Knollenberg Bernhard. Growth of the American Revolution: 1766-1775
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COLONIAL WHIGS AND NEGRO
SLAVERY
:
1765–1775
D S J’ familiar quip, “how is it that we hear the
loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?”¹ was but one of many
remarks of the period which pointed to the incongruity between the colonists’
outcry against British encroachment on colonial liberty and their continuing
to hold tens of thousands of blacks in abject slavery.²
Replying in to the argument of Richard Bland, a leading Virginia
Whig, that Parliament had no right to “impose laws upon us...relative to our
Government,” because “Under an English government all men are
born free,” the Reverend John Camm pointed out the condition of Bland’s
“own domestics,” who were slaves from birth.³
In , the Philadelphia Quaker⁴ Anthony Benezet wrote, “At a time
when...the preservation of those valuable privileges transmitted to us from
our ancestors are become so much the subjects of consideration, can it be an
inquiry indifferent to any, how many of those who distinguish themselves as the
Advocates of Liberty, remain insensible and inattentive to the treatment of
thousands of our fellow men, who, from motives of avarice, and the inexorable
decree of tyrant custom, are at this very time kept in the deplorable state of
slavery....”⁵
In , some Massachusetts slaves wrote a circular letter to members of
the Massachusetts House of Representatives, stating, “The efforts made by the
Legislature of this province in their last sessions to free themselves from Slav-
ery,⁶...[we] cannot but expect your House will...take our deplorable case
into serious consideration, and give us that ample relief, which, as men, we have
a natural right to.”⁷
In this same year, the unidentified author of Brief Considerations on Slavery,
published in New Jersey, observed, “In the present contest with Great Britain
...it seems particularly necessary on our parts to convince her that our oppo-
sition to her is not merely from selfish motives...but from a disinterested gen-
erous love to liberty...and a conviction that it is the inalienable right of man.
But how can she believe this when, so loudly complaining of her attacks on our
political liberties, all the colonies tolerate and many of them greatly encourage
. . . subjecting the Africans not only to the deprivation of all property, but even
to the most abject state of perpetual slavery.”⁸
The following year, the Reverend John Allen⁹ in his Watchman’s Alarm, ex-
claimed, “Blush ye pretended votaries for freedom! ye trifling patriots! who are
making...a mockery of your profession by trampling on the sacred natural
rights and privileges of Africans; for while you are fasting, praying, non-
importing, non-exporting, remonstrating, resolving and pleading for a restora-
tion of your charter rights, you at the same time are continuing this lawless, cruel,
inhuman and abominable practice of enslaving your fellow creatures....”¹⁰
Granville Sharp, later the great English anti-slavery leader, wrote () in
similar vein of colonial Whigs, “Let them put away the accursed thing (that hor-
rid Oppression) from among them, before they presume to implore the inter-
position of divine Justice” for their relief.¹¹
About the same time, Abigail Adams was writing to her husband, John, at
the First Continental Congress, “I wish most sincerely there was not a Slave in
the province. It always appear’d a most iniquitous scheme to me—fight ourselfs
for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a
right to freedom as we have. You know my mind upon this subject.”¹²
But John Adams, though he replied to other passages in Abigail’s letter,
made no mention of her remarks on slavery,¹³ and the Congress took no action
toward even the gradual abolition of slavery in the colonies.¹⁴
Probably most of the slaveholders in the Congress shared the sentiments of
Patrick Henry, expressed by him in a letter of January , , to Robert
Pleasants, a Virginia Quaker.
“I take this opportunity [wrote Henry] to acknowledge the receipt of A.
Benezets Book against the Slave Trade. I thank you for it....Is it not amazing
that, at a time when the Rights of Humanity are defined and understood with
precision, in a Country above all others fond of Liberty,...we find Men...
adopting a Principle as repugnant to humanity as it is inconsistent with the
Bible and destructive to Liberty.
