Thomas Walke to Virginia Delegates, 3 May 1783
Thomas Walke to Virginia Delegates
RC (NA: PCC, No. 78, XXIV, 367–70). Addressed “To the Honble The Virginia Delegates in Congress.” Docketed, “Letter from Thos Walke to the Delegates of Virga. May 3d 1783. Read May 8th, 1783 (copy of the within sent to the Commander in Chief Agreeably to an order of Congress of this day.)”
Philadelphia May 3d 1783.
Gentlemen1
In consequence of the 7th: article of the treaty between America, and England;2 I, with a number of others, have been to New-York; in order to reclaim our slaves that were wrested from us by the British enimy; supposing there cou’d be no obstacle to our recovering, at least such of the slaves as we cou’d find and prove to be our property, but contrary to our expectations, the event has proved the reverse, in as much as, that having discover’d the numberless difficulties attending this matter, we thought it most expedient to apply to Sir Guy Carlton, that through his means the business might be rendered more practicable, than we had before found it;3 upon which application, we recieved for answer, from his aid de camp,4 that no slaves were to be given up, who claimed the benefit of their former proclamations for liberating such slaves as threw themselves under the protection of the British government,5 and that he thought it unnecessary for us to wait longer on business of that nature. This appears to me to be such a glareing piece of injustice, and open violation of the above mentioned article of the treaty, that I think it my duty as well as interest to acquaint you of this matter, that you may lay it before Congress, who will I flatter myself as speedily as possibly, take the necessary steps for preventing a further injury being done to the citizens of this country:6 if there is not an immediate check put to the proceedings of the British General in this matter, the injury will be inconcieveable, as I am well assured several hundreds of the above mentioned slaves sailed during the last weik to Nova Scotia.7 I am with the utmost respect and regard
Your Most Obedt. Servt:
Thos Walke
1. Theodorick Bland, Joseph Jones, Arthur Lee, JM, and John Francis Mercer.
2. The relevant passage of the preliminary articles of peace, ratified by Congress on 15 April 1783, reads: “his Britannick Majesty shall, with all convenient speed, and without causing any destruction, or carrying away any negroes or other property of the American inhabitants, withdraw all his armies, garrisons and fleets from the said United States and from every port, place and harbour within the same” ( , XXIV, 249).
3. On 28 April 1783 Thomas Walke (ca. 1740–1797), a justice of the peace of Princess Anne County, Captain John Willoughby, Jr., sheriff of Norfolk County, and “others” submitted to General Sir Guy Carleton a “Memorial” on their own behalf and that of “sundry inhabitants” of the two counties, asking to be aided in recovering “at least 300 negroes” (Norfolk Herald, 6 Apr. 1797; , V, 90, n. 2; Historical Manuscripts Commission, eds., Report on American Manuscripts in the Royal Institution of Great Britain [4 vols.; London, 1904–9], IV, 61–62; Lower Norfolk County Virginia Antiquary, I [1896], 17; Va. Mag. Hist. and Biog., I [1893–94], 450; XV [1907–8], 187, 188, 192; XXVI [1918], 412–13). Walke was also a member of the House of Delegates from his county during most of the sessions from 1782 to 1788, and of the Virginia convention of 1788 which ratified the Constitution of the United States ( , pp. 16, 20, 27, 29, 441). In a letter of 30 August 1782 Governor Benjamin Harrison informed the Virginia delegates in Congress that Willoughby had lost ninety slaves and was “thereby ruin’d” ( , V, 90, and n. 2; 111; 112, n. 2; 113; 148; , III, 266).
4. Perhaps Major George Beckwith (1753–1823) ( , XXVII, 240, n. 62; Worthington Chauncey Ford, comp., British Officers Serving in the American Revolution, 1774–1783 [Brooklyn, N.Y., 1897], p. 26).
5. On 30 June 1779 General Sir Henry Clinton, Carleton’s immediate predecessor as commander-in-chief of the British military forces in North America, issued a proclamation in which “negro deserters” were “promised liberty to follow any occupation.” In June 1782 Lieutenant General Alexander Leslie, commanding the British army in South Carolina and Georgia, promised freedom to the “many Negroes” who had rendered services to his troops (Historical Manuscripts Commission, eds., Report on American Manuscripts, I, 463; II, 544; , VII, 175–76).
While or soon after Walke and Willoughby were told not “to wait longer,” Captain Hugh Walker, a merchant shipowner of Richmond and Urbanna, Middlesex County, came to Carleton’s headquarters on a similar mission from Governor Harrison, and was also rebuffed (Historical Manuscripts Commission, eds., Report on American Manuscripts, IV, 39; , III, 246; , I, 34; III, 55). On his return to Virginia, Walker reported to Harrison, “I waited on Sir Guy Carleton’s Secretary every Day, till I got the answer.” Maurice Morgann, the “Secretary,” continued Walker, told him “I was not allowed to take any slaves without their own concent; & they are taught not to come here” ( , III, 491).
On 5 May, in compliance with instructions from Congress and also with a request from Harrison who had forwarded “a List and description of Negroes,” Washington conferred with Carleton without much hope of enlisting his co-operation in recovering slaves. Carleton declared that “the 7th: article” obliged him to sequester, for return to their masters, only those Negroes who were still “Property” at the time of embarkation; that he could not violate the pledges of freedom made to the Negroes by “his Predecessors in Command,” and that, unlike in the case of “archives, records, deeds and papers belonging to any of said states, or their citizens,” he was not required by the seventh article to deliver the Negroes to the “persons to whom they belong.” If, concluded Carleton, his interpretation was incorrect, the alleged owners of the slaves could seek reparations from “the Crown of Great Britain” through the normal diplomatic channels ( , XXVI, 370, 402–6; , XXIV, 249–50). The next day Washington, in a letter to Harrison, expressed his conviction “that the Slaves which have absconded from their Masters will never be restored to them. Vast numbers of them are already gone to Nova Scotia” ( , VI, 462, n. 2; 479; 480, n. 7; , XXVI, 364–65, 369–70, 401–6).
6. On 8 May, upon receiving from the Virginia delegates the present letter, Congress ordered that a copy of it should be forwarded to Washington (JM Notes, 8 May; , XXIV, 333). That copy was docketed by Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Trumbull, Jr., military secretary of Washington, “Superceeded by Measures already taken” ( , XXVI, 430, and n. 57).
7. Walke had been correctly informed. A registry book, kept by Carleton’s orders, reveals that Negroes were aboard ships leaving New York Harbor as early as 23 April and as late as 30 November 1783. The destination of many of these vessels was Halifax, Nova Scotia (Historical Manuscripts Commission, eds., Report on American Manuscripts, IV, 471). In the Pennsylvania Packet of 26 April, under a New York City date line of 19 April 1783, is a news item to the effect that British headquarters had warned all shipmasters against harboring Negroes, “without obtaining a legal right to them.”