Free Blacks in Prince William County Virginia in 1860

 The Robinson Farm

Although only about one tenth the size of the slave population, Virginia had the largest free black population in the Union (some 30,000 plus).  Freedom was the greatest gift a master could bestow upon a slave, but the situation of the free black was only a little better than that of the slave.

Free blacks could not vote in Virginia, they were required to register every three years, and to pay for certificates of freedom.  It was unlawful for free blacks to organize their own schools.  Free blacks were feared and mistrusted.  They were accused of being unwilling to work, of spreading discontent among the slaves, and of causing a disproportionate amount of crime.  Several Virginia governors advocated that all free blacks be forcibly expelled from the state.  The Assembly did not enact this legislation but did pass laws providing for voluntary re-enslavement.

Despite stifling restrictions, many free blacks managed to improve their lot.  A freed slave named Jim Robinson, the illegitimate son of Landon Carter of Pittsylvania, operated a drover’s tavern along the Alexandria and Warrenton Turnpike, near Manassas Junction.  Eventually he was able to purchase his wife and three of his five children as well as buy several hundred acres of land.  He was unable to purchase his sons Alfred and James, both of whom were talented stonemasons, who had been sold south and eventually ended up in New Orleans.  James’ fate is unknown, but Alfred returned to Northern Virginia in 1888.

The Robinson family continued to work their farm after the Civil War.  The farm was sold to the Department of the Interior in 1934 to become part of the Manassas National Battlefield.  Prior to selling their farm, the Robinson family acted as informal stewards of their part of the battlefield, taking Confederate remains to a small cemetery to join an estimated 500 unknown soldiers. The family philosophy was summed up in the phrase, “Just remember, these remains belonged to someone’s son who did not want to die in this manner.”

Hidden History of Northern Virginia 

Runaway Slaves in Virginia

White Virginians wanted to believe that their slaves were basically happy, to the point that they would prefer to serve their masters rather than to choose their own freedom.  

Slave flight, “running away,” the most common form of slave resistance, called into question the notion of benevolent paternalism and struck particularly hard at the idea that slaves were basically happy.

Did Slavery Pay? The Economics of Slavery

From : Why the South Fought the Civil War

The production of cotton in the Deep South demanded labor, and with the termination of the African slave trade, this demand for labor fueled an explosion in the price of slaves and the proliferation of the domestic slave trade.  Slavery was a dynamic institution, expanding where the economy was expanding and providing an easily convertible asset in case of need.   The case of Hickory Hill plantation is illustrative.  Hickory Hill, owned by the Wickham family, was a 3,500 acre plantation located in central Hanover County, near Richmond, Virginia.  The plantation practiced the most up to date agricultural methods.  The most important pillar of the Wickhams’ financial security, however, was the increasing value and number of slaves at Hickory Hill.  In 1852 there were two hundred slaves valued at $70,000, an average of $350 each at Hickory Hill.  In 1860 there were 275 slaves, averaging slightly more than $650 each, worth $180,000.  In eight years the value of the Wickham’s slave property increased two and one half times.  Low crop yields were not something the Wickhams had to worry about.  If the Wickhams had to endure several consecutive years of crop failures, they could always sell some of their slaves.(9) The Wickham family was not alone however; as previously noted, slave owning was not only for wealthy planters.(10)

     Fueled by speculation, the total value of slave property across the South in 1860 was enormous compared to other sectors of the economy.  It was nearly three times larger than the total amount of capital invested in manufacturing throughout the entire country, almost three times the amount invested in all railroads, and seven times the amount invested in all banks.  It was three times the value of all livestock, twelve times the value of all farm implements and machinery and forty eight times larger than the total annual expenditures of the Federal government. (11)  Slave owning Southerners worried about the loss of this huge investment.  Northerners, such as Ambert Remington of New York, foretold that, “…a man that owns ten, twenty, or thirty thousand dollars in slaves, ($4-12 million in current dollars) will not give them up without a struggle….” (12)

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First African American Roman Catholic Priest

Father Augustus Tolton is regarded as the first Roman Catholic priest of purely African descent in the United States. Both of Tolton’s parents were brought to America from Africa. Born in 1854 near Hannibal, Missouri, Tolton and his entire family were baptized as Roman Catholics at the behest of their master, Stephen Elliott.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Tolton’s father ran away and joined the Union army, later dying in a St. Louis hospital of dysentery. Tolton’s mother took her three small children and ran away from her master, dodging Confederate bounty hunters, finally reaching safety in Quincy, Illinois.

Tolton’s religious vocation became apparent as he matured and a number of priests attempted to get Tolton accepted in a seminary. No Catholic seminary in the United States was willing to accept a black seminarian. Eventually, Augustus Tolton was accepted to a seminary in Rome. At the age of 26 Augustus Tolton traveled to Italy to begin his studies. Six years later on April 24, 1886, he was ordained a priest at St. John Lateran Basilica in Rome.

Most of Father Tolton’s teachers in the seminary felt that he would never be able to minister in the United States given the widespread climate of racism and anti-Catholicism existing in the country. Father Tolton expected to be sent to Africa and was surprised when Cardinal Giovanni Simeoni insisted that he return to Illinois, saying, “America has been called the most enlightened nation; we will see if it deserves that honor. If America has never seen a black priest, it has to see one now.”

Father Tolton said his first Mass in America on July 7, 1886.



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