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Tally of plantation slave rebels |
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Tally of plantation slaves in the Black
Seminole slave rebellion, with sources
Author: J.B. Bird, October 29, 2012. (This
table revises the first version published in 2005. If you need to
see the earlier version it is here.)
What is this table: The best available
estimate from primary sources of slaves who escaped from or rebelled
against their masters to join the Black Seminole maroons and
Seminole Indians in Florida, from 1835-1838.
How to read this table: Estimates of rebels are listed plantation by plantation, with sources
to the right (and a bibliography below the
table). Low and high numbers are reported with an estimate based on the credibility of the sources.
Are the totals sound? While further
research may raise the total estimate of rebels, as historians
Canter Brown and Larry Rivers have suggested, the author
believes the estimate of 416 is sound. The total number of rebels
was surely not much lower, given that 334 escapees were credibly and
consistently reported in the first week of the uprising alone. A
higher total is possible, but at present it can only be reached through
the following means: a)
conjecture about mass escapes outside East Florida, for which little evidence
has emerged; b) discovery of new sources; c) counting the
"Forrester" escapes as 160 slaves, as mentioned in some sources,
even though close examination shows this was an error in some
newspaper reports of the time, which misidentified the 160 Rees
slaves as property of Forrester, who was a manager on Rees'
plantation (the error leads to double counting);
or d) assuming that Dupont, Bulow, Hernandez and other East Florida
slaveholders lost many more slaves than were reported. Given the
solid detail in primary sources for the escapes listed below, it may
not be likely that many large, mass escapes went unreported, though
it is certainly realistic that a small number of escapes were
overlooked.
Dates: Unless noted, all reported plantation rebels defected between Christmas
day 1835 and mid-January 1836. There are no reports of mass defections after 1836.
Plantation rebels remained with the Seminole allies through 1838. |
|
|
Master (Plantation) |
Low # |
High # |
Source(s) & notes |
| Bulow (Bulowville) |
4 |
4 |
U.S. Senate,
Senate Documents, 25th Cong., 3rd Sess., January
22, 1839, Report 129, 11. Statement from Bulow's overseer to the
Committee of Claims: "and deponent states that the Indians
got possession of four prime negroes, named George, July,
Scipio, and Abraham ...." |
| |
0 |
0 |
Cohen, 96.
Cohen thought all of Bulow's slaves were landed on Anastasia
Island "where the city authorities had directed that the
negroes should be located." |
| Subtotal estimate |
4 |
|
Overseer's
sworn statement is highly credibly and Cohen, loose
with numerical details, was probably just not aware
of the four absconding slaves. |
|
Cruger and Depeyster |
70 |
80 |
Niles' Weekly Register, January 30, 1836. Anonymous
letter from St. Augustine, dated January 6, 1836, states,
"Depeyster has 70 or 80 negroes taken away—Heriott as
many." |
|
|
65 |
80 |
St. Augustine Florida-Herald, January 13, 1836. A first
report from Capt. John S. Williams described Depeyster's
"negroes, with but one or two exceptions, captured and taken
off." A second "more particular report" from
the same issue continues: "Some of Depeyster's negroes joined them, and they carried off all
the rest, about sixty, except one old negro man, whom they
shot...." |
|
|
NA |
NA |
Potter, 118. Does not offer numbers but notes a conspiracy
between the Seminole allies and servants of Mr. Depeyster,
"with whose negroes they formed a league." |
|
|
45 |
|
Cohen, 88. |
|
|
"all" |
"all" |
Macon Georgia Telegraph, January 21, 1836. Report notes of
Depeyster, "all his negroes carried off." |
|
Subtotal estimate |
70 |
|
The number seems reliably higher than 60, since even in the
credible low estimates, "some" conspired to carry off 60. At
most two slaves are reported as not absconding. |
|
Dummett |
3 |
25 |
Strickland,
"The Dummett Family Saga," 9. Refers to the loss of some of
his slaves to the Indians and the destruction of the
plantation, without specifics. |
| Subtotal estimate |
10 |
|
"Some" would
be more than two, and he was believed to have a maximum of
25. 10 is strictly an estimate. |
| Heriot |
70 |
80 |
Niles' Weekly
Register, January 30, 1836. Anonymous
letter from St. Augustine dated January 6, 1836
stated,
"Depeyster has 70 or 80 negroes taken away—Heriott as
many." |
| |
80 |
80 |
Cohen,
88. Reported slaves "about 80 in number" captured from Heriot. |
|
|
80 |
80 |
Potter, 118: Major Heriot's plantation was laid waste — his
houses were consumed, and eighty of his negroes moved off
with the Indians." |
|
|
75 |
80 |
St. Augustine
Florida-Herald, January 13, 1836. A first report from Capt.
