On 7/6/15 2:29 AM, Gunner Asch wrote:

On Sun, 05 Jul 2015 19:00:41 -0500, "David J. Hughes"
wrote:



Only for free men of any color. Many free blacks fought for the
colonies, as did many for the Crown.

As did free blacks in the Civil War..both North and South sides

Gunner

At the end, Lee recommended enlisting blacks so they wouldn't join the
Union Army as it came through. It was authorized March 13, 1865, without
the incentive of freedom. Richmond fell March 25.
Some had been enlisted, but it's doubtful that any were armed and
trained by then.

In the Revolution, Dr. Benjamin West wrote that Negritude was a disease
for which Medical Science would someday find a cure. He said it was dumb
to assume someone was intellectually or morally deficient just because
he had a disease. He freed his slave and started the first abolition
society.

He was a close friend of my ancestor, reputed to own the worst runaway
of all time. He employed hundreds of blacks and whites, but, except for
a couple of apprentices, his only slaves were a retired man and four
mothers, with children scheduled to be emancipated. He must have been a
commie liberal, and slavery was an entitlement program for those who
couldn't make a living otherwise.

The habitual runaway was an apprentice in his late teens. White or
black, apprentices were in bondage because the master was investing in
training, and teens are footloose.

A lot of abolitionist sentiment was really jealousy. The apprentice was
free to travel. A farmer would express moral disapproval of slavery. If
the apprentice stayed, the farmer could get his labor for free because
he was, after all, a runaway slave.

It was up to my ancestor to put notices in newspapers, appealing to the
slave by telling the public what an intelligent, well-spoken,
good-looking, hard-working, decent young man he was.

As the weeks went by and the adventure got old, the apprentice would
talk about returning. The farmer would turn him in, saying he'd come to
suspect this was a runaway. When it was settled, my ancestor would be
required to pay him a reward, but it wouldn't be settled yet. The law
required a master to pay a jailor by the day, so the jailor would pay
dumb, meanwhile having an intelligent, well-spoken, hard-working
apprentice to do all kinds of chores.

I guess my ancestor was too understanding to punish him because he kept
running away but always stayed close enough that he knew he'd be
returned. My ancestor was afraid Lord Dunmore would talk him into
joining the British Army for the promise of freedom.

Whether or not Dunmore was sincere, my ancestor sincerely intended to
free the slave when he learned the craft. He knew that except for menial
tasks, a productive relationship with labor required the incentive of
pay. Jefferson and Lee couldn't make ends meet because they didn't
understand that.