In November of 1860, executor William F. Smith was in a pickle.  Charged with settling the estate of Elizabeth P. Via of Augusta County, he had recently been a defendant in both a chancery and a judgment suit from seven of Via’s heirs that challenged the validity of her will.  The heirs objected to the provisions that Via made for her slaves, namely that they all be emancipated.  Additionally, she left $4,000 to transport them to a free state and set them up in homes there.  The remainder of her estate was to be distributed amongst Via’s heirs who were not pleased by this and thought it in their best interest to have the will invalidated so that they could get everything, including the slaves that were left at Via’s death.  The will was upheld, however, and then it was time for executor Smith to get on with the business of carrying out Via’s wishes.  But there were some questions that he struggled to answer about his job as executor.

At issue were several points.  Did children born since Via’s death have an interest in the money left to the slaves?  What should happen to the residue of the $4,000 after the will’s provisions were carried out?  How should title to any house or land purchased for the emancipated slaves be done?  The slaves had been hired out since 1859 due to the dispute over the will, so did the money earned by their hire belong now to them or to the estate?  Smith sought the court’s guidance on how to answer these thorny questions and fulfill his duties as executor.  He then filed accounts with the chancery suit to prove that he had properly carried out his tasks.

Included in the accounts is a two-page document written by Smith titled “Account for removing and settling slaves in a free state.”  Beginning 28 January 1861, and ending 7 February of the same year, this master account reads like a travel journal of Smith’s trip to Columbus, Ohio, with his assistant, Mr. Larew, and Via’s 18 newly emancipated slaves.  Line by line, one can follow the party as they get train tickets and meals in Staunton, look at land in Franklin County, Ohio, buy the land and have it surveyed, purchase livestock and household goods, and finally return home to Staunton via train and omnibus.  Accompanying this master account are individual vouchers for goods or services provided that reveal more details about the items purchased to set up the farm and housekeeping in Ohio.  Included in other accounts are receipts for registering Via’s former slaves as free negroes in Augusta County prior to their departure for Ohio.  One of the final items on the master account is $14.00 for “cash paid negroes,” Via’s final bequest for their new life of freedom.

Through the lens of estate accounts, this chancery suit offers a rare glimpse of what followed emancipation.  It is common enough to find evidence of slaves freed in deeds and wills, but what happened after that is usually a mystery, especially if the freed persons then left the state.  The Franklin County, Ohio, Recorder’s Office has digitized their early deeds, and the deed for the sale of 110 4/10 acres of land from Edwin W. Warren to Elizabeth Jane and others (Elizabeth P. Via’s negroes) can be uncovered easily enough.  What happened to these eighteen people after 1861?  Did they stay together on their new land in Ohio?  Did they drift apart to other parts of Ohio or the country?  Did any of them return to Virginia after the Civil War?  This the records do not show.

Read the entire chancery suits that are filed together on the Chancery Records Index as Augusta County 1860-016, James W. Bishop, etc. vs. Administrator of Elizabeth P. Via, etc. and Executor of Elizabeth P. Via vs. James W. Bishop.  The judgment that decided Via’s will, James W. Bishop, etc. vs. William F. Smith, Exr. of Elizabeth P. Via, ended June 1860, is at the Augusta County courthouse; although a copy of the final order was used as evidence in the chancery suit.

-Sarah Nerney, Senior Local Records Archivist

“It was a hot summer day on August 5, 1865, when George Kiner and Diana Bumgardner arrived at the courthouse in Augusta County, Virginia, to apply for a marriage license. They brought with them an order from Capt. John Collins, Provost Marshall, directing the court to issue the license as ‘they being in all respects entitled to such license.’ While there were other couples that day applying for marriage licenses, George and Diana were the only couple with such an order. This was indeed a historical event as they were the first African American couple to be issued a marriage license in Augusta County.”

-African American Marriage Index 1865-1899, Augusta County, Virginia

At first glance the story of George Kiner and Diana Bumgardner is one of love triumphing over the tragedies of slavery and war. But documents found in the Augusta County Chancery Causes reveal not a lovely wedding born of true love, but a shotgun affair with a groom forced to the altar at gunpoint. In his bill for divorce filed in the Augusta County courts in February 1866, George Coiner (the predominant spelling in court documents was Coiner, but Kiner and Koiner were also used) painted a less than idealistic picture of his wedding day. George Coiner, a former slave, was working in a field when two armed soldiers, one white and the other black, came to arrest him and forcibly carry him off to Staunton. Without giving him time to protest or argue, George Coiner was arraigned before General Isaac Duval’s forces on the complaint of Dinah Bumgardner, a former slave of Frank Strouse.

In her own bill for divorce filed in 1868, Dinah, or Diana Kiner as she is named in her divorce suit, claimed that George seduced her with the promise of marriage and had “carnal intercourse” with her that resulted in a pregnancy. When he was deposed, Dinah’s former owner backed up her allegations stating that George admitted to sleeping with Dinah in March of that year, but George argued that he only knew of Dinah because of frequent visits to see his nephew, another member of the Strouse household. George repeatedly affirmed that “he never had carnal knowledge of her person… nor did he ever use any language toward her tending to express any passion or partiality for her.”