“Every thinking honest Man rejects it in Speculation, how few in Practise
from conscienscious Motives?...Would any one believe that I am Master of
Slaves of my own purchase! I am drawn along by the general inconvenience of
living without them; I will not, I cannot justify it. However culpable my Con-
duct, I will so far pay my devoir to Virtue as to own the excellence & rectitude
of her Precepts, & to lament my want of conforming to them....I know not
where to stop; I could say many things on this Subject, a serious review of
which gives a gloomy perspective to future times....”¹⁵
So far as I have found, George Washington was the only slaveowner at the
First Continental Congress to make provision to free his slaves.¹⁶ His will,
signed in July, , five months before his death, provided for their manumis-
sion and support.¹⁷
What John Adams and other non-slaveholders in the Congress thought
about the matter does not appear. Some may have been indifferent; those who
were not probably reasoned that it was not a time to raise so potentially divi-
sive a question when unity was of the essence.
The Rhode Island General Assembly apparently was the only colonial leg-
islative body that took any steps at this time to deal with negro slavery, and even
its action was feeble.
In May, , a Providence town meeting passed a resolution that “Whereas,
the inhabitants of America are engaged in the preservation of their rights and
liberties, and, as personal liberty is an essential part of the natural rights of
mankind, the Deputies of the town are directed to obtain an act of the General
Assembly...that all negroes born in the Colony should be free at obtaining
to a certain age.”¹⁸
Presumably in response to pressure from the members for Providence,
headed by Stephen Hopkins,¹⁹ the Rhode Island Assembly, in June, ,
passed an act dealing with slavery. But after a high-sounding recital, “Whereas
the inhabitants of America are generally engaged in the preservation of their
own rights and liberties...[and] as those who are desirous of enjoying all the
advantages of liberty themselves, should be willing to extend personal liberty
to others,” the act made no provision whatever toward freeing the slaves al-
ready held in the colony.²⁰
The act provided only that “for the future, no negro or mulatto slave shall
be brought into this colony,” and even this ban on future importation was qual-
ified. It was followed by the proviso that “nothing in this act shall extend...to
any negro or mulatto slave, belonging to any inhabitant of either of the British
colonies...who shall come into this colony with intention to reside or settle
for a number of years, therein...,” or “to any negro or mulatto slave brought
from the coast of Africa into the West Indies, on board any vessel belonging to
this colony, and which negro or mulatto slave could not be disposed of in the
West Indies but shall be brought into this colony.”²¹
Massachusetts legislators did not go even this far. The slaves’ circular letter
of to members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, quoted
earlier in this appendix, apparently was ignored by the House, and, as brought
out in Chapter , the Massachusetts Congress of rejected the request to
“take into consideration the state and circumstances of the negro slaves in this
province.”
No wonder that Whig leaders in the colonies had no good answer to John-
son’s quip!
APRIL 19TH
:
THE CONFLICT
OF EVIDENCE
T M C of Safety’s brief letter of April ,
quoted in Chapter , was supplemented by several other provincial accounts
of the day of Lexington and Concord.
The first was a circular letter of the Massachusetts Committee of Safety,
sent soon after April , to towns throughout the province, stating:
“Gentlemen:—The barbarous murders committed upon our innocent
brethren, on Wednesday, the th instant, have made it absolutely necessary,
that we immediately raise an army to defend our wives and children from the
butchering hands of an inhuman soldiery, who, incensed at the obstacles they
meet with in their bloody progress, and enraged at being repulsed from the
field of slaughter, will, without the least doubt, take the first opportunity in
their power, to ravage this devoted county with fire and sword.
