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Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War": Plantation Overseers and Slavery during the American Revolution Author(s): LAURA SANDY Drawing primarily on archival material such as plantation records, this article place the plantation overseer at the centre of the drama of the American Revolution colonies. Occupying a contested liminal space within colonial society, between and between the free and the unfree, the overseer was not necessarily the n conventional stereotype. This "Predatory War," however, tested the overseer's lo of duty to the fullest extent. Understanding his role in the conflict offers a sig into the experience of a plantation society at war. In particular the overseer w tension between elite and yeomanry, between the conflicting calls of loyalism the Patriots. Perhaps most significantly of all he stood at the forefront of the slavery during the tumult of civil conflict. In the conclusion of her recent historiographical survey of th Revolution, Gwenda Morgan points to the enormous difficulti face in "incorporating the vast array of actors who particip Revolution] into a single narrative," and suggests that now "the ch create a new synthesis."1 This will, indeed, be quite a challenge. O forty years our knowledge of those who shaped the new republic' and bloody birth has expanded impressively. In particular, soc have drawn previously neglected groups - women, artisans, the African Americans - into the literature and convincingly portrayed war with itself as much as with Great Britain/ Yet other actors s Department of American Studies, Keele University. Email: [email protected] 1 Gwenda Morgan, The Debate on the American Revolution (Manchester University Press, 1007), 301. This work offers the fullest synthesis o historiography. 1 Key works would include Linda Kerber, '"History Can Do It No Justice': W Reinterpretation of the American Revolution," in Ronald Hoffman and Peter Women in the Age of the American Revolution (Charlottesville, Virginia: Virginia Press, 1989), 3-45; Mary Beth Norton, Liberty's Daughters: The Experience of American Women, 17SO-1S00 (New York: Ithaca, 1980); Norto on Women in the Age of the American Revolution,' in Hoffman and A This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  3$8 Laura Sandy shadowy figures in the drama. Among them is the plantation overseer. Maligned in popular memory, neglected by academics, and thus marginalized in treatments of both slavery and colonial society as a whole, he was often caught in the eye of war's storm in the South as armies marched and raided, and bondsmen and women tested the limits of authority as the system of slavery wavered under the pressure of war. A far more socially diverse group than has generally been recognized, an analysis of the varied responses of overseers to the challenges, and opportunities, presented by revolution offers another illuminating insight into the fractious internal dynamics of the conflict and the vulnerability of slavery as an institution, and an intriguing suggestion concerning how that institution weathered the years of crisis. The conventional historiography has yet to answer this question fully. The process by which "the Peculiar Institution" became embedded within the very constitution of the new republic has been explored particularly effectively by David Brion Davis and William H. Freehling.3 Yet the survival of the institution during the crucial war years themselves remains a rather mysterious phenomenon. The southern colonies were not yet the mature "slave societies" of the antebellum period. Indeed, in Georgia, plantation slavery was a relatively recent innovation established in the face of some determined local opposition. It would be a mistake to project the racial solidarity of the antebellum South's putative "herrenvolk democracy" back Edward Countryman, The American Revolution (London: I. B.Tauris, 1986); Rosemarie Zagarri, Revolutionary Backlash: Women and Politics in the Early American Republic (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2.008); Gary Nash, The Urban Crucible: Social Change, Political Consciousness, and the Origins of the American Revolution (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979); Woody Holton, Forced Founders: Indians, Debtors and Slaves, and the Making of America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999); Michael McDonnell, The Politics of War: Race, Class and Conflict in Revolutionary Virginia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007). Ira Berlin, "Time, Space and the Evolution of Afro-American Society on British Mainland North America," American Historical Review, 85 (1980), 44-78; John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger, Runaway Slaves: Rebels on the Plantation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000); Sylvia Frey, Waterfrom the Rock: Black Resistance in a Revolutionary Age (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991); Benjamin Quarles, The Negro in the American Revolution (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1961). A counterrevisionist trend towards emphasizing the significance of elites is evident in such work as Richard Bernstein, The Founding Fathers Reconsidered (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009); John Ferling, Setting the World Ablaze: Washington, Jefferson and the American Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), Ferling, Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009) and Bernard Bailyn, To Begin the World Anew: The Genius and Ambiguities of the Founding Fathers (New York: Alfred Knopf, 2003). ' David Brion Davis, The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution, 1770-182$ (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975); William H. Freehling, "The Founding Fathers and Slavery," American Historical Review, 77 (1972), 81-93. