Read Ebook: Colored Americans in the Wars of 1776 and 1812 by Nell William C William Cooper Kealing H T Hightower Theodore Author Of Introduction Etc Phillips Wendell Author Of Introduction Etc

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THE AMERICAN QUARTERLY REVIEW.

MARCH, 1831.

SOLD IN PHILADELPHIA BY E. L. CAREY & A. HART. NEW-YORK, BY G. & C. & H. CARVILL.

AMERICAN QUARTERLY REVIEW.

MARCH, 1831.

It was that solemn hour of the night, when, in the words of the poet, "creation sleeps;"--a silence as of the dead reigned amid the streets and alleys of the great city of Dublin, interrupted, ever and anon, only by the solitary voice of the watchman, announcing the time, and the prospects of fair or foul weather for the ensuing day. Even the noise of carriages returning from revels and festive scenes of various kinds, was no longer heard--

"The diligence of trades and noiseful gain, And luxury more late, asleep were laid: All was the night's:"

All! save the inhabitants of one mansion, situated in Kildare street, who were still invading nature's rest. Why were they alone up and stirring? Why were they debarred from taking their needful repose, and obliged to employ the time which should have been devoted to it, in active occupation? The reason is easily understood. Early in the morning, the master and mistress were to set off on a trip to Paris, and there was no small quantity of "packing up" yet to be done. Trunks innumerable lay scattered about a romantically furnished bed-chamber; some were partly filled with different articles of female habiliment; others seemed to be appropriated to literary purposes, and books without number, and of all descriptions, were lying around them--here was a pile of novels, amongst which, the titles of "The Novice of St. Dominick," "Ida of Athens," "The Wild Irish Girl," &c. &c. could be discerned--there was a heap of "Travels," composed of "Italy," "France in 1816," and others:--a couple of volumes, entitled "Life and Times of Salvator Rosa," were reposing in graceful dignity on the open lid of a portmanteau. Several maids were exerting all their activity to get every thing properly arranged; all was bustle and preparation.

"Reste de ces esprits jadis si renomm?s Que d'un coup de son art Moli?re a diffam?s."

Pity, then, kind reader, pity the lot of the unfortunate gentleman whom we have just introduced to your acquaintance. A further account of this dame may prove not unacceptable.

"Nought but a genius can a genius fit, A wit herself, Amelia weds a wit."

Attucks was killed by Montgomery, one of Captain Preston's soldiers. He had been foremost in resisting and was first slain; as proof of front and close engagement, received two balls, one in each breast.

John Adams, counsel for the soldiers, admitted that Attucks appeared to have undertaken to be the Hero of the night, and to lead the army with banners. He and Caldwell, not being residents of Boston, were both buried from Faneuil Hall. The citizens generally participated in the funeral solemnities.

And Judge Dawes, in 1775, thus alludes to the band of misguided incendiaries. "The provocation of that night must be numbered among the master springs which gave the first motion to a vast machinery, a noble and comprehensive system of national independence."

The 5th of March continued to be celebrated for the above reasons, until the Declaration of American Independence was substituted in its place, and its orators were expected to consider the feelings, manners, and principles of the former as giving birth to the latter.

In judging, then, of the merits of those who launched the American Revolution, we would not take counsel from the Tories of that or the present day, but rather heed the approving eulogy of Lovell, Hancock and Warren.

Welcome, then, be every taunt that such correspondents have flung at Attucks and his company, as the best evidence of their merits and strongest claims on our gratitude. Envy and the foe do not labor to abuse any but prominent champions of a cause.

The rejection of this petition was to be expected, if we accept the axiom that a Colored man never gets Justice done him in the United States, except by mistake. The petitioners only asked for that Justice, and that the name of Crispus Attucks be surrounded with the same emblems constantly appropriated by a grateful country to other gallant Americans.

And yet let it be recorded that the same session of the Legislature which had refused the Attucks monument, granted one to Isaac Davis, of Concord,--both were promoters of the American Revolution; but one was white, the other black--and this fact is the only solution to the problem why Justice is not meted out.

A monument to Crispus Attucks has been erected on Boston Commons since the above was written.--H. T. K.

