When conducting research using 18th-century newspapers such as the Maryland Gazette, it’s easy to get in the flow of looking for particular items of interest and glossing over less pertinent pieces. For the past three months, most of my weekly blogs have focused on how Annapolitans of 1770 reacted, both politically and economically, to British taxation under the Townshend Acts. When scanning pages of the Gazette, I knew I could skip over news items from Constantinople, Vienna, Madrid, Warsaw, and other distant locations, while stories from London, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore might be relevant to my theme. Notices placed by Annapolis merchants and public letters by members of the local Committee of Inspection deserved close attention, but I could tune out run-of-the-mill advertisements for property sales, lotteries, missing horses, runaway people, patent medicines, etc.
Wait…what was that about ads for runaway people?
Several years ago, Historic Annapolis’s “Project Run-A-Way” stage production and “Freedom Bound” museum exhibition told the stories of nine servants and slaves who tried to escape from forced servitude between 1728 and 1864. Stephen, Isabella Pierce, Jack, Oliver Stephens, Nace Butler, Candis, William ‘Rolla’ Ross, James Watkins, and Henry Smothers represented just a few of the many hundreds of bound laborers advertised as runaways in 18th- and 19th-century Annapolis newspapers. Their masters wrote and placed ads in the hope their fugitive human property would be recognized and returned to their service.
The June 28, 1770 issue of the Maryland Gazette contains 14 such notices describing 26 runaways. Twenty-one were indentured or convict servants, four were enslaved, and one was a free black man who had indentured himself for five years in payment for “Cure of a Pox.” I’m not posting clippings of all of the ads (you can read them for yourself starting here), but I do want to recognize by name each of these individuals who took decisive action in pursuit of their own freedom 250 years ago:
Joseph Moor (or Joseph Simon), indentured servant
Jacob Duffeld, convict servant
Thomas Ager, servant
Thomas Kelly, indentured servant
Nann, enslaved
Thomas Coulson, servant
Collin Porter, servant
Charles Dodd, servant
John Johnson, servant
William Robinson, servant
William Inkley, servant
Benjamin Daniel, indentured servant
John White, indentured servant
Henry Joseph, indentured servant
Peter Golding, convict servant
William Plain, indentured servant
William Harrison, indentured servant
William Dickerson, convict servant
Daniel Dorrovan, servant
John Taylor, servant
John Humphries, convict servant
Thomas Lacy, convict servant
Ned, enslaved
Frank, enslaved
Harry Cooke, indentured free black
Sam, enslaved
Irate, outwitted masters penned the runaway ads, so it’s no surprise that many of these notices contain derogatory descriptions and racist language. Sometimes, though, a notice written to help track down a runaway slave or servant unwittingly reveals a glimpse at the indomitable human spirit of a real person of the past.
Such is the case with the last of four men listed in the above ad. William Flood tells us that “SAM, a Negro Fellow belonging to the Estate of the late Mr. Taite” escaped with three other men in April 1770, and that Sam was “an old Offender in this Way,” having run off once before a few years earlier. Captured “up near the Head of the Bay, within a few miles of the Pennsylvania Government,” Sam was returned to Taite’s control in Westmoreland, Virginia and, most likely, punished severely for his transgression. Yet Sam was unbroken and obviously willing to take the risk of running away again, this time with the aid of three companions and an 18-foot yawl with “Two good Sails” and “Two new Pine Oars.”
Unfortunately, we don’t know if Sam or any of the other 25 runaways described in this Maryland Gazette issue made good on their escape attempts. But 250 years later, at least we can know and say their names.
Glenn E. Campbell
HA Senior Historian
A note about Freedom Bound: Freedom Bound, an exhibition developed by Historic Annapolis in 2013, is now owned by the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of African American History & Culture, in Baltimore, MD. The exhibit is scheduled to be on display through February 2021, but do note that the museum is currently closed. Be sure to watch their website for information about when they will reopen, or follow them on Facebook.