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 359 into the colonial period when racial ideologies were developing but not yet hegemonic. The institution of race slavery was, thus, far from secure.4 After all, it was precisely in circumstances of war and revolution that New World slave systems proved fatally vulnerable, most demonstrably in Haiti, 1791-1804, and the United States itself, 1861-65. In wartime, most of those "concrete political realities" of power relationships within slave societies were under mined as white manpower was drawn away from policing slavery; as existing political and legal structures crumbled; and as barriers to slave mobility, and the concomitant capacity to organize, disappeared.5 Add in to the equation the emancipationist impulse within the Revolutionary movement and the deliberate use by the British of emancipation as part of the strategy of war in the South, and the vulnerability of American slavery during the War of Independence is manifest. The existing historiography has not always addressed this issue convincingly. Against the backdrop of the civil rights movement, black history flourished and Peter Wood has identified interest in the revolution as a key trend in the literature of the 1960s and 1970s. Yet an overemphasis on the role of atypical individuals, such as Crispus Attucks, felled by a British musket ball during the so-called "Boston Massacre," threatened to obscure wider understanding of the lives of those for whom "colonialism did not end in 1776." Similarly, much productive work was done on the constitutional position of slavery but the 4 For a discussion of the concept of "herrenvolk democracy" see George Frederickson, The Black Image in the White Mind: The Debate on Afro-American Character and Destiny, 1817-1914 (New York: Harper and Row, 1971); George Frederickson, White Supremacy: A Comparative Study in America and South African History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981). It should be noted that some historians of the South contest the concept of "herrenvolk democracy" even in the antebellum period. See, for example, Charles Bolton, Poor Whites of the Antebellum South: Tenants and Labourers in Central North Carolina and Northeast Mississippi (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994); Timothy Lockley, Lines in the Sand: Race and Class in Lowcountry Georgia, 1750-1860 (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2001); Jeff Forret, Race Relations at the Margins: Slaves and Poor Whites in the Antebellum Southern Countryside (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2.006). The literature on the distinct characteristics of colonial slavery is extensive. Indicative works would include Ira Berlin, Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North America (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998); Allan Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves: The Development of South Cultures in the Chesapeake, 1680-1800 (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1986); Edmund Morgan, American Slavery, American Freedom: The Ordeal of Colonial Virginia (New York: W. W. Norton and Co. Inc., 1976), 308; Philip Morgan, Slave Counterpoint: Black Culture in the Eighteenth Century Chesapeake and Lowcountry (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1998); Kenneth Morgan, Slavery and Servitude in Colonial North America (New York: New York University Press, 2001); Anthony Parent, Foul Means: The Formation of a Slave Society in Virginia, 1660-1740 (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1003), Peter Wood, Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina From 1670 through the Stono Rebellion (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1974). 5 Peter Kolchin, American Slavery (London: Penguin, 1995), 155. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  360 Laura Sandy lived experience of men and women, free and unfree, on Southern plantations during the war years remained largely unexplored.6 The need for a specifically southern dimension in the writing of the history of the conflict began to be addressed at the time of the bicentennial.7 Three key collections of essays were published in the late 1970s and early 1980s, edited by Jeffrey Crow, Larry Tise, W. Robert Higgins, Ronald Hoffman and Ira Berlin. A number of their contributors touch explicitly on the issue of slavery. Michael Mullin contrasts race relations in the Chesapeake, South Carolina and the British Caribbean across the "Revolutionary era." Peter Wood highlights the race-conscious nature of the early republic, while Philip Morgan reflects on the Revolution's impact on slavery in the South Carolina Low Country in the aftermath of independence. Mary Beth Norton broadens the field by incorporating the experiences of southern women, black and white, into the story of the American Revolution.8 Elsewhere, Jeffrey Crow himself wrote an insightful article highlighting the relationship between the Revolution and slave rebelliousness and suggested a growing political consciousness amongst the enslaved.9 Yet, once again, even within these works of scholarship our understanding of the lives of those who continued to live and work on southern slave plantations during the conflict, including the overseers who were responsible for their management, remains very limited. In this work, like Wood, I hope to "weave together incidents" that took place on slave plantations in Virginia and South Carolina in order to understand more clearly the "down-to-earth" and "localized" experiences of 6 Peter H. Wood, "'I Did the Best I Could in My Day': The Study of Early Black History during the Second Reconstruction, 1960-1976," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, 35, 2 (April 1978), 185-12.5. 