Coiner was not afforded an investigation or an opportunity to disprove Dinah’s claims but “was condemned unheard and informed that unless he married her forthwith, he would be sent off to Richmond the next morning.” Not wanting to risk being arrested and carried off by strangers, George “was obliged to yield to the superior power of those who had possession of him, and a license was obtained, and he was compelled, at the point of the bayonet, to submit to the marriage, though it was in opposition to all his wishes.” One of the officers told George “not to be uneasy, for as soon as the ceremony was over, he could leave her.” Which was exactly what George did, claiming that Dinah was a “woman of loose morals” and “little better than a common strumpet.”

In 1868 the marriage was dissolved and both parties were granted full liberty to marry again, so ended the first African American marriage on record after the Civil War in Augusta County. The chancery causes George Coiner vs. Dinah Coiner (1868-010) and Diana Kiner vs. George Kiner (1868-015) are open for research and available digitally as part of the Augusta County Chancery Causes, 1747-1912, a scanning project funded by the Circuit Court Records Preservation Program and a $150,000 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC).

-Bari Helms, Local Records Archivist

The colonial era Northampton County court records tell a fascinating story of a woman named Jane Webb. Born of a white mother, she was a free mulatto, formerly called Jane Williams. In 1704, Jane Webb had “a strong desire to intermarry with a certain negro slave … commonly called and known by the name of Left.” Webb informed Left’s owner Thomas Savage, a gentleman of Northampton County, of her desire to marry Left and made an offer to Savage. She would be a servant of Savage’s for seven years and would let Savage “have all the children that should be bornd [sic] upon her body during the time of [Jane’s] servitude,” but for how long the children were to be bound is not clear. In return, Savage would allow Jane Webb to marry his slave, and after Jane’s period of servitude ended, Savage would free Left. Also, neither Savage nor his heirs could claim any child born to Jane Webb and Left after her period of servitude. Savage agreed to Jane Webb’s offer, and an agreement was written and signed by both parties.

Jane Webb fulfilled her part of the agreement and served Savage for seven years. During that time, she had three children by her husband Left—Diana or Dinah Webb, Daniel Webb, and Francis Webb. After she completed her term of service in 1711, Jane Webb “in a kindly manner” demanded her husband from Savage as well as her children. Apparently, Jane Webb and Savage were at odds on how long the children she bore during her servitude were supposed to be bound to him, and Savage refused to free Left and the children. In April 1711, Savage submitted a letter to the county court of Northampton requesting that Jane Webb’s children be bound to him and his heirs, to which the court agreed.

Eleven years later, Jane Webb filed a petition with the court pleading to the justices to free her children. Webb pointed out to the court her agreement with Savage and beseeched the court that the “children being born in lawful wedlock may not be judged to servitude.” She prayed that the court would not “enslave your petitioner’s children born as aforesaid.” Thomas Savage was unable to, or refused to, appear in court to answer Webb’s petition. On one occasion, he informed the court that he was too sick to attend, and so, the case was continued until the next term, and the next term, and the next term, until it was finally dismissed by the court. Reason given? “Plaintiff’s argument dismissed as frivolous.”

In February 1725, Thomas Savage petitioned the court to have two of Jane’s children, born after Jane completed her term of service, to be bound to him. When you read the petition you will notice that part of it has been marked out. Fortunately, one can make out the words: “…the said Jane hath two children named Lisha & Abimelech the former of which hath long lived with your Petitioner but hath lately been decoyd [sic] away from your Petitioner’s house & is detaind [sic] by her said mother from your Petitioner.” Since Jane had no means to support the children, “they may be induced to take ill courses,” and for that reason, Savage argued that he, and not their mother, had the best right to the children. Savage’s action was in violation of their 1701 agreement as understood by Jane Webb; however, Savage claimed that 1701 agreement permitted him to bind any child born to Jane Webb and Left, even children born after Jane’s seven years of servitude. Savage never produced the agreement as evidence in the case, but he did provide two witnesses who informed the court that they had seen an indenture between Savage and Jane Webb in which “it was agreed that the said Jane was to serve seven years & all her children born in the lifetime of her husband Left should serve the said Savage.”

At the same time the court was hearing Savage’s petition, Jane Webb tried to win freedom for her husband and children in the chancery court. In March 1725, Webb filed her bill of complaint against Thomas Savage in which she recounted the agreement the two made and accused Savage of holding in bondage children born to her and her husband after 1711. She accused Savage of concealing the written agreement which made it difficult for her to prove her case in the previous suit. She asked the chancery court to issue a writ of subpoena to Savage “commanding him” to personally appear before the court to answer her complaint and produce the written agreement.

By July 1726, Savage had yet to respond to Jane’s complaint in the chancery court. On 12 July, the justices made their decision on Savage’s petition regarding Lisha and Abimilech. Both were bound to Savage. On that same day, Jane Webb was arrested on the charge of uttering dangerous words “tending to the breach of the peace” which was heard by several individuals. They swore “that the said Jane had declared that if all Virginia Negroes had as a good as heart as she had they would all be free.” The court ordered that she receive ten lashes “well laid” on her bare back at the whipping post and that it was to be done immediately.

