dagblog - Comments for "Highland County's Forgotten Child"

Thanks for all of yout

Danny Cardwell — Thu, 22 Mar 2018 01:14:26 +0000

In reply to Highland County's Forgotten Child

Thanks for all of yout thoughtful comments. This was a particularly crass report from them. I truly don't think they are malicious, but this one stung.

There was a difference

rmrd0000 — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 21:37:19 +0000

In reply to I was talking about the

There was a difference between what white and Black bondsmen could expect

In other cases, masters refused to acknowledge the expiration of indentured contracts of blacks, most of whom were illiterate in English. Anthony Johnson was claimed to have held his indentured servant, John Casor, past his term. Johnson was among the first 20 black men brought to Jamestown in 1619 as indentured servants. By 1623, the Angolan had gained his freedom. By 1651 he was prosperous enough to import five "servants" of his own, for which he was granted 250 acres (1.0 km2) as "headrights".[10] One of his servants was John Casor. Casor later claimed to a neighboring farmer, Robert Parker, that he had completed his term. Parker persuaded Johnson to free Casor, who then went to work for Parker. The farmer signed him to a new term of indenture. Johnson challenged Parker in court, saying he had taken his worker. In the lawsuit of Johnson vs. Parker, the court in Northampton County ruled that "seriously consideringe and maturely weighing the premisses, doe fynde that the saide Mr. Robert Parker most unjustly keepeth the said Negro from Anthony Johnson his master....It is therefore the Judgement of the Court and ordered That the said John Casor Negro forthwith returne unto the service of the said master Anthony Johnson, and that Mr. Robert Parker make payment of all charges in the suit." Casor was returned to Johnson and served him for the rest of his life.

There is evidence in the 1650s that some Virginia Negroes were serving for life. In 1660 the Assembly stated that “in case any English servant shall run away in company with any Negroes who are incapable of making satisfaction by addition of time…[he] shall serve for the time of the said Negroes absence.” This statute indicates quite clearly that Negroes served for life and hence could not make “satisfaction” by serving longer once they were recaptured. This phrase gave legal status to the already existing practice of lifetime enslavement of Negroes. Statutes were soon passed to define slavery with more conditions than lifetime servitude.[11]

In 1660 Elizabeth Key won the first freedom suit in Virginia. She challenged being classified as a slave in a complicated case related to a lengthy indenture and an estate. The mixed-race woman, daughter of an African woman and English planter, argued that she was free due to her white English father who had acknowledged her as his daughter, had her baptized as a Christian, and tried to protect her by establishing a guardian and indentureship for her as a girl when he was dying. After this case, the colonial legislature adopted the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, saying that all children born in the colony would take the status of their mothers, regardless of paternity. Thus children born to enslaved mothers would be enslaved, regardless of their ethnicity or paternity. This was contrary to English common law for children of parents who are both English subjects, in which the child takes status from the father. But the law also meant that mixed-race children born to white women were born free, and many families of free African Americans were descended from unions between white women and ethnic African men during the colonial era.

The above is mostly from Phillip S Foner’s “History of Black Americans: From African to the Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom cited in Wikipedia. Some black bond servants had a life sentence.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_slavery_in_Virginia#Indentured_servant_to_slave

I was talking about the

artappraiser — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 21:04:04 +0000

In reply to Regarding shame, there were

Just to be clear, I was talking about what records are probable and I was talking about the possibility of an instance like a free black parent selling their child into indentured servitude because they could not afford to support her. Poor people did that a lot back then, more than is recognized. And they might be embarrassed that they had to do so, so they would want as few records as possible.

This is still done a lot in the third world.

It is an unfortunate mindset where this is not seen as the equivalent of slavery, back then someone might rationalize it as more like apprenticeship. And truth be told, it is not the exact equivalent of the type of lifetime of slavery you are referring to with your link.

Edit to add, to reiterate, this is what Danny has got on this girl, she was "bound out" as an unpaid apprentice from age 2 to age 18 to learn housekeeping and in turn after finishing that stint, she would be sent on her way, free to do what she liked, at age 18, with $25.

"On this day in 1857, Mary Gordon, a "free" black child of about 2 years old, was bound out as an apprentice to Stuart C. Slaven until age 18 to learn the business of housekeeping. Slaven was ordered to pay Mary $25 when she reached the age of 18; Mary died at age 16."

I would think it unlikely in

artappraiser — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 20:05:15 +0000

In reply to Mary's life was treated like

I would think it unlikely in this case because she mostly an underage indentured servant until she died. So whoever sold her as a child would either be embarrassed that they had done so or didn't value her life. So she wouldn't be on many records.What is entering in here besides race, slavery and/or indentured servitude: many people did not invest as much in children as we do now precisely because: they often died! Especially people that were not of the upper classes. (Get too attached and it might break your heart, you expected children to die.The further back you go in history before modern medicine, the more you see this.)

Edit to add: gender also comes in here. Women in general were only considered important to record if they bore children, otherwise their lives of not much import to society or historical record.

Regarding shame, there were

rmrd0000 — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 19:56:07 +0000

In reply to I would think it unlikely in

Regarding shame, there were open slave markets where black children were sold.

https://www.citylab.com/design/2015/07/how-slavery-built-charleston/399005/

Finding black ancestors may

rmrd0000 — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 18:42:25 +0000

In reply to Mary's life was treated like

Finding black ancestors may not be easy

http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/technique/african-american-genealogy/

Sometimes professional help is required

https://blogs.ancestry.com/ancestry/2017/10/05/professional-genealogist-offers-advice-on-tracing-african-american-roots/

Mary's life was treated like

barefooted — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 18:12:33 +0000

In reply to Highland County's Forgotten Child

Mary's life was treated like a footnote. We learned she was the "free" property of Stuart Slaven. Her interests and dreams didn't make the cut.

Perhaps, as you say, the Historical Society had no further information, but it seems unlikely that they would have been able to uncover those details and nothing more. Have you tried to research her life?

Statues of Confederates were

rmrd0000 — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 15:08:03 +0000

In reply to Highland County's Forgotten Child

Statues of Confederates were erected, but we are instructed to move on rather than remember when it comes to slaves. Florida is removing the statute of a Confederate general in Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capital and replacing it with one of Mary McCloud Bethune. Progress is happening.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/florida-replace-confederate-statue-us-capitol-53862207

NOLA Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s book comes out today. In the Shadow of Statues: A White Southerner Confronts History” details how Landrieu came to grips the harm he was causing by ignoring how blacks felt about the Confederate statues.

http://www.nola.com/opinions/index.ssf/2018/03/mitch_landrieu_book_statues.html

There is no obligation to remain silent. We have to push to find out details about our ancestors. It can be heartbreaking to try to trace one’s genealogy because black lives didn’t matter.

Thanks fot this post.