7 Military events, written as conventional campaign narratives, have received the bulk of attention. See, for example, John S. Pancake, This Destructive War: The British Campaign in the Carolinas, 1780-1782 (Mobile: University of Alabama Press, 1985); Lawrence Babits, A Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000); and David K. Wilson, The Southern Strategy: Britain's Conquest of South Carolina and Georgia, 1775-1780 (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2008). 8 Jeffrey J. Crow and Larry E. Tise, eds., The Southern Experience in the American Revolution (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1978); W. Robert Higgins, ed., The Revolutionary War in the South: Power, Conflict and Leadership (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1979); Ira Berlin and Ronald Hoffman, eds., Slavery and Freedom in the Age of the American Revolution (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1983); Michael Mullin, "British Caribbean and North American Slaves in an Era of War and Revolution, 1775-1807," in Crow and Tise, 235-67; Peter Wood, "'Taking Care of Business' in Revolutionary South Carolina: Republicanism and the Slave Society," in ibid., 268-93; Philip Morgan, "Black Society in the Low Country 1760-1810," in Berlin and Hoffman, 83-141; Mary Beth Norton, "'What an Alarming Crisis Is This': Southern Women and the American Revolution," in Crow and Tise, 203-34. 'Jeffrey Crow, "Slave Rebelliousness and Social Conflict in North Carolina, 1775-1802," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, 37, 1 0an. 1980), 79-102. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 361 white overseers and the enslaved who inhabited these plantations.10 This work will assess the impact the American Revolution had on the lives of these mosdy illiterate men and women who have left very little direct testimony. In particular, this work examines the actions and allegiances of overseers (black and white) during the conflict and how their behaviour was perceived by the planter elite, their peers, and the enslaved they attempted to supervise during the tumult of warfare. Against the backdrop of this unfolding conflict, both the racial and class hierarchies of slave society proved mutable and easily prone to disruption, processes clearly discernible in the lived experiences of those who managed the workforces of the plantation. The colonial overseer lived and worked in a liminal space between the free and the unfree and, just as strikingly, between the planter elite and the poorer white yeomanry, agricultural labourers, and servants. His wife, too, took responsibility for a broad range of economic and supervisory roles on the plantation, as well as attending to the well-being of the slave labour force.11 Together, even in peacetime, they worked and lived within a volatile nexus where race, class and power intersected; when revolution brought war to the plantation, they often bore the full brunt of its fury. There are a number of practical factors that inhibit a systematic investigation of the lives of overseers in this period. The meagreness of the extant source materials related to the day-to-day management of plantations has contributed to our limited ability to explore the crucial theme of the often antagonistic relationships between owners, overseers and slaves. In the colonial period, and particularly during the Revolution, evidence and personal testimony authored by overseers is extremely scarce, which makes a thorough understanding of the overseer's personal perspective difficult to determine. The fragmentary nature of the evidence relating to overseeing means that, inevitably, the voices of the wealthy and the powerful are those heard most clearly in the surviving documentation, namely their letters, diaries and accounts books - thus these provide the main evidential base for this study. Yet these sources provide evidence from which to reconstruct plantation life in the eighteenth century and from which to glean fresh insight into the lives of overseers during the American Revolution.11 Peter Wood, "Taking Care of Business," 170-71. " Laura Sandy, "Homemakers, Supervisors and Peach-Stealing Bitches," Women's History Review, 1, 5 (July ion), 473-94. 11 The extensive records left by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Landon and Robert Carter, William Byrd, William Cabbell, and Joseph Ball in Virginia, and Henry Laurens, Robert Raper, Josiah Smith, William Ancrum, Margaret Colleton, Eliza Pinckney, Charles Pinckney and Thomas Pinckney in South Carolina, to name but a few, provide useful information about slavery and overseers during the Revolutionary period. