Undated “Abram Lincoln Negroes” List
Sale Agreement for Tom 1858
Col. Abraham Lincoln 1848 Letter – “Black Men’s Shoes”
Enslavement at the Lincoln Homestead
The first Africans arrived in the colony of Virginia in 1619. Numbering about twenty, their legal status in the colony initially was ambiguous. However, by 1705, the colonial government created laws that established a race-based system of legal slavery which controlled the actions of enslaved people and passed enslavement onto the children of enslaved mothers. The population of enslaved Africans and African Americans grew rapidly; by 1790, they made up 39 percent of Virginia’s total population. Unfortunately, based on early scholarship of the Shenandoah Valley, there is a conception that enslaved African Americans did not make up any significant portion of the population of the Valley. Previous writers, such as Joseph Waddell and John Walter Wayland, incorrectly asserted that German and Scots-Irish people did not support enslavement, and since they had been the largest immigrant groups to settle in the Valley, there were limited numbers of enslaved people living in the Shenandoah Valley. This was categorically untrue; enslaved people made up approximately 25 percent of the Valley’s population by the start of the Civil War. Similarly, past scholarship also argued that enslaved people were well treated in the Valley and got along well with their slaveowners. [1]
More recent scholarship by authors such as Jonathan A. Noyalas and Edward Ayers has begun to delve into the complicated history of enslavement in the Shenandoah Valley and disprove these narratives. Because of biases in historic records, it can be hard to get a full picture of the experience of enslavement in the Valley. One of the only slave narratives from the Valley, The Narrative of Bethany Veney, A Slave Woman, is an invaluable source into what enslavement was like in Page County. Unfortunately, there are no written records from the enslaved people owned by the Lincoln family. However, stories of their lives can be pieced together using court records, letters, and economic records.
Henry
There are several appearances of a man named Henry in the Lincoln family records. Henry was one of Colonel Abraham Lincoln’s most valuable enslaved men. He appears on two undated lists of enslaved people; on one he is valued at $600 and the other at $625. There are no records which reveal when Abraham purchased Henry or his birthdate. However, it seems that Abraham allowed Henry some opportunities for self-sufficiency. In 1848, Abraham wrote a short note to an unidentified man asking that he send him a calfskin and leather for “black men’s shoes.” He also wrote that his “man Henry has some bark and sheep skins they belong to him and you will please pay him the money.” Furthermore, in a letter written by Abraham’s agent in Richmond, Jacob Shook in 1849, Jacob relays that the “wagons left, about 12’ oclock to day with the articles called for in [Abraham’s] letter. [He] sent the sales by Henry as well as the bills [he] purchased.” He goes on to mention that he “gave them no money, they having sold some flour on the road.” In addition to selling his own bark and sheepskins, it appears that Henry, and potentially other enslaved people, were producing and selling their own flour. Perhaps Jacob Shook assured Abraham that he had sent everything asked for and told him the time that the wagons left so that Abraham would know if anything went missing from the wagons. [2]
Henry was still enslaved by the Lincolns in 1851, when Abraham passed away. His will ordered that Henry and another enslaved man should be given to his wife Mary, with “their increase of the females, with permission.” Enslavement was a legal status in Virginia and after a law passed in 1662, any children born to an enslaved mother inherited her status as an enslaved person, a legal concept called partus sequitur ventrem. By giving Henry to Mary Lincoln, Abraham was giving her the wealth that would come from any children Henry would have. This demonstrates how the reproductive capabilities of enslaved people, particularly women, was used as a method to derive more wealth by slave owners. [3]
Squire
Squire was estimated to be around 50 years old in September 1841, which if accurate, would put his birthdate around the year 1791. Before coming to the Lincoln family, Squire was enslaved by Dorcas Robinson in Rockingham County. In her will dated 1811, Dorcas entrusted three enslaved people named Cate, James, and Squire to the children of her daughter Dorcas Lincoln, “in consideration of [the] natural love and affection” she had for her daughter. Squire remained enslaved by members of the Lincoln family from 1811-1841. In an undated list of the enslaved people owned by Col. Abraham Lincoln, Squire’s value is listed at $325.[4]