“We conjure you, therefore, by all that is sacred, that you give assistance in
forming an army. Our all is at stake. Death and devastation are the certain con-
sequences of delay. Every moment is infinitely precious. An hour lost may del-
uge your country in blood, and entail perpetual slavery upon the few of our
posterity who may survive the carnage.”¹
Later in the month, the Massachusetts Congress secured depositions from
eyewitnesses of the events of April , which it sent (April ) with an accom-
panying “true and authentic Account” to the London Agent of the Massachu-
setts House of Representatives “to be immediately printed and Dispersed thro’
every Town in England.”²
This account told of the killing of eight unresisting men of Lexington and
stated, as to “the Ravages of the Troops as they retreated from Concord to
Charlestown...,Let it suffice to say that a great Number of the Houses on
the road were plundered and rendered unfit for Use; several were burnt;
Women in child bed were driven by the Soldiery naked into the Streets; old
Men peaceably in their Houses were shot dead; and such Scenes exhibited as
would disgrace the annals of the most uncivilized Nation.”³
The provincial version of the events of April th, as given in the above doc-
uments and in the Essex Gazette of April , quoted in Chapter , conflicts with
that of General Gage, also quoted in Chapter , on four material points: who
fired first at Lexington; who fired first at Concord; alleged American atrocities;
and alleged British atrocities.
Who Fired First at Lexington?
The most impressive evidence in support of the provincial version that the
British fired first at Lexington are depositions dated April , , of Captain
John Parker and thirty-four members of the Lexington company of militia un-
der his command. Parker states:
“I, John Parker, of lawful Age and Commander of the Militia in Lexington,
do testify and declare, that on the th Instant in the Morning, about one of
the Clock, being informed that there were a number of Regular Officers, rid-
ing up and down the Road, stopping and insulting People as they passed the
Road, and also...informed that a Number of Regular Troops were on their
march from Boston in order to take the Province Stores at Concord, ordered
our Militia to meet on the Common in said Lexington to consult what to do,
and concluded not to be discovered, nor meddle or make with said Regular
Troops (if they should approach) unless they should insult or molest us; and,
upon their sudden Approach, I immediately ordered our Militia to disperse
and not to fire:⁴—Immediately said Troops made their appearance and rushed
furiously, fired upon, and killed eight of our Party without receiving any Provo-
cation from us.”⁵
The deposition of the thirty-four members of Parker’s company states:
“On the th of April instant about one or two o’Clock in the morning,...
understanding that a body of Regulars were marching from Boston towards
Concord, with intent (as it was supposed) to take the Stores, belonging to the
Colony, in that town we were alarmed, and having met at the place of our Com-
pany’s Parade, were dismissed by our Captain, John Parker, for the Present,
with orders to be ready to attend at the beat of the drum....About five o’Clock
in the morning, hearing our drum beat,⁶ we proceeded towards the Parade and
soon found a Large body of troops were marching towards us.
“Some of our Company were coming up to the Parade and others had
reached it, at which time the Company began to disperse. While our backs
were Turned on the Troops, we were fired on by them, and a number of our
men were Instantly killed or wounded. Not a Gun was fired by any Person in
our Company on the Regulars, to our knowledge, before they fired on us, and
they continued Firing until we had all made our Escape.”⁷
On the British side, Major John Pitcairn, commander of the British ad-
vance party at Lexington, in response to a request from Gage for “the partic-
ulars” of the happenings there, wrote:
“When I arrived at the end of the Village, I observed drawn up upon a
Green near Rebels; when I came within about One Hundred Yards of
them, they began to File off towards some stone Walls on our Right Flank. The
Light Infantry observing this, ran after them. I instantly called to the Soldiers
not to Fire, but to surround and disarm them, and after several repetitions of
those positive Orders to the men, not to Fire etc., some of the Rebels who had
jumped over the Wall, Fired Four or Five Shott at the Soldiers, which wounded
a man of the Tenth, and my Horse was Wounded in two places, from some
quarter or other, and at the same time several Shott were fired from a Meeting
House on our Left—upon this, without any order or Regularity, the Light In-
fantry began a scattering Fire, and continued in that situation for some time,
contrary to the repeated orders both of me and the [other] officers that were
present.”⁸
This version of the firing was corroborated by contemporary statements of
two British officers, Lieutenants William Sutherland and John Barker, who ap-
parently were with Pitcairn.