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  )6z Laura Sandy Prominent and influential planters strove to build efficient plantations and simultaneously embody the paternalist ideal.1' They aspired and competed to create models and set standards for other planters to follow. In their quest to become leading agriculturalists they provide avid commentary on the dramas and struggles that unfolded on their plantations along the way. Although, naturally, within such a multifaceted institution, no one man can stand as the "typical" planter, analysis of the records of Virginia and South Carolina's most successful slave-owning planters, with their extensive landholdings, multiple plantations and large numbers of slave labourers, who over decades constantly hired overseers, allows us to explore the precise function of overseers within the colonial slave society and assess their importance during the Revolution. Unfortunately, the comments and details recorded by class-conscious planters have tended to focus closely on the disappointing cases rather than detailing the lives of those men who were conscientious, honest and successful. Though planters' petty prejudices or passing frustrations are useful for what they reveal about their attitudes and their often febrile relationships with their employees and slaves, in this study the overseer himself will no longer remain silent. Although testimony authored by overseers is extremely rare, as the historian of colonial Virginia Rhys Isaac has so forcefully emphasized, "actions must be viewed as statements."14 Even when filtered through a documentary record inevitably shaped by the partisan perceptions of a ruling class, the actions of the overseer can still speak loudly, of both his own milieu and, indeed, of a wider and discordant colonial society, where a recently established but fragile planter hegemony struggled to maintain its authority. As a significant historical actor, therefore, the overseer needs to be recovered from an undeserved obscurity. His image has been most powerfully shaped by representations in popular culture that have relentlessly portrayed him as poor, cruel and a trial to both the employer he cheated and slaves he brutalized. 13 Many historians have written excellent accounts of planters' attempts to organize their plantation businesses to achieve maximum profit and at the same time act paternally towards their enslaved labourers. Some of the most important contributions, which include reference to slavery and plantation management during the American Revolution, are Kathleen Brown, Good Wives, Nasty Wenches, and Anxious Patriarchs: Gender, Race, and Power in Colonial Virginia (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1996); Joyce Chaplin, An Anxious Pursuit: Agricultural Innovation and Modernity in the Lower South, 1730-1815 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 199}); Max Edelson, Plantation Enterprise in Colonial South Carolina (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1006); Rhys Isaac, The Transformation of Virginia, 1740-1790 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981); Isaac, Landon Carter's Uneasy Kingdom: Revolution and Rebellion on a Virginia Plantation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1004); Kulikoff; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint-, Robert Olwell, Masters, Slaves, and Subjects: The Culture of Power in the South Carolina Low Country, 1740-1790 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998); Henry Wiencek, An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves and the Creation of America (Oxford: Pan Macmillian, 1004). 14 Isaac, The Transformation of Virginia, 314. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 363 Eighteenth-century planters did much to lay the foundations for what has become an undisputed caricature. Many planters claimed it was the "Tyranny and Villainy of Overseers," and their "vicious designs" that were to blame for the many problems that arose on slave plantations in the colonial era. Though there is no doubt that some overseers were "troublesome," all overseers have been tarred with the same brush.15 The planters' negative views of overseers were not simply related to the perceived shortcomings of overseers as their employees; the disdain and contempt planters had for overseers was rooted in a strong prejudice against those from the lower classes. From the early eighteenth century, the white men employed to supervise labour and production on large plantations quickly became categorized as a "class." The behaviour and characters of "that class of people" were, and still are, judged in relation to their reputation as a group, rather than as individuals or with regard to their particular circumstances on the plantation and within colonial society.16 By the end of the eighteenth century the notion that this "necessary class of men" formed a separate social as well as occupational group, drawn from the poor and lowly sections of society, was universally accepted. Indeed, when Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to a friend, attempted to "state the differences between the classes of society" that had formed during the eighteenth century he noted that the "last and lowest" was a "seculum of beings called overseers."17 It is this view of overseers as a distinct social class, marked by its alleged dependency, and low character, that has formed the basis of their history in colonial Virginia and South Carolina, and has shaped modern scholarship on the subject. Though planters' statements give a clear indication of how they perceived overseers as essential but odious, the rhetoric does not always accurately express the reality; that in fact overseers were a mixture of people from different "classes" and occupational backgrounds. Historical scholarship has, thus far, done a limited amount to overturn this caricature or thoroughly investigate the backgrounds or lives of overseers. John Spencer Bassett's The Southern Plantation Overseer as Revealed in His Letters, published in 1915, was, in its time, a groundbreaking investigation of the role 15 Henry Laurens to Ralph Izard, i April and 9 June 1777, quoted in Olwell, 238; Lewis Gray, History of Agriculture in the Southern United States to 1S60 (Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1958), 501-3. 