Savage finally responded to Jane Webb’s bill of complaint in November 1726. He informed the court that he never consented to freeing Left and that the children born during and after Webb’s time of servitude were to be bound to him but he could not recall for how long. Once again, Savage did not produce the 1701 agreement. The court put the burden on Jane to produce the evidence on how long her children were to serve Savage. If she could not, the court would dismiss her bill. Jane appeared at the next court held in December 1726 with witnesses to give evidence on her behalf—African-American witnesses. None of the testimony exists because there was some confusion on the part of the court concerning whether the testimony of African-Americans should be admissible. The order book entry reads, “the court being divided about Negro evidence offered ordered the same to be referred to the next court.” In April 1727, the court ruled “that none such [Negro evidence] ought to be allowed.” With no evidence to support her complaint, Jane Webb realized she had no chance of winning her suit. She failed to appear in court the next time the case was heard in July 1727, and the court dismissed the case from the docket. Her husband Left remained a slave and all her children and, by now, grandchildren remained bound to Savage and his heirs.

To learn more stories like Jane Webb’s, visit the Library of Virginia’s latest exhibition You Have No Right: Law and Justice in Virginia, running 24 September 2012-18 May 2013

Information for this story was gathered from the following Northampton County Court Records found at the Library of Virginia:

Northampton County (Va.) Judgments, 1655-1816. Jane Webb versus Thomas Savage, 1723 January, Barcode number 1154682. Local Government Records Collection, Northampton Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Northampton County Chancery Causes, 1721-1816. Jane Webb versus Thomas Savage, Northampton County Chancery Cause, 1727-001. Local Government Records Collection, Northampton Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Northampton County (Va.) Criminal Causes, 1722-1799. Warrant for Jane Webb, 1726 July, Barcode number 1168307. Local Government Records Collection, Northampton Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Northampton County (Va.) Judgments, 1655-1816. Petition of  Thomas Savage, 1726, Barcode number 1154685. Local Government Records Collection, Northampton Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Northampton County Order Book No. 18, 1722-1729 (copy), Barcode number 1123591. Local Government Records Collection, Northampton Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

-Greg Crawford, Local Records Coordinator

A small slip of paper on display in the Library of Virginia’s latest exhibition You Have No Right: Law and Justice in Virginia, running 24 September 2012-18 May 2013, was of immense importance to twelve people. It discloses, even though it does not state the fact in so many words, that on 2 May 1772 they gained their freedom after being held in slavery since each of them was born. The piece of paper and the fates of those Virginians illuminates a disturbing and little-known part of Virginia’s history, the enslavement of American Indians.

The paper came into the possession of the Library of Virginia in 1988 when it acquired a copy of volume two of John Tracy Atkyns, Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the High Court of Chancery in the Time of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke . . . (London, 1765–1768) that had once been in the library of the colonial government in Williamsburg. One of the librarians in the cataloguing section showed it to me, knowing of my interest in that library. When she lifted it from her desk to hand it to me, a piece of paper that had been slipped between leaves in the middle of the volume fell out and fluttered to the floor. We were surprised, and I was even more surprised when I saw what it was. It was a 1780s or 1790s copy of the judgment in Robyn v. Hardiway (or Robin, or Hardaway), an unusually important case decided in the General Court of Virginia. The librarian and I presented the judgment to the archivists who added it to the meager surviving records of the colonial General Court.

The court case had two parts. First, attorneys argued about whether a 1682 law that allowed for the lifetime enslavement of Indians imported from other colonies had been repealed in 1684, 1691, or 1705. For decades Virginia’s courts had assumed that the 1684 invalidated the 1682 law, and “under that persuasion,” one of the attorneys informed the court, “hundreds of the descendants of Indians have obtained their freedom, on actions brought in this court.” The court concluded the first part of the case by deciding that the 1682 law had remained in effect until 1705.  This decision enlarged the number of residents of Virginia who could not hope to gain their freedom by claiming to be descendants of Indian women illegally enslaved between 1684 and 1705.

A jury trial then established that the twelve people were descendants of an Indian woman who had been illegally enslaved. The jury awarded Robin, Hannah, Daniel, Cuffie, Isham, Moses, Peter, Judy, Autry, Silvia, Davy, and Ned, all of unstated age, one shilling in damages. Each received one penny, but each also received freedom.

Some excellent 21^st-century scholarship demonstrates that English-speaking Virginians enslaved many more Indian residents of Virginia in the 17^th century than earlier historians believed and that the enslavement may very well have taken place in spite of the laws or in the absence of laws governing the enslavement of Indians. Because almost all of the records of the colonial General Court burned in the fire that destroyed the state court house and much of the business district of Richmond in April 1865, the specific record of the outcome of the important 1772 freedom suit naming the persons freed is especially rare and valuable.

It was critically important that the twelve plaintiffs were descendants of “Indian women,” not of Indian men. In 1662 the Virginia General Assembly had passed a law that arose from a case that Elizabeth Key filed in the Northumberland County Court. She was the daughter of Thomas Key, a white man who had been a burgess in the 1630s, and one of his enslaved female laborers of African origin or descent. Elizabeth Key claimed her freedom as the daughter of a free man and won her case, but the assembly then changed the law. The act of 1662 explained that because “some doubts have arrisen whether children got by any Englishman upon a negro woman should be slave or ffree” it declared “that all children borne in this country shalbe held bound or free only according to the condition of the mother.”