Sutherland said in a statement dated April that “instantly some of the
Villains [who] were got over the hedge, fired at us, & it was then & not before
that the Soldiers fired....”⁹
Barker’s diary for April , states that “at about oclock we arrived there
[Lexington] and saw a number of People, I believe between and , formed
on a Common in the middle of the Town;...on our coming near them, they
fired one or two shots, upon which our Men without any orders rushed in upon
them, fired and put ’em to flight....”¹⁰
At first glance it seems impossible to reconcile the American and British
versions of who fired first. But the following statement, dated May , of George
Leonard suggests that the two versions are in fact reconcilable:
“George Leonard of Boston¹¹ Deposes that he went from Boston on the
nineteenth of april; with the Brigade commanded by Lord Percy upon their
march to Lexington; that being on horse back and having no connexion with
the army: he several times went forward of the Brigade; in one of which excur-
sions he met with a Countryman who was wounded supported by two others
:
who were arm’d; this was about a mile on this [Boston] side of Lexington meet-
ing House; that the Deponent asked the wounded person what was the matter
with him, he answered that the Regulars had shot him; the Deponent then
asked what provoked them to do it—he said that Some of our pepol fired upon
the Regulars; and they fell on us Like Bull Dogs and killed eight & wounded
nineteen.
“He said further that it was not the Company he belonged to that fired but
some of our Country pepol that were on the other side of the Road: the Depo-
nent enquired of the other men if they were present; they answered, yes, and
Related the affair much as the wounded man had Done: and all three Blamed
the rashness of their own pepol for fireing first: and said they supposed now the
Regulars would kill every Body they met with.”¹²
The deposition of the members of the Lexington militia quoted above
states, “Not a gun was fired by any Person in our Company [italics added]...be-
fore they fired on us,” and Captain Parker declared, “said Troops...fired
upon, and killed eight of our Party, without receiving any Provocation therefor
from us [italics added].”
Both these affidavits, it will be observed, leave open the possibility, indeed,
even tend to imply that some person or persons not in “our Company,” not “of
our Party” might have fired first.
Who Fired First at Concord?
Convincing the world that the British troops fired first at Concord obviously
was of less importance than establishing that they had fired first at Lexington,
since few, if any, whose support the Massachusetts patriots were seeking would
doubt the rightness of firing on the British troops once they had begun hostil-
ities. But even so, the Massachusetts Congress collected depositions of many
eyewitnesses that the British had fired first at Concord, too. The most impres-
sive of these, a deposition dated April of sixteen officers and men of Con-
cord engaged in the fighting there, states:
“We, Nathan Barrett, Captain; Jonathan Farrar, Joseph Butler, and Fran-
cis Wheeler, Lieutenants; [etc.] all of Concord, in the County of Middlesex, in
the province of the Massachusetts Bay, of Lawfull Age, Testify and Declare,
that on Wednesday, the Nineteenth Instant, about an Hour after sun rise, we
Assembled on a Hill near the meeting House, in Concord aforesaid, in conse-
quence of an information, that a number of regular Troops had killed six of our
Countrymen, at Lexington, and were on their march to said Concord; and
about an Hour afterwards, we saw them approaching, to the number, as we
Imagine, of about Twelve Hundred; on which we retreated to a Hill about
Eighty rods back, and the aforesaid Troops then took possession of a Hill where
we were first posted.