John S. Williams described “All the negroes captured and
taken off.” A second report specified the loss of all of
Heriot's “negroes, about seventy-five in number.” |
| Subtotal
estimate |
80 |
|
Here the slightly higher estimate seems
warranted since all of Heriot's slaves were consistently
said to have left, and veterans Cohen and Potter, who did
not exaggerate escapes, both pinned the number at 80. |
|
Hernandez (Mala Compra, St. Josephs, Harford) |
12 |
12 |
U.S. Congress, House Journal, 25th Cong., 2nd Sess., July 6,
1836, Rep. No. 1043: 2: “… [T]he Indians
captured about a dozen of the negroes as he [Hernandez] was
in the act of taking them away.” |
|
|
3 |
3 |
U.S. Senate, Senate Documents, 25th Cong., 3rd
Sess., January 22, 1839, Report 130. In this later report
based on Hernandez' petition for restitution of damages from
the war, the Senate states that all of the slaves from two
of his plantations (Mala Compra and St. Josephs), "eighty in
number, were driven off by the Indians, [and] three of the
most valuable of them captured," meaning only three remained
with the Seminoles. [The most infamous, Stephen Hernandez,
was later caught raiding near St. Augustine with John Caesar.] |
| Subtotal
estimate |
3 |
|
The lower, later number appears most accurate. |
|
Humphreys |
34 |
59 |
U.S. Congress, Congressional Documents, 25th Cong., 3rd
Sess., "Negroes Captured from Indians in Florida," Doc. 225:
106. Humphreys, writing government
officials in 1838 advancing a claim: “My heaviest loss
consisted in negroes; a valuable gang of thirty-four of whom
were captured by the enemy in the summer of 1836; some
twenty-five others absconded before the war commenced, and
took refuge in the Indian country.” |
|
|
47 |
47 |
Ibid. Pages 95-96 of the same report show a
"descriptive roll" Humphreys submitted to General Jesup
listing
his "captured slaves ... in possession of Seminole Indians,"
with 47 slaves named. (29 of them subsequently emigrated
west with the Black Seminoles.) |
| Subtotal
estimate |
47 |
|
The later, lower number seems to be the most concrete and
accurate. |
|
Stamp and Hunter |
3 |
5 |
St. Augustine Florida-Herald, January 13, 1836.
Captain John S. Williams reported,
“Hunter’s cotton house burnt, and four or five negroes
taken.” A second report in the same issue noted three slaves
defecting. |
| Subtotal
estimate |
4 |
|
4 splits the difference. |
|
Woodruff,
Forrester |
20 |
20 |
Cohen, 81, 88. Deduced by subtraction since Cohen mentions 180
negroes taken from the combination of the Rees and Woodruff-Forrester
estates, while listing negroes taken specifically from Rees
as “about” 160, which is consistent for other totals of the
Rees slave population. (Note: Some primary sources confuse
the larger Rees property with the
smaller Woodruff-Forrester property, since Forrester
managed the Rees plantation and either managed or co-owned
the Woodruff property.) |
|
|
0 |
146 |
Millidgeville Federal Union, January 29, 1836: "From Mr.