Extract from the Speech of Hon. Anson Burlingame, in Faneuil Hall, October 13, 1852, when alluding to the volunteer participation of Boston officials in returning Thomas Sims to bondage, in April, 1851.

"The conquering of New England prejudices in favor of liberty, 'does not pay.' It 'does not pay,' I submit, to put our fellow citizens under practical martial law; to beat the drum in our streets; to clothe our temples of justice in chains, and to creep along by the light of the morning star, over the ground wet with the blood of Crispus Attucks, the noble Colored man, who fell in King Street, before the muskets of tyranny, away in the dawn of our Revolution; creep by Faneuil Hall, silent and dark; by the Green Dragon, where that noble mechanic, Paul Revere, once mustered the sons of liberty; within sight of Prospect Hill, where we first unfurled the glorious banner; creep along with funeral pace, bearing a brother, a man made in the image of his God, not to the grave--oh, that were merciful, for in the grave there is no work and no device, and the voice of a master never comes--but back to the degradation of a Slavery which kills out of a living body an immortal soul. Oh! where is the man now who took part in that mournful transaction, who would wish, looking back upon it, to avow it."

During the Revolutionary War, public opinion was so strongly in favor of the abolition of slavery, that, in some of the country towns, votes were passed in town meetings that they would have no slaves among them; and that they would not exact, of masters, any bonds for the maintenance of liberated blacks, should they become incapable of supporting themselves. A liberty-loving antiquarian copied the following from Suffolk Probate Record, and published it in the Liberator of February, 1847:

"Know all men by these presents, that I, Jonathan Jackson, of Newburyport, in the county of Essex, gentleman, in consideration of the impropriety I feel, and have felt in beholding any person in constant bondage--more especially at the time when my country is so warmly contending for the liberty every man ought to enjoy--and having sometime since promised my Negro man, Pomp, that I would give him his freedom--and in further consideration of five shillings, paid me by said Pomp, I do hereby liberate, manumit, and set him free; and I do hereby remise and release unto said Pomp, all demands of whatever nature I have against said Pomp.

"In witness whereof, I hereunto set my hand and seal, this nineteenth June, 1776.

"JONATHAN JACKSON. .

"Witness, Mary Coburn, Wm. Noyes."

It only remains to say a word respecting the two parties of the foregoing indenture.

Jonathan Jackson, of Newburyport, we well remember to have heard spoken of, in our boyish days, by honored lips, as a most upright and thorough gentleman of the old school, possessing talents and character of the first standing. He was the first Collector of the Port of Boston, under Washington's administration and was Treasurer of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts for many years, and died in 1810. A tribute to his memory and his worth, said to be from the pen of the late John Lowell, appeared in the Columbian Sentinel, March 10, 1810. His immediate descendants have long resided in this city, are extensively known, and as widely and justly honored.

Pomp took the name of his late master, upon his emancipation, and soon after enlisted in the army, as Pomp Jackson, served through the whole war of the revolution and obtained an honorable discharge at its termination. He afterwards settled in Andover, near a pond, still known as "Pomp's Pond," where some of his descendants yet live. In this case of emancipation, it appears, instead of "cutting his master's throat," he only slashed the throats of his country's enemies.

The late Governor Eustis, of Massachusetts, the pride and boast of the democracy of the East, himself an active participant in the War, and therefore a most competent witness, states that the Freed Colored Soldiers entered the ranks with the whites. The time of those who were Slaves was purchased of their masters, and they were induced to enter the service in consequence of a law of Congress, by which, on condition of their serving in the ranks during the War, they were made Freemen. The hope of Liberty inspired them with the courage to oppose their breasts to the Hessian bayonet at Red Bank, and enabled them to endure with fortitude the cold and famine of Valley Forge.

Seymour Burr was a Slave in Connecticut, to a brother of Col. Aaron Burr, from whom he derived his name. Though treated with much favor by his master, his heart yearned for liberty, and he seized an occasion to induce several of his fellow servants to escape in a boat, intending to join the British, that they might become Freemen; but being pursued by their owners, armed with implements of death, they were compelled to surrender.