Two other pieces of paper on exhibition in You Have No Right demonstrate that descendants of enslaved Indian women continued to file freedom suits in Virginia courts well into the 19^th century. In May 1820, after seven years of tedious and delayed proceedings in the courts of Wythe and Powhatan Counties, Rachel Findlay won her freedom for the second time. When she was a girl in 1773, one year after the General Court issued its judgment in Robyn v. Hardiway, the court ruled that she and her family, too, were entitled to their freedom as descendants of an illegally enslaved Indian woman. But her owner, who lived in the part of Cumberland County that in 1777 became Powhatan County, sold rather than freed her. She lived in slavery in far-away Wythe County for forty years until learning in 1813 that she should have been freed in 1773.

When the Powhatan County Court finally issued its ruling in the May 1820 judgment Rachel vs. John Draper, Sr. that Rachel Findlay was a free person, she was an old woman with thirty or forty descendants, all of whom had lived all of their lives in slavery and should have always lived free. It is not known whether any or all of her children and grandchildren and perhaps great grandchildren ever learned that they, too, should have been living in freedom and not in slavery since their births or whether any of them actually became free as a result of her persistent pursuit of her law suit. A court judgment was not self-enforcing, especially for a group of people like Rachel Findlay’s descendants who probably lived in wide dispersion, perhaps some of them outside of Virginia. Some of them may have lived the remainder of their lives in slavery, too, as she did for forty-seven years.

About the time that Rachel Findlay won her freedom for the second time, members of the Evans family lost a freedom suit in Lynchburg in Charles Evans, etc. vs. Lewis B. Allen, 1821-033. Their story is truly tragic. In preparation for their case, members of the family or perhaps their court-appointed attorney compiled and submitted to the court a genealogical chart that demonstrated how the family members were related to one another. That sheet of paper is also on display in the Library of Virginia’s exhibition and together with other evidence might have persuaded a court that they were entitled to their freedom. However, their attorney, former Congressman Christopher Henderson Clark, had a stroke sometime in 1820 and failed to appear in court on behalf of his clients. As a consequence of the case not being presented when scheduled, the court dismissed it in 1821, leaving all of the people and the descendants of the females stuck in slavery for the remainder of their lives.

Slavery and the laws that created and protected it were cruel and unjust. Adding to the cruelty and injustice were the many unpredictable factors, like the illness of an attorney, that could prevent people from presenting their cases in court, or like the sale of Rachel before she could become free. It is now clear that colonial Virginians enslaved more Indians than historians once knew about, and it is evident that many more people had been illegally enslaved than historians once believed. Men, women, and children of African, American Indian, and also of European and mixed ancestry like Elizabeth Key fell victim to the system of slavery that sustained Virginia’s economy and society from the early years of the colonial period to the end of the American Civil War.

It is also now convenient for the first time to do thorough research on some of the freedom suits that people filed after the American Revolution. People who filed suits seeking freedom and alleging illegal enslavement often sought justice through local courts of chancery. The record of each surviving court case contains unique personal stories about the enslavement of one or more Virginians and the conditions under which they lived and how they attempted to gain their freedom. As part of the Library of Virginia’s project to preserve and make available to researchers the records of the commonwealth’s local chancery courts, archivists at the library have to date digitized thousands of case files containing several million pages of documents, including more than one hundred freedom suits. They are processing and digitizing more every day. The records of the cases that have been digitized can be viewed online in the Chancery Records Index.

Clerks of court did not know or use the surnames of the people who filed freedom suits, so to identify freedom suits it is necessary to search for chancery causes in which the style, or title, of the case does not include a surname. In the search field for the surname for the plaintiff(s), simply enter a tilde ~ which will return a list of cases in which the surname of the plaintiff is not part of the official name of the case.

-Brent Tarter, Founding Editor of the Dictionary of Virginia Biography

“In the time worn and musty old folios long since filed away in our public offices, there is many a fact recorded that has occured [sic] under the personal observation of no one now living; and which if placed within the reach of the public, would go farther to give us a knowledge of the manners, customs, and character of the pioneers of Augusta County than all the histories that have been written on our native state.”

These words were written by a young lawyer who was researching court records filed in the Augusta County courthouse in the early 1830’s. He was amazed by the amount of history found in the old court papers. He discovered stories about the first settlers of western Virginia and the many obstacles they encountered in their efforts to start a new life in an untamed wilderness. He read about events that happened during the French and Indian War and Revolutionary War. The young lawyer came across suits in which the litigants talked about their migration down the Shenandoah Valley from western Pennsylvania to Kentucky, Tennessee, and Georgia. Mesmerized by what he was reading, the young lawyer wanted to make his discoveries in the court records available to the public, and so, he wrote a letter to the editor of an unidentified newspaper requesting a weekly column in which he would share the history of Augusta County using records found in the courthouse.

The latest digital images of the Augusta County chancery causes now available on the Chancery Records Index cover the years 1747-1818 and include the court records the young lawyer came across 180 years earlier. And just like the young lawyer, the Library of Virginia is placing within the reach of the public the stories of the pioneers of western Virginia.

Why are the early Augusta County chancery records so rich with the history of western Virginia? Staunton was the site of a Superior Court of Chancery that existed from 1802 to 1832. The Superior Courts of Chancery were created by an act of the General Assembly passed on 23 January 1802. In order to expedite the hearing of chancery suits, the High Court of Chancery was abolished and the state was divided into three chancery districts with a Superior Court of Chancery for each district. For this reason these courts were sometimes called “District Courts of Chancery.” Suits heard in these courts were typically cases appealed from the local courts. A transcript of the suit from the local court was commonly filed with the appeal. Litigants could bypass the local courts and file their suits in the chancery district court directly. The Superior Court of Chancery in Staunton heard on average over a hundred suits per year – 210 in 1811 alone. Of the three original Superior Courts of Chancery – Staunton, Richmond (City), and Williamsburg – only the records of the Staunton district remain.

