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This is Part 2 in a new series, Against the Grain, by Libby Cook, about her research over the past few years to discover and tell the stories of the enslaved community at White Plains in King George County, Virginia.

Part 1 | Part 3

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The last post took a wide-angle view of what we can reconstruct about the African American community at White Plains based on available sources, such as census data and personal property taxes. The end result was a general view of population increases and decreases, ages, etc., but nothing that humanized the people represented by the hash marks. 

So what are the next steps? What other grains in the historical record can we study? 

Before we begin, there are qualifiers. First, terms that are no longer acceptable to modern society appear in these records. When I use them, I do so only in direct references and quotations. Second, the records discussed below are not complete or comprehensive. They do not capture the inner lives of the individuals recorded. They do, however, offer a sense of personhood, a sense of motivation, and – most importantly – names. 

Surviving Records

As we’ve seen, enslaved individuals are rarely named in certain types of surviving records. Thus, we must change the records we read, change the people for whom we search. Free Blacks were not only named, but extensively documented in Virginia records. Two relevant collections survive for King George County:  the Register of Free Negroes, 1794-1822, and the Free Negro and Slave Records, 1851-1868. These records give us a broader sense of how the African American community navigated life in King George County. (Note: I use the term “Free Black” to describe individuals of African descent who were not bound in slavery. This and “Free Negro” were used almost interchangeably in the period to describe these communities and individuals, though the latter carries additional cultural implications to which society should no longer subscribe.)

Acts passed by the Virginia Legislature in 1793 and 1803 required Free Blacks to register themselves with the county courts. Only sixty-seven persons presented themselves for registration during the twenty-seven-year period of the surviving register. The entries are fairly formulaic: name, physical description, service or birth status, and date.

The earliest registrations reflect freedom from indenture, rather than slavery, implying that these individuals were born free, then bound into service, possibly as wards of the local vestry. On completing that term of service, they were then “free.” For example, Laurence Payne, “a mulatto man born October the 4^th 1748 about five feet nine inches high was bound by indenture to Langhorn Dade to serve the term of thirty-one years and is now a free man – Nov. 1794.” Susannah Payne, Laurence’s wife, was recorded the same month as “about fifty-two years old about four feet six inches high, of a dark yellow colour, served to the age of thirty-one years, and is now free.” The wording of Sarah’s registration plays fast and loose with the point at which she obtained her freedom. As of 1794, Susannah had been free of her indenture for over twenty years, but only upon recordation in clerk’s office was she “now free.”

Beginning in 1800, and concurrent with Gabriel’s Rebellion, the majority of registrations include phrases like “was born in this county of a free woman and is consequently free” or “descended from a free woman and is consequently free.” This phrasing emphasizes the legal status of the mother, which was made the determining factor in a child’s legal status in 1662. That year, the House of Burgesses passed the act, “Negro womens children to serve according to the condition of the mother.” By 1800, however, only four Free Black women had registered in the county, only one of whom, the above mentioned Susannah Payne, registered a surname, making it difficult to trace family connections. Nevertheless, by documenting their mother’s status, individuals who used this phrase relied on its legal power to assert their freedom in an increasingly tense racial landscape.

Undocumented Relationships

Interracial relationships between white men and African American women were also captured in the register. On 5 August 1801, Winny Mahoney (42), Rachel Mahoney (21), and Sukey Mahoney (26) all registered as free women, “having served in the estate of Richard Bernard, decd.” Winny served the estate thirty-one years, while Rachel and Sukey each served twenty-one years. The simplest reading of these registrations is that of a benevolent owner freeing three enslaved women in his will. Unfortunately, I do not have the will to verify that. Another potential reading of these registrations is one which is supported by similar cases that appear elsewhere in the documentary record: Winny may have been Richard Bernard’s “wife” (in the best case) or concubine (in the worst), and Rachel and Sukey were the results of that union. All were freed after his death out of paternal affection or patriarchal disingenuousness. (Note: I am assuming that Richard Bernard is a white man, as his name does not previously appear in the register. Free Blacks could and did own their family members as “slaves” in order to ensure that the family unit remained together.)

One particularly interesting registration is that of Betsy Conway. Betsy merited a more detailed description than many of the previous individuals: “a bright mulatto girl aged about sixteen years, about five feet four inches high, having a scar on the under part of the left arm a little above the elbow.” This may have been due to Betsy’s birth status, “born of a free white woman.” Some of King George County’s white female residents did cross racial lines in their romantic relationships, though the nature of the Conway family unit remains unknown at present.