Burr's master, contrary to his expectation, did not inflict corporal punishment, but reminded him of the kindness with which he had been treated, and asked what inducement he could have in leaving him. Burr replied that he wanted his liberty. His owner finally proposed, that if he would give him the bounty money he might join the American army, and at the end of the war be his own man. Burr, willing to make any sacrifice for his liberty, consented, and served faithfully during the campaign, attached to the Seventh Regiment, commanded by Colonel, afterwards Governor Brooks, of Melford. He was present at the siege of Fort Catskill, and endured much suffering from starvation and cold. After some skirmishing the army was relieved by the arrival of Gen. Washington, who, as witnessed by him, shed tears of joy on finding them unexpectedly safe.

Burr married one of the Punkapog tribe of Indians, and settled in Canton, Mass., where his widow now, aged one hundred and one years, draws his pension.

Primus Hall, a native Bostonian, and long known to the citizens as a soap-boiler, served in the revolutionary war, and used to entertain the social circle with various anecdotes of military experience; among them an instance, where being himself in possession of a blanket, at a time when such a luxury had become scarce, Gen. Washington entered the tent, having appropriated his own bedding for the worn-out soldiers, Hall immediately tendered his blanket for the General, who replied, he preferred sharing his privations with his fellow soldiers, and accordingly Gen. Washington and Primus Hall reposed for the night together.

Mr. Hall was among those Colored citizens who, in the war of 1812, repaired to Castle Island, in Boston harbor, to assist in building fortifications.

Joshua B. Smith narrated to me that he was present at a company of distinguished Massachusetts men, when the conversation turned upon the exploits of Revolutionary times; and that the late Judge Story related the instance of a Colored Artillerist, who, while having charge of a cannon with a white fellow soldier, was wounded in one arm. He immediately turned to his comrade and proposed changing his position, exclaiming that he had yet one arm left with which he could render some service to his country. The change proved fatal to the heroic soldier, for another shot from the enemy killed him on the spot. Judge Story furnished other incidents of the bravery and devotion of Colored Soldiers, adding, that he had often thought them and their descendants too much neglected, considering the part they had sustained in the Wars; and he regretted that he did not, in early life, gather the facts into a shape for general information.

At the close of the Revolutionary War, John Hancock presented the Colored Soldiers, called the "Bucks of America," an appropriate banner as a tribute to their courage and devotion in the cause of American Liberty, through a protracted and bloody struggle. This banner is now in the possession of Mrs. Kay, whose father was a member of the company.

When a boy, living in West Boston, I was familiar with the presence of "Big Dick," and of hearing the following history confirmed. It is not wholly out of place in this collection.

Big Dick--Richard Seavers, whose death in this city we lately mentioned, was a man of mighty mould. A short time previous to his death, he measured six feet five inches in height, and attracted much attention when seen in the street. He was born in Salem or vicinity and when about sixteen years old, went to England, where he entered the British navy. When the war of 1812 broke out, he would not fight against his country, gave himself up as an American citizen, and was made a prisoner of war.

A Surgeon on board of an American privateer, who experienced the tender mercies of the British Government in Darton prison, during the War of 1812, makes honorable mention of King Dick, as he was there called.

"There are about four hundred and fifty negroes in prison No. 4, and this assemblage of blacks affords many curious anecdotes, and much matter for speculation. These blacks have a ruler among them whom they call King Dick. He is by far the largest, and I suspect, the strongest man in the prison. He is six feet five inches in height, and proportionably large. This black Hercules commands respect, and his subjects tremble in his presence. He goes the rounds every day, and visits every berth to see if they are all kept clean. When he goes the rounds, he puts on a large bearskin cap, and carries in his hand a huge club. If any of his men are dirty, drunken or grossly negligent, he threatens them with a beating; and if they are saucy, they are sure to receive one. They have several times conspired against him, and attempted to dethrone him, but he has always conquered the rebels. One night several attacked him while asleep in his hammock, he sprang up and seized the smallest of them by his feet, and thumped another with him. The poor negro who had thus been made a beetle of, was carried next day to the hospital, sadly bruised, and provokingly laughed at. This ruler of the blacks, this King Richard IV, is a man of good understanding, and he exercises it to a good purpose. If any one of his color cheats, defrauds, or steals from his comrades, he is sure to be punished for it."--Boston Patriot.