From 1802 to 1812, the Staunton district consisted of localities found in the western half of the Commonwealth including the ones in present-day West Virginia: Augusta, Bath, Berkeley, Botetourt, Brooke, Frederick, Grayson, Greenbrier, Hampshire, Hardy, Harrison, Jefferson, Kanawha, Lee, Monongalia, Monroe, Montgomery, Ohio, Pendleton, Randolph, Rockbridge, Rockingham, Russell, Shenandoah, Tazewell, Washington, Wood, and Wythe counties. In 1812, the General Assembly created additional Superior Courts of Chancery which reduced the number of localities in the Staunton district to the following: Albemarle, Amherst, Augusta, Bath, Botetourt, Cabell, Greenbrier, Kanawha, Mason, Monroe, Nelson, Pendleton, Rockbridge, and Rockingham counties. Consequently, the Augusta County chancery causes are a tremendous resource for historical and genealogical researchers of West Virginia and western Virginia localities that experienced substantial loss of their pre-Civil War era loose records such as Russell County, Washington County, Lee County, and Botetourt Counties. (For more information on the counties and cities with missing records see the Lost Records Localities research note.)

Chancery causes from the Superior Court of Chancery period are a rich primary source for a variety of historical topics. Many suits document violent encounters between the first settlers and Native Americans, the original inhabitants of the region. In James Maxwell vs. Thomas Pickens, etc., 1810-031, James Maxwell wrote that during his twelve years’ residence in the county he “encountered death in a thousand shapes” and that his family were “almost continually exposed to the cruelty of the merciless Savages” and two of his daughters “fell a sacrifice to their barbarity during his residence” while he was “engaged abroad in defending his country.”

Transcript of letter to a newspaper editor

There are a multitude of land ownership and boundary disputes that contain exhibits such as deeds, land surveys, and plats. One suit involved the disputed boundary between North Carolina and Virginia and references the Fry-Jefferson survey of the state border. (See Colonel William Robinson vs. Colonel Arthur Campbell, 1807-067, image number 61.) One will also find in these suits the names of African Americans brought to western Virginia as slaves. Chancery cause 1812-042, William McMechen & James P. Heath vs. John H. Hyde etc., involves a dispute over the ownership of a large number of slaves in Rockbridge County. A bill of sale for 31 of the slaves is an exhibit in the suit and lists the names of the slaves, family relationships (husband, wife, children), occupations, and the appraised monetary value of each slave (image numbers 36 and 37). One will also read about women suing to defend their property rights (1805-041, Elizabeth Russell vs. John Doyell etc.), the establishment of schools (1805-090,  Trustees of Washington Academy vs. Robert Gold), and one suit related to an attempt to invent a steam-powered boat (1803-089, James McMeechen vs Exr. of James Rumsey.)

This latest addition of Augusta County chancery causes covering the time period from 1747 through 1818 joins the 1867-1912 causes already available. These cases are representative of the over 10,000 found in the Augusta County Chancery Causes collection that document the rich heritage of Augusta County and western Virginia. This scanning project is funded by the Circuit Court Records Preservation Program and a $150,000 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC).

-Greg Crawford, Local Records Coordinator

In the years following the Civil War, the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands (commonly referred to as simply the Freedmen’s Bureau) provided assistance to former slaves still living in the South, helping them transition from a society based on slavery to one allowing freedom. Established as part of the War Department by an act of Congress on 3 March 1865, the Freedmen’s Bureau, operational until 1872, helped introduce a system of free labor, provided food and clothing, helped locate families and legalize marriages, promoted education, supervised labor contracts, and provided legal representation.

One of the Bureau’s most important roles was to help safeguard the rights of African Americans and ensure they received justice from the court system. Following the Civil War, several southern states, including Virginia, enacted a series of laws commonly known as “black codes” that restricted the rights and legal status of freedmen. African Americans were often given harsh sentences for petty crimes and were sometimes unable to get their cases heard in the state courts. In September 1865, Freedmen’s Bureau courts were established to adjudicate cases involving freedmen. By February 1866, Virginia had amended her laws and the Bureau courts were discontinued by May of that same year, but because of the failure of many local court officials to administer equal justice, the Bureau courts were reestablished in certain areas of the state.

One instance of the Freedmen’s Bureau interceding to ensure the legal rights of African Americans happened in the Highland County criminal courts. In November 1865, Stephen J. Reynolds accused Alexander McCray, an African American, of feloniously stealing and carrying away his bay horse valued at seventy-five dollars. Alexander McCray successfully postponed his trial until January 1866 by claiming that he had already been tried and acquitted in Staunton before a military court for the crime he now stood accused of again. McCray claimed that he could not safely go to trial without the benefit of a statement from the military court. In January 1866, Lieutenant Colonel Cecil Clay, then stationed in Staunton, wrote a letter stating that McCray had been tried for the alleged offense and further claimed that the horse was proven to be the property of the U.S. government. Clay went on to write that “at the time of trial, civil authority was yet unrestored” and that the provost court was “competent to decide all cases in which the U.S. Government or its soldiers were parties or a party.”