The last four pages of the register include the Dunlop family group, who registered several individuals between 1819 and 1822. In February 1819, Nathan (17), Charlotte (16), Dicy (12), and Lydia (4) Dunlop all registered as free individuals. The three girls were recorded as “born of free woman Sarah Dunlop in this county,” though Nathan was not. While most entries into the register were made after an individual reached adulthood, it seems that Sarah and her partner were proactive in protecting their children’s freedom. Three more Dunlops, Patsy (18 or 19), Harriet (17 or 18), and Charlotte (15 or 16) were registered in August 1822. Though no parentage was recorded, the shared surname and possible repetition of Charlotte as a family name, hint at some degree of relation between the groups of individuals. If so, these young women were also registered proactively, possibly to protect their freedom and property as they came of marriageable age. 

A Growing Community

Here, we move to a different collection, the King George County Free Negro and Slave Records, 1851-1868. These records capture different information than the Free Negro Register. Rather than recording name, age, appearance, and birth status, these records record name, age, and occupation. The assumption behind inclusion in these lists is that the individual was already free and that legal status was already sufficiently documented. Like the other records we’ve discussed, these are also fragmentary, existing only for 1858, 1860, and 1861. An undated draft of a page of the Free Negro Register included in this collection shows a substantive increase in the registered Free Blacks of King George. Whereas only 67 individuals had registered by 1822, that undated page records numbers 228 to 254. 

The Free Black community in King George County was growing, and with growth came career diversification. The majority of Free Blacks were listed as “laborers.” Other traditionally unskilled  occupations (here to mean not requiring an apprenticeship or other formal training) included farmers, wagoners, ditchers, mechanics, millers, cooks, and washers. Skilled occupations included blacksmiths, carpenters, shoemakers, brickmakers, seamstresses, and midwives/nurses.

The occupational patterns these lists capture reveal a community that was equipped to serve many of its own basic needs. The plethora of “laborers” were likely involved in a wide array of work, from for-hire farm work to domestic labor to anything else that could earn a wage, whether in their own family, in the Free Black community, or within the broader labor needs of the county. The appearance and slow growth of skilled occupations like carpenters indicates that there was a sustained need for that work, and that the opportunity to obtain those skills was available to the individuals who pursued those occupations. In sum, in the years just prior to the Civil War, the Free Black community in King George County was slowly but surely attaining some degree of occupational and economic growth. While they still lacked access to professions such as the law, their use of the Free Negro Register as a way to secure their freedom indicates they had sufficient knowledge of the law to use it to their own advantages. 

Several Dunlops are recorded in these lists. Many were grouped into the category of “laborer,” though some took on more specialized occupations. Winny Dunlop, age 31 in 1858, was a seamstress, and Dicy Dunlop, 73, was the only midwife listed for that year. In 1860, John Dunlop (29) was a carpenter and George (38) a wagoner. Winny Dunlop (33) was still a seamstress, and Dicy Dunlop (75) had yet to retire from her midwifery practice, though she may have been relying on Catherine Dunlop (49) more, as Catherine shares the honor of being listed as the other midwife in the community. By 1861, Dicy, Kitty, Sarah, and Winny Dunlop were all listed as nurses, possibly indicating a growing attention to health care in the community. 

Free Families

So now we have an overview of the Free Black community in King George County. Based on the actions captured in county records, the men and women in that community not only took advantage of the law to protect their individual freedoms, but also developed skills that could both earn a wage and benefit the community. Families like the Dunlops may have been some of the earliest Free Blacks in the county, and thus best equipped to take advantage of legal and economic opportunities. The appearances of Fraziers, Satterwhites, Cunninghams, Greenes, and Fitzhughs, among others, indicates some immigration into the initial community documented in the earliest registers, and where some people come in, others likely leave. Thus, this was not a community in stasis, but rather one that was dynamic, growing both by population and by skills, all while actively asserting their status as Free people. 

By looking for a different grain of history, we shift our understanding of history.

By looking for a different grain of history, we shift our understanding of history. The African American community in King George County were not all enslaved, and those that were free fought to protect that freedom for decades. Their experiences reveal a texture of possibility that an individual’s skill could be used to their own benefit, that economic independence could be had, and that family could be preserved. Though unrecorded, the free and enslaved African Americans in King George County likely interacted, and shared between them the richness of those possibilities. Possibilities which could bring limited freedoms while in bondage or total freedom outside of it. To find that grain, we’ll have to look in still other places. 

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