RHODE ISLAND.

The Hon. Tristam Burgess, of Rhode Island, in a speech to Congress first month, 1828, said: "At the commencement of the Revolutionary War, Rhode Island had a number of slaves. A regiment of them were enlisted into the Continental service, and no braver men met the enemy in battle; but not one of them was permitted to be a solider until he had first been made a freeman."

"In Rhode Island," says Governor Eustis, in his able speech against slavery in Missouri, twelfth of Twelfth month, 1820, "the blacks formed an entire regiment, and they discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity. The gallant defence of Red Bank, in which the black regiment bore a part, is among the proofs of their valor." In this contest it will be recollected that four hundred men met and repulsed, after a terrible and sanguinary struggle, fifteen hundred Hessian troops, headed by Count Donop. The glory of the defence of Red Bank, which has been pronounced one of the most heroic actions of the war, belongs in reality to black men; yet who now hears them spoken of in connection with it? Among the traits which distinguished the black regiment, was devotion to their officers. In the attack made upon the American lines, near Croton river, on the 13th of Fifth month, 1781, Colonel Greene, the commander of the regiment, was cut down and mortally wounded; but the sabres of the enemy only reached him through the bodies of his faithful guard of blacks, who hovered over him to protect him, every one of whom was killed.

Lieutenant Colonel Barton, of the Rhode Island militia, planned a bold exploit for the purpose of surprising and taking Major-General Prescott, the commanding officer of the royal army at Newport. Taking with him in the night about forty men, in two boats, with oars muffled, he had the address to elude the vigilance of the ships of war and guard boats, and having arrived undiscovered at the General's quarters, they were taken for the sentinels, and the General was not alarmed until the captors were at the door of his lodging chamber, which was fast closed. A negro man named Prince instantly thrust his head through the panel door and seized the victim while in bed. The General's aid-de-camp leaped from a window undressed, and attempted to escape but was taken, and with the General brought off in safety.--Thatcher's Military Journal, August 3, 1777.

CONNECTICUT.

Hon. Calvin Goddard, of Connecticut, states that in the little circle of his residence, he was instrumental in securing, under the Act of 1818, the pensions of nineteen Colored Soldiers. "I cannot," he says, "refrain from mentioning one aged black man, Primus Babcock, who proudly presented to me an honorable discharge from service during the war, dated at the close of it, wholly in the handwriting of George Washington. Nor can I forget the expression of his feelings, when informed after his discharge had been sent to the War Department, that it could not be returned. At his request it was written for, as he seemed inclined to spurn the pension and reclaim the discharge." There is a touching anecdote related of Baron Steuben, on the occasion of the disbandment of the American army. A black soldier, with his wounds unhealed, utterly destitute, stood on the wharf just as a vessel bound for a distant home was getting under way. The poor fellow gazed at the vessel with tears in his eyes, and gave himself up to despair. The warm hearted foreigner witnessed his emotion, and, inquiring into the cause of it, took his last dollar from his purse, and gave it to him with tears of sympathy trickling down his cheeks. Overwhelmed with gratitude, the poor wounded soldier hailed the sloop, and was received on board. As it moved out from the wharf, he cried back to his noble friend on shore, 'God Almighty bless you, master Baron.'"

During the Revolutionary War, and after the sufferings of a protracted contest had rendered it difficult to procure recruits for the army, the Colony of Connecticut adopted the expedient of forming a corps of colored soldiers. A battalion of blacks was soon enlisted, and throughout the war conducted themselves with fidelity and efficiency. The late General Humphreys, then a Captain, commanded a company of this corps. It is said that some objections were made on the part of officers, to accepting the command of the colored troops. In this exigency, Captain Humphreys, who was attached to the family of General Washington, volunteered his services. His patriotism was rewarded, and his fellow officers were afterwards as desirous to obtain appointments in that corps as they had previously been to avoid them.

The following extract, furnished by Charles Lennox Remond, from the pay rolls of the second company fourth regiment of the Connecticut line of the Revolutionary army may rescue many gallant names from oblivion.

CAPTAIN, DAVID HUMPHREYS.

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