To further ensure that McCray was not tried for his alleged crime a second time, the Freedmen’s Bureau sent a letter by command of Major General A. H. Terry, then Assistant Commissioner for the Bureau in Virginia, on 14 February 1866. The Bureau wrote to James M. Sieg, prosecuting attorney for Highland County, and ordered that all further action in the criminal prosecution against McCray be suspended until further orders were received from the Freedmen’s Bureau. It is unclear why Stephen J. Reynolds was convinced the horse was his property or why the case was brought against McCray for a second time. And, it is also unknown exactly how the Freedmen’s Bureau became aware of McCray’s plight, but they did and the Bureau ensured that the legal rights of this African American were upheld.

The Highland County (Va.) Commonwealth Causes, 1852-1867, are open for research and available at the Library of Virginia. Other Freedmen’s Bureau records can be found at the Library of Virginia in the Free Negro and Slave Records, Court Records, and Cohabitation Registers of various localities.

-Bari Helms, Local Records Archivist

Three Highland County Commonwealth Causes (Barcode 0007281802) reveal a tangled web of conspiracy, murder, and secret affairs. The cast of players includes Elizabeth Sheridan, wife of the deceased; Mary Ann Wily, Elizabeth’s daughter from a previous marriage; Sam, a slave; and Ellen, a slave and Sam’s wife. Commonwealth vs. Sam (slave), 1856 August; Commonwealth vs. Ellen (slave), 1856 August; and Commonwealth vs. Elizabeth Sheridan and Mary Ann Wily, 1856 November concern the murder of Mr. Francis W. Sheridan by Sam, a slave hired by Sheridan from William Wilson. Sam’s wife, Ellen, was also charged with being “concerned in the murder,” while Elizabeth Sheridan and her daughter Mary Ann Wily were charged as accessories.  The cases contain assorted court documents including depositions and statements from various neighbors and acquaintances of the accused and the murder victim. 

A document entitled “Evidence in Support of Prosecution” offers a wealth of information.  Notes from the coroner’s inquest give revealing physical facts about Francis Sheridan.  He was described as a small man about the age of 21 or 22 years whose body displayed visible signs of trauma due to strangulation.  The report reveals that the body was found lying face down in a drain twenty or thirty feet away from the public road and gives a detailed forensic account of Sheridan’s bedroom, where the murder actually took place.

Francis Sheridan was noted around town for getting drunk and becoming quite belligerent, making verbal threats to kill his wife and step-daughter with a “pistol and a gun.” He often lamented the fact that he had gotten married and said his married life had been the worst six months of his life. Statements also suggest that Sheridan was not the most honest businessman in town. Several people felt they were treated unfairly by him and had ample motive to see Sheridan leave the earth quickly and violently. There are also accounts of Mary Ann telling people in town she wished someone would kill Sheridan, stating that “she would pay to have him killed or if she was a man she would kill him herself.”  

A multitude of scenarios and implications concerning the murder abound within the records.  The predominant theory was that Elizabeth Sheridan and her daughter, along with Sam’s wife, Ellen, plotted to kill Sheridan and convinced Sam to carry out the deed. There is testimony that the three ladies were witnessed having a loud, quarrelsome conversation with Sam prior to Sheridan’s death and that at one point Ellen beat Sam with her fist and Mary Ann “cracked her fist together” toward Sam. Sam was supposedly madly in love with Elizabeth and desirous that no harm would come to her or her children, especially Mary Ann. Sam is quoted as saying that he loved Mrs. Sheridan “more than any woman on the face of the earth – that he would do more for her, risk his life further, than for anyone else – that he had been sleeping with her for more than twelve months whenever he pleased, that she was to continue to hire his wife [Ellen] as long as she was for hire and he was to continue to sleep with her [Mrs. Sheridan] whenever he pleased.”

While the true nature of the personal relationship between Elizabeth Sheridan and Sam remains unclear, Sam acknowledged that he was in a “bad fix.”  He confessed his guilt to the justice of the peace, claiming that he had been promised a hundred dollars from both Mrs. Sheridan and Mary Ann if he committed the murder. Sam claimed that Francis Sheridan was drunk on the day of his death and that he, Sam, was “drinking himself or he could not have done the deed.” Sam claimed to love the man as well as if he had been his own brother and “if he had opened his eyes he could not have killed him.”

Other theories tried to pass off the murder as a suicide. Sheridan was noted as being “smartly intoxicated” on the day of his death and Elizabeth and Mary Ann started telling people that Francis may have wanted to commit suicide because he appeared to be in a bad state. Mrs. Sheridan stated that when he came home that morning “if she had been standing up she would have sunk down, his looks was so dark and terrible.”

Ultimately, Sam was found guilty of the murder and sentenced to be “hanged by the neck until he be dead” and he was, on Friday, 26 September 1856. But despite Sam’s execution, the county did not stop investigating the murder of Francis Sheridan.  The investigation continued through November 1856 with the prosecution of Elizabeth Sheridan and Mary Ann Wily as accessories to murder. The lone document in the case states it is seeking costs incurred by the prosecution in the pursuit of the charges and lists witnesses and monies paid to them by the county. As there are no other documents concerning this particular court action, we will never know if Sam acted alone or if he was just a tool wielded by Mrs. Sheridan in an attempt to rid herself of an unwanted husband. 