At some point after this list was written, Squire became the property of Abraham’s brother, Jacob Lincoln Jr. On August 19th, 1841, Squire was the subject of a court of oyer and terminer case involving arson. Oyer and terminer courts were a type of criminal court formed specifically to try slaves accused of capital crimes until 1785, when they began trying enslaved people for all felonies. Capital crimes were any crimes committed which could result in the death penalty; this included crimes such as murder, attempted murder, rape or attempted rape, arson, poisoning, conspiracy or insurrection, and theft. These trials took place at county courthouses and were presided over by five justices of the peace with no jury. If given a guilty verdict, there was no legal opportunity for an enslaved person to appeal the court’s decision themselves. Because Virginia law required an enslaved person convicted of a capital crime to receive the death penalty, judges and justices of the peace were required to impose that sentence. In some instances, however, enslaved people had their sentences commuted. [5]
The case of each enslaved person sentenced to death by a court in Virginia was sent to the governor for review. Virginia law allowed the governor to use the power of executive clemency to “sell and transport condemned bondsmen,” rather than hang them, if they felt the case warranted it. Notes from the justices of the peace, defense counsel, or petitions from local community members in favor of commuting the sentence could be included in the trial record for the governor to consider. Factors such as an enslaved person’s youth, personality, whether they had or had not committed crimes before, and the harshness of the death sentence in contrast to the crime committed – particularly if the crime involved property – were just a few of the reasons that justices cited when asking governors for clemency. [6]
Squire was accused of “feloniously burning a barn” owned by Abraham Lincoln that was valued at $1000. He was found guilty by the court of oyer and terminer in Rockingham County and sentenced to hang for his crime on October 29, 1841. Prosecutions for arson rose sharply in Virginia in the antebellum period, particularly after 1831 when charges of murder or conspiracy and insurrection began to decline. Arson was one of the “most feared” crimes by white slave owners. While the court records do not reveal a motive behind Squire’s actions, burning property was one of the most overt ways that enslaved people could rebel against their enslavement. When Squire’s case was sent to the governor’s office, the justices of the peace “recommended [Squire]….to the clemency of the executive,” though their reasons for doing so were not recorded. The lieutenant governor granted clemency to Squire and “ordered that he be brought to the penitentiary for transportation.” Instead of being hanged, Squire was sent to the Penitentiary of Virginia, located in Richmond, on September 10, 1841. Unfortunately, there are no further records of what happened to Squire. Since he was recommended for transportation, it is most likely that he was sold somewhere outside of Virginia. [7]
[1] Cynthia A. Kierner, “‘Skillfull in Anie Country Worke’: Red, White, and Black in Colonial Virginia,” in Changing History: Virginia Women Through Four Centuries (Richmond: The Library of Virginia, 2013); Kelley Fanto Deetz, Bound to the Fire: How Virginia’s Enslaved Cooks Helped Invent American Cuisine (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2017); Jonathan A. Noyalas, Slavery and Freedom in the Shenandoah Valley During the Civil War Era (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2021).
[2] Undated list of enslaved people, Lincoln Society of Virginia; “Abram Lincoln Negroes,” Lincoln Society of Virginia, undated; Colonel Abraham Lincoln to Unknown, July 22, 1848, Lincoln Society of Virginia; Jacob Shook to Col. Abraham Lincoln, May 17, 1849, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975, Accession no. 6065A.
[3] Abraham Lincoln, “Last Will of Abraham Lincoln,” May 14, 1851, Records of Rockingham County, Virginia, Circuit Court, Will Book A, 197; Brent Tarter, “Elizabeth Key (fl. 165-1660),” Encyclopedia Virginia, last updated November 8, 2022, Elizabeth Key (fl. 1655–1660) – Encyclopedia Virginia.
[4] Dorcas Robinson, “Dorcas Robinson Will,” April 7, 1811, In Waldo Lincoln’s History of the Lincoln Family, 205-206, https://archive.org/details/historyoflincoln00illinc/page/205/ mode/1up; “Abram Lincoln Negroes,” Lincoln Society of Virginia, undated.
[5] Philip J. Schwarz, Slave Laws in Virginia (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1996) 72 and 68; Daniel J. Flanigan, “Criminal Procedure in Slave Trials in the Antebellum South,” The Journal of Southern History 40, no. 4 (Nov 1974): 544, https://doi.org/10.2307/2206354.