“Presently after this, we saw them moving towards the North Bridge, about
one mile from the said meeting House; we then immediately went before them,
and passed the bridge just before a party of them to the number of about Two
Hundred, arrived....We then seeing several fires in the Town, thought our
houses were in Danger, and immediately march’d back towards said bridge,
and the troops who were station’d there, observing our approach, march’d
back over the bridge, and then took up some of the planks. We then hastened
our Steps towards the bridge, and when we had got near the bridge, they fir’d
on our men, first three guns, one after the other, and then a Considerable num-
ber more; upon which, and not before, (having orders from our Commanding
Officer not to fire till we were fired upon) we fir’d upon the regulars, and they
retreated.”¹³
This deposition was supported by several other depositions of American
participants and of a British officer and a British soldier in American hands.¹⁴
Two other British officers (not held by the Americans) who were present at
the first fire at Concord made statements in conflict with each other. Captain
Walter S. Laurie of the Forty-third Regiment wrote in a statement dated April
, “By this time they [“the Country people”] were close upon us, and I imag-
ine myself that a man of my Company (afterwards killed) did fire his piece, tho’
Mr. Southerland has since assured me that the Country people first fired. A gen-
eral popping from them ensued. The Company of the th Regt. gave a fire, as
did a few of my own...,” while Lieutenant Sutherland wrote on April , “the
Enemy [at Concord bridge] . . . fired a few shot which our men returned....”¹⁵
The weight of evidence on this point obviously is in favor of the American
version.
The American “Atrocities”
Smith’s account of the events of April , sent by Gage to Lord Dartmouth,
states: “It appears that...they scalped and otherwise ill-treated one or two of
the men who were either killed or severely wounded. . . .” Colonel Lord Percy
reported that “the Rebels...scalped & cut off the ears of some of the wounded
men who fell into their hands.” Anne Hulton, sister of one of the Customs
Commissioners at Boston, wrote a friend in England, “The Troops...found
two or three of their people Lying in the Agonies of Death, scalp’d & their
Noses and ears cut off & Eyes bored out.”¹⁶
The only known contemporary or near contemporary account by an
American of the mangling of the British soldier or soldiers at Concord is that
:
of Reverend William Gordon, pastor of the Congregational church of the third
parish of Roxbury, who after a visit to Concord a few weeks after April ,
wrote an unidentified correspondent (May , ):
“The Reverend Mr. Emerson informed me how the matter was, with great
concern for its having happened. A young fellow coming over the bridge in or-
der to join the country people, and seeing the soldier wounded and attempting
to get up, not being under the feelings of humanity, very barbarously broke his
skull, and let out his brains with a small axe, (apprehended of the tomahawk
kind) but as to his being scalped and having his ears cut off, there was nothing
in it. The poor object lived an hour or two before he expired.”¹⁷*
The British “Atrocities”
The shocking account of alleged British atrocities in the Essex Gazette of April
, quoted in Chapter , was repeated word for word in a “Narrative” pub-
lished by the Second Massachusetts Congress in May, ,¹⁸ and in substance
in the account sent to London by the Massachusetts Congress quoted above.
The British “atrocities” also were described in several letters published in
British newspapers in June, , and in a horrifying letter of April from
Wethersfield, Connecticut, which apparently did not reach the British press.
The London Evening Post of June carried a Boston letter of April , re-
porting that of the more than forty Americans killed, “the greater part were
murthered by the troops going into their houses to steal their effects.” The
Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser (London) of June carried a Boston letter of
April stating that “the troops broke into every house [along their line of
march] and put all the males to the sword, and plundered the houses.” Lloyd’s
Evening Post (London) of June published a letter from a “Gentleman of Rank
in New England,” dated April , declaring that having “gone over the whole
of the ground of the late engagement,” he had seen “some homes that had
been set on fire, and some old men, women and children that had been killed.”
The Wethersfield letter reported, “In one house a woman and seven children
were slaughtered” by a soldiery guilty of “cruelties and barbarity, never
equalled by the Savages of America.”¹⁹
The reports of extensive plundering were true.²⁰ And so were those con-
cerning the burning of many houses.²¹ But the Americans were using houses
along the road as cover from which to fire on the passing British troops,²² and
the houses burned may well have been among those from which the provin-
cials were firing or had fired.
* Robert Gross, The Minutemen and Their World (New York: Hill and Wang, ). [B.W.S.]