fhow that the queftion was ever mooted in that colony, as it was in other colonies, where legiflation was found neceffary to eftablifh the doctrine.
Still it was in the power of mafters in Maffachu- fetts to deny baptifm to their flaves, as appears from the following extract, from Matthias Plant to the Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gofpel, etc. Anfwers to Queries, from Newbury, October 25, 1727 :
" 6. Negroe Slaves, one of them is defirous of baptifm, but denied by her Mafter, a woman of wonder- ful fenfe, and prudent in matters, of equal knowledge in Religion with moft of her fex, far exceeding any of her own nation that ever yet I heard of."
ferved in looking over the old record of "Entryes for Publications " (for marriages) within the town of Bofton, two in the year 1707, and two in 1710.
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About baptism of flaves "borne in the houfe, or bought with monie," see letter of Davenport to the younger Winthrop, June 14, 1666, and poftscript. M. H. S. Coll. III., x., 60. 62.
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