1 Henry Laurens, The Papers of Henry Laurens, 1746-1792, ed. Philip Hamer, G. Rogers and D. Chesnutt (Columbia: Published for the South Carolina Historical Society by the University of South Carolina Press, 1968-1003) (hereafter PHL), Volume V, 197. 17 Thomas Jefferson to William Wirt, 14 Aug. 1814, Thomas Jefferson Papers, series 1, Library of Congress (hereafter LC); George Washington to Antony Whitting, 16 Dec. 1792, The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources, 174S-1799, ed. J. C. Fitzpatrick (Washington: US Government Printing Office, 1931 44) (hereafter WGJV), Volume XXXIV, 193; PHL, Volume IV, 503. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  364 Laura Sandy of an overseer living and working on a slave plantation. The image created by this book, based entirely on the letters of one nineteenth-century overseer, however, has never been rigorously challenged. The book claims that there were a very small number of overseers of "an ambitious and advancing class," but alleges that, beyond those few, the majority of overseers were "illiterate men," "unimaginative" and unmotivated, due to their lower-class back ground.'8 Other analyses of plantation overseers have, by and large, endorsed this view, stereotyping the overseer as lazy, incompetent, dishonest and cruel.19 William Scarborough's work was the first piece of scholarship to give overseers more credit for their "erudite comprehension of principles of scientific agriculture." Like William Scarborough, the most recent study of overseers, Crafting the Overseer's Image by William Wiethoff, focussed almost exclusively on the antebellum era. Though Wiethoff provides a provocative analysis of the links between rhetoric, social hierarchy, race relations and power, it adds little to our understanding of the backgrounds and the day-to-day work carried out by overseers in the colonial era and during the Revolutionary period.10 Indeed, they presume, without substantiation, that there were few important differences between the overseers of pre- and post- Revolutionary America.11 It is a notable omission in the historiography for, as Max Edelson's thorough account of the "plantation enterprise" in colonial South Carolina has demonstrated, the overseer played a pivotal role in the exchange of goods and people which took place between town and Low Country plantations.11 18 John Bassett, The Southern Plantation Overseer as Revealed in His Letters (Northampton: Smith College, 1915), z, 9. 19 Carl Bridenbaugh, The Colonial Craftsman (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1961); Bridenbaugh, Myths and Realities: Societies of the Colonial South (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 195 z). Bridenbaugh re-enforced the idea that overseers came from the lowliest groups in society. Furthermore, a study of South Carolina overseers in the mid- to late antebellum period also proposed that overseers came from a pool of poor farmers and landless whites of "questionable ability and character." Thomas Clark, ed., Travels in the Old South: A Bibliography, (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1956). 10 William WiethofF, Crafting the Overseer s Image (Columbia: South Carolina University Press, 2006). 11 William Scarborough, The Overseer (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1984), xvi, 3-4. 21 Edelson, 100-54. Historians who have looked at the development of colonial slave plantations have touched on the use of overseers to manage them. In particular, Philip Morgan's Slave Counterpoint and Robert Olwell's Masters, Slaves and Subjects include important discussions of overseers' roles in plantation labour systems in the eighteenth century. Both analyse overseers' conflicts with slaves on colonial slave plantations. Yet the primary focus on the planter class, slave culture and the relevance of slavery in maturing colonial societies determines the course of these investigations. In works such as these the principal task of examining the influence of slavery and black culture on the social and economic development of the two colonies dominates the depiction of overseers, and their lives as separate, autonomous individuals are not explored. James Baird states that "the presence of a racially debased slave population stigmatized dependence in new and powerful This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 365 Although overseers' lives were intertwined with masters and slaves, and their futures were often determined by the part they played in slavery, they remain peripheral, mentioned most commonly for their failings or their role in plantation violence. While recognizing the key role of the overseer in using violence to maintain the slave order, we should nevertheless note that there were many other aspects to their job that continue to be ignored, which in turn prevents full understanding of their contribution to the plantation system. Indeed, they are almost entirely absent from the history of the American Revolution. Yet if we are to fully appreciate exactly how significant their role had become by the Revolutionary period, it is first necessary to dismiss the myth of the "ne'er-do-well" overseer, and establish the reality of their backgrounds, their responsibilities and their working lives before turning our attention to how, as linchpins of slave society, these men fared within the maelstrom of Revolutionary war. Though there is a long-standing debate about the different slave-labour systems that developed on plantations in the Upper and the Lower South, and it is clear that Virginia and South Carolina differed markedly in