Forrester's plantation on the St. John's, at Spring Garden
they got 146 negroes." Appears to be a reference to the Rees
plantation that Forrester managed. |
|
|
0 |
160 |
Millidgeville Southern Reporter, January 26, 1836, offers
similar report as Millidgeville Federal Union (preceding)
but cites 160 slaves lost. |
|
|
NA |
NA |
Potter, 117. Offers no numbers but distinguished the Rees from
the Forrester plantation, identifying latter as place where
Joseph Woodruff was killed. |
| Subtotal
estimate |
20 |
|
The Woodruff-Forrester property did not have close to 160
slaves. Reports clearly confuse the Spring Garden property
Forrester managed for Colonel Orlando Rees with the Woodruff
property he managed or co-owned. Still, credible reports
suggest all the Woodruff slaves joined the rebels. |
| Rees
(Spring Garden) |
160 |
160 |
Cohen, 81, 88.
Cohen's 1836 report cited “about 160”
slaves carried off. |
| |
160 |
160 |
St. Augustine
Florida-Herald, January 13, 1836: “At
Spring Garden, we learn from Forrester … the negroes,
amounting to one hundred and sixty … taken off.” |
| |
160 |
160 |
Macon Georgia
Telegraph, January 21, 1836 cites "upwards to 160" slaves
lost. |
| Subtotal estimate |
160 |
|
The total is
consistently cited across these and several other newspaper
sources, and elsewhere is described as a "total" loss. |
|
Various Small Holders |
|
|
|
|
Clinch |
3 |
|
Macon Georgia Telegraph, May 12, 1836. |
|
Cooley |
2 |
|
Potter, 117; Cohen, 79. |
|
Crowell |
3 |
|
U.S. Congress, Congressional Documents, 25th Cong., 3rd
Sess., "Negroes Captured from Indians in Florida," Doc. 225:
18. |
|
Dill |
1 |
|
Ibid.,
89. |
|
Gay |
1 |
|
Porter, "Slaves and Free Negroes," 399, 401. The
escaped slave, Andrew Gay (aka Gue),
was an urban slave. |
|
McIntosh |
1 |
|
U.S. Congress, Congressional Documents, 25th Cong., 3rd
Sess., "Negroes Captured from Indians in Florida," Doc. 225:
80. |
|
Pacheco |
1 |
|
Ibid.,
120. |
|
Salvate |
1 |
|
Porter, "Slaves and Free Negroes," citing Adjutant General's
Office records, 402. |
|
Sanchez |
1 |
|
Ibid., 395. |
|
Smith |
3 |
|
U.S. Congress, Congressional Documents, 25th Cong., 3rd
Sess., "Negroes Captured from Indians in Florida," Doc. 225:
12-13, 110. Estimate of three. Jesup mentions one slave
specifically, but Smith refers to a list of several he sent
to Jesup. |
|
Wanton |
1 |
|
Porter, "Slaves and Free Negroes," citing Adjutant General's
Office records, 395. |
|
Subtotal estimate |
18 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Estimated total |
416 |
|
Source: J.B. Bird, "Tally of plantation slaves in the Black Seminole
slave rebellion, with sources," Rebellion (www.johnhorse.com/toolkit/numbers.htm). |
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Plantations destroyed but without recorded rebels
Of the seventeen East Florida plantations destroyed by
early 1836, only ten recorded the loss of slaves, and in the case of
Hernandez, the three escaped slaves might have lived on any of his
three plantations (Mala Compra, St. Josephs, and Harford). These
seven East Florida plantations had no recorded losses:
Anderson
Dunham
Dupont (Buen Retiro)
Hernandez (St. Joseph's)
Hernandez (Hartford)
Hewlett and Flotard
Macrae (Carrickfergus)
Pellicer
Williams
The Dupont plantation was the scene of a dramatic, well chronicled
encounter that ended with the master taking flight with his small
children. According to a widely disseminated story reported in the
St, Augustine Florida Herald on May 12, 1836, Seminole
Indians "distributed Mr. Dupont's [four] guns among the negroes, and
told them to kill every white man they saw." The report went on to
say, however, that all of Dupont's slaves returned to St. Augustine,
and none joined the rebels.
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