[6] Flanigan, “Criminal Procedure in Slave Trials,” 544; Schwarz, Slave Laws in Virginia, 75-76.
[7] Jacob Lincoln, “Public Claim October 10, 1841,” Condemned slaves and free blacks executed or transported records, 1781-1865, Accession APA 756, Box 7, Folder 16 Library of Virginia, 2, http://rosetta.virginiamemory.com:1801/delivery/DeliveryManagerServlet?dps_pid=IE1181034; Schwarz, Slave Laws in Virginia, 7 and 88; Noyalas, Slavery and Freedom in the Shenandoah Valley, 21; A List of Slaves and Free Persons of Color Received in the Penitentiary of Virginia for Sale and Transportation from the 25th June 1816 to the 4th February 1842, 10, https://lva.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01LVA_INST/br4o1h/alma9917846592105756.
Col. Abraham Lincoln 1847 Letter
Seeking to Stay: Nathan’s 1833 Petition to the General Assembly
Nick Baker, Daniel D’Amico, and Nick Spadaccini
In 1833, a newly emancipated African American man named Nathan persuaded Jacob Lincoln, Jr. and dozens of other white Rockingham County men to “unite with him” in a petition asking the General Assembly to allow Nathan “to spend the remnant of his days, in the said county in which he was born.”
African Americans, even once freed, were not equal in southern society. In Virginia, an 1806 law required all freed slaves to leave the Commonwealth within a year of emancipation (Guild, 72-73). Those who wished to stay had to petition for residency. Only white men were permitted to sign, vouching for the petitioner’s good character and testifying that they did not pose a threat to the community as a whole.
The most common reason for seeking to stay was family. Many freed slaves had family members who were still enslaved and did not want to abandon them. This was especially the case because very few former slaves had the means to purchase the freedom of their family members.
According to the petition, Nathan, who by his emancipation in 1833 was “considerably advanced in years,” had a “wife and four children” who were enslaved by Rockingham County farmer George Sites. With “no way of purchasing” his wife and children “in any short time,” even if Sites proved willing to sell them, Nathan asked his white neighbors to help him persuade the General Assembly to let him stay.
Jacob Lincoln, Jr. was one of the signers. Like many powerful families of the antebellum period, the Lincolns owned slaves and were involved in the slave matters of their neighbors. Nathan had been owned by the Dunlap family. Jacob Lincoln, Jr. almost certainly knew him personally. He may also have known his wife and children, who lived not far away on Linville Creek. An enslaver himself, Lincoln thought highly enough of Nathan to testify that he was not a threat to the community as a free person.
While enslavers sometimes sought to manipulate and exploit freed slaves, Jacob Lincoln, Jr. and the other petitioners appear to have had Nathan’s best interest at heart. This is clear because Nathan was old and had little to offer those speaking on his behalf, aside from being “a faithfull servant” in the past.
What happened to Nathan? Not much is known about his whereabouts after the 1833 petition. In 1834, residents of Rockingham County filed another petition on Nathan’s behalf. This petition had many of the same signatures, with the exception of Jacob Lincoln, Jr. The result of this petition is unknown.
If Nathan received permission and opted to remain in Rockingham County, he would have faced discrimination in labor and everyday life. He might have found work as a field hand, street sweeper, or outhouse cleaner, doing hard labor for low pay. He would have been a second-class member of society, subject to harassment and discrimination (West, 465). Nathan knew this grim outlook when he organized his petition to the General Assembly, but the bonds of family nevertheless persuaded him to seek to stay.
Works Cited
Citizens: Petitions, Rockingham County, 4 December 1833, Legislative Petitions Digital Collection, Library of Virginia, Richmond, Va.
Citizens: Petitions, Rockingham County, 2 December 1834, Legislative Petitions Digital Collection, Library of Virginia, Richmond, Va.
Guild, June Purcell. Black Laws of Virginia. New York, NY: Negro Univ. Press, 1969.
West, Emily. “‘Between Slavery and Freedom’: The Expulsion and Enslavement of Free Women of Colour in the US South before the Civil War.” Women’s History Review 22 (2013).
Squire, Fire, Repression, and Rebellion
Madeleine Hesler, Ryan Ritter, and Ashton White
Squire was an enslaved man at the Lincoln Homestead who in 1841 was charged with burning a barn “of the value of one Thousand Dollars” belonging to Abraham Lincoln (Lincoln Public Claim). He had been acquired by Jacob Lincoln, Jr., son of the original builder of the Homestead, through his mother-in-law Dorcas Robinson in 1811 (Wayland, 253). As with many enslaved people in the antebellum South, there is, unfortunately, little information about Squire in the historical records. However, his story may be pieced together through the few available documents and recorded testimony.
Squire was tried and convicted by a five-judge court of oyer and terminer, a type of court established specifically to handle slave crime, and was originally sentenced to be hanged on October 29, 1841.However, an act of “clemency” from the court ordered that he be brought to an unidentified penitentiary for transportation before he was likely sold for $280. At the time of his transfer to the penitentiary, Squire was 50 years old. What happened after his transfer is a matter of speculation, though it is most likely that he continued his servitude elsewhere.
Virginia had one of the most “repressive systems of criminal law regarding slaves” (Flanigan, 546). Court magistrates were often composed almost entirely of slave owners, and lack of evidence against an accused defendant often did not halt the issuing of a guilty verdict (Campbell 71-85). As opposed to the biennial circuit court sessions where white defendants were tried, courts of oyer and terminer met for only five to ten days after an investigation was filed and, according to historian James Campbell, largely existed “for the sole purpose of trying and sentencing […] specific slave[s].”
Though Squire was likely never executed, his original sentencing to be hanged was not an uncommon punishment for enslaved Virginians. For courts of oyer and terminer, capital punishment was often preferred. It served as a mechanism for white slave owners to assert power and intimidate those they enslaved. To instill further fear, slave owners would oftentimes display the heads of executed slaves as a reminder to others of their fate should they choose to rebel (Blackman and McLaughlin, 45). At the time of his sentencing, Squire’s crime was considered particularly egregious. According to Anne Willis, slaveholders feared arson the most as it was “impossible to guard against, and it endangered their own lives and property” (Willis, 37).
Slave rebellion is often associated with dramatic acts such as Squire’s alleged act of arson, with less attention paid to quieter forms of resistance (Scully). Yet practicing religion, fostering community and family connections, and staying true to oneself allowed enslaved individuals to experience a taste of freedom, agency, and hope even while under the oppression of their enslavers. Quieter forms of rebellion could contribute to the stirrings of (and success of) dramatic slave rebellions.
Squire’s case is an interesting, yet not uncommon one in the historical record. Due to the lack of information and documentation of Squire outside of his court case, we cannot determine what occurred to him after the trial. Squire represents one of many enslaved individuals who went through an unjust court system. His act of rebellion was one among many varieties. Rebellion could look different based on the motives and hopes of each individual living under a system of oppression.
Works Cited
Blackman, Paul H. and McLaughlin, Vance. “Mass Legal Executions in America up to 1865.” Crime, Histoire, & Sociétés 8, no. 2 (2004).
Campbell, James. “‘The Victim of Prejudice and Hasty Consideration’: The Slave Trial System in Richmond, Virginia, 1830-61.” Slavery & Abolition 26, no. 1 (2005).
Flanigan, Daniel J. “Criminal Procedure in Slave Trials in the Antebellum South.” The Journal of Southern History 40, no. 4 (1974).
Lincoln, Jacob: Public Claim, 1841-10-09. Virginia Untold: The African American Narrative Digital Collection, Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA.
Scully, Randolph Ferguson. “‘I Come Here Before You Did and I Shall Not Go Away’: Race, Gender, and Evangelical Community on the Eve of the Nat Turner Rebellion.” Journal of the Early Republic 27, no. 4 (2007).
Wayland, John W. The Lincolns in Virginia. Staunton, VA: The McClure Printing Company, 1946.
Willis, Anne Romberg, “The Master’s Mercy: Slave Prosecutions and Punishments in York County, Virginia, 1700-1780.” Master’s thesis. College of William & Mary, 1995.
Squire Court Documents 1841