-Joanne Porter, Local Records Archivist and Bari Helms, Local Records Archivist

The wool of Merino sheep was highly prized and for centuries the flocks were not allowed to be exported from their home in Spain. One of the few individuals to get Merinos into the United States was U.S. minister to Spain David Humphreys, who imported twenty-five rams and seventy-five ewes to his home in Connecticut in 1802. The Library of Virginia has a copy of Humphreys’s 1804 book The miscellaneous works of David Humphreys, late minister plenipotentiary —to the court of Madrid, which contains an essay on Merino sheep. Thomas Jefferson was also particularly interested in the improvements of sheep herds and by 1810 had acquired his own herd of Merino sheep. The demand for Merinos soon reached manic proportions, a bubble was created, and like all bubbles there was a crash. (For more on this subject see Monticello’s article on sheep.)

Amongst the Cowling Papers found in the City of Richmond records is a letter dated 14 August 1827 from William DuVal (1748-1842), a Virginia lawyer, legislator, and planter, to Willis Cowling (1788-1828), a Richmond cabinetmaker. Enclosed in the letter is a sample of Merino wool. DuVal wrote to ask Cowling if he would sell two hundred pounds of Merino wool to buy material for slave clothing. Cowling was a good choice for carrying out DuVal’s request as he regularly dealt with merchants in New York and Philadelphia for mahogany and furniture hardware. He also had experience in selling Virginia coal in New York. (For more on Cowling see “Willis Cowling, Richmond Cabinetmaker “in the Journal of Early Southern Decorative Arts, Winter 2001, Vol. XXVII, No.2)

-Chris Kolbe, Archives Reference Coordinator

The transcribed letter below is found in the Richmond City Clerk’s Correspondence that includes both personal and court related material for 1801-1866 (Barcode 1117043).

Buckingham August 14 1827

Dear Sir,

     I have about 200 lb. of Marino Wool of the full Blooded Marino’s which I would sell at 45 Cents pr lb. or exchange for cotton and Wool Winter Cloathing for my Negroes 40 Yards for Men and Boys & sixty yards of single Wove Cotton Wool striped for women and children to be warm & well wove. The balance in white domestic Cotton Shirting from 10 Cents to 12 per Yard. The Wool will make excellent super Fine Broad Cloath. It is not washed and is free from Sheep Burs and Spanish Needles.

     I send enclosed a sample of the Wool I expect your Correspondents in Philadelphia or New York would buy it or exchange it for the above Articles or perhaps you may exchange it for the above Articles in Richmond. Inform Mr. Richard Adams that this Fall shall send him Three Marinoses. I have sold 21 more of them.

     Write me by Mail & I can send the wool to Richmond. My love to your Lady self & Family and to Mr.Ritter & Lady

I am

Your obliged Friend

William DuVal

At one o’clock in the morning on 1 September 1859, Milly T. King arrived at the home of James Clary and found his slave Hannah “lying on the hearth gasping for breath, and I thought dying.” When King saw Hannah an hour later, she was dead. The following day Brunswick County coroner William Lett arrived to examine the body.  With him were twelve men, none of whom had a medical background but rather were chosen as upstanding men and representatives of the county. The office of coroner held inquisitions in cases when persons met a sudden, violent, unnatural, or suspicious death. In this case Hannah had certainly met a sudden and suspicious demise.

Hannah, owned by the late Elizabeth H. Harwell, had been in the possession of James Clary, who adamantly maintained that the marks found on her feet and legs and the wound on her head were not from anything suspicious but came as a result of a fall from a window occurring a few weeks before her death. The coroner and his jury of white men were left to decide if Hannah had suffered an accidental death or if her death had been caused by something more malicious. Clary’s wife, Eliza, backed up her husband’s statements and claimed to know nothing of Hannah’s death, maintaining that her wounds were caused by the fall. But the Clarys’ neighbors painted a different picture of the events surrounding Hannah’s death.

Milly King heard Hannah “wailing and begging as though she was under severe chastisement” and reported Eliza Clary saying “she would kill [Hannah] if she did not do better.” Samuel King recalled seeing Hannah “tied across a log hands and feet” with Clary “whipping her with a leather rein doubled” two weeks prior to her death. Clary was said to have explained that he was “whipping her for going in the table cloth and taking out something to eat.” Samuel testified that he heard Hannah at other times, including the day before she died, “making lamentations as if under severe chastisement and sometimes for nearly an hour at a time.” Another neighbor also heard “some person begging and heard some blows as if inflicted with a large switch…”

Faced with contradictory evidence from witnesses, a doctor was finally summoned to provide a physician’s view of events. Dr. Robert S. Powell testified that all of Hannah’s wounds “did their part in hastening the fatal termination,” and the large wound on her head “would ultimately have produced death without medical assistance.” When questioned if her myriad of wounds could have come from a fall, Powell replied that the large head wound could have, but that her other wounds could not have come from the same fall. Powell further believed that “the marks of chastisements had been inflicted about 48 hours” before he saw her, which certainly contradicted Clary’s claims that Hannah’s wounds came from a fall occurring weeks before her death.

After examining the body and hearing testimony, the coroner and his jurors determined that Hannah did not die from a fall but that the “deceased came to her death by abuse inflicted on her person at sundry times during the present year and in various ways by choking and by blows inflicted on her head, body, and limbs,” and some of the blows appeared “to have been inflicted with switches and by other heavier weapons we know not what in the hands of James Clary.”

Virginia coroners were frequently called upon to investigate the deaths of slaves and were often reluctant to place blame in these instances. In the case of Hannah, the coroner and jury did not hesitate to blame Clary for her murder. However, a similar case in Petersburg showed a different outcome. Reuben, a 40-year-old slave, died in 1843 after being “severely whipped” by John Minetree. The coroner found “his body marked with many blows of the cowhide” yet the whipping was not considered a sufficient cause of death. It was determined that Reuben came to his death from an “undue quantity of cold water in his stomach, while under excessive heat and exhaustion.” The coroner and his jury censured the severity of the whipping, but Minetree was discharged from all murder charges.  A similar death happened in Frederick County when Lucy met her end in 1833. Earlier on the day of her death, Lucy had been whipped about the thighs as punishment for stealing some “trifling article” from a neighbor. After her punishment she was sent about her day’s work. While working over the fire Lucy fainted and struck her head on the hearth. The coroner determined that the whipping and fall were the cause of her death but no blame was placed on her owner because there was “no intention to kill on the part of her master.”

The separate office of coroner was created in about 1660 to hold inquisitions into sudden, suspicious, and violent deaths. Causes of death found in coroner’s inquisitions include murder, infanticide, suicide, exposure to the elements, drownings, train accidents, and natural causes. Coroner’s inquisitions are a valuable source for local, social, and legal history. They are especially useful for those researching African Americans. The gender and race of the deceased was often noted in the inquests. If the deceased was African American, the inquest would identify the individual as either a slave or a free person, and if the deceased was a slave, the inquest would include the name of the slaveowner. Currently, the following counties and cities have coroner’s inquisitions available for research at the Library of Virginia: Amelia County, Amherst County, Arlington County, Bedford County, Botetourt County, Brunswick County, Charlotte County, Frederick County, Henrico County, Norfolk County, Petersburg (City), and Rockbridge County.

-Bari Helms, Local Records Archivist

 

The Library of Virginia is pleased to announce that the first installment of images from the Petersburg chancery causes digitization project have been added to the Chancery Records Index. This project has been funded, in part, through a $155,071 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Images for the first forty-four boxes of chancery suits have been added to the index (circa 1803-1845). The boxes are not strictly chronological, so not all images for a given year are available. Additional images will be added periodically as the project progresses. Be sure to check back!

Here are some interesting suits that archivists found while processing, indexing, and conserving the collection. Many other fascinating and complex stories will surely be uncovered once the project is complete and the collection is studied by students, scholars, and family historians.

Transcript of Benjamin W. B. Jones Letter to William Smith, 5 February 1826

Petersburg chancery cause 1827-003 involves a dispute over a runaway slave named Davey, alias Davey Smith. Exhibits found in the suit include a notice published in a local newspaper describing Davey’s physical appearance, occupation, and his escape (image 22). The suit also contains letters from Benjamin W. B. Jones of Alabama claiming that he was Davey’s owner (image 27). 

Also in the newly released images there are two suits that involve an African American woman named Jane.  She was a slave of Edwin Lanier of Sussex County, who owned the Prince George County plantation where Jane lived.  Lanier’s will called for Jane to be emancipated upon his death, which occurred in 1828. She was the only one of Lanier’s slaves to be set free. In the first suit, 1834-015, Jane sues the administrator and heirs of Lanier’s estate to receive the property and cash bequeathed to her in Lanier’s will (image 23). The second suit, 1840-066, has its origin in several judgment suits heard in Sussex County. Lanier’s administrator and others successfully sued Jane for debts she owed as a consequence of the property she received from her former owner. When Jane could not repay the money owed, she was placed in the Petersburg jail. The case details Jane’s efforts to win back the freedom she had enjoyed only briefly. 

Jane’s certificate of freedom, the paperwork that had to be carried by freed persons of color, is used as an exhibit in the suit (image 46).  To add to the drama, Jane had several children and became pregnant during the course of the litigation. Sadly, Jane lost the case. Since she was unable to repay the debts, which included interest, Jane and her children were to be hired out as “servants and apprentices” for fourteen years to work off their debts. The sheriff auctioned Jane and her family to the highest bidder on the steps of the Petersburg courthouse (image 31).

In his will, Lanier allowed that Jane could remain on his plantation for nine months after his death and then move to a free state of her choosing. A statute passed by the General of Assembly of Virginia in 1806 stated that freed slaves had to leave the commonwealth within one year of their emancipation or they forfeited their freedom. The defendants in the earlier suit (1834-015) cited this law in their response to Jane’s complaint regarding the money and property.  They argued that Jane was no longer free because she had remained in Virginia beyond the twelve months. The defendants in the later suit (1840-066) also cited the 1806 law telling Jane that if she were truly a free person she would leave the commonwealth.

Did Jane need the money from Lanier’s estate to travel to a free state? Did she choose to stay in Virginia in spite of the law? Feel free to share your thoughts and opinions as to why Jane remained in Virgina in the comments.

-Vince Brooks, Senior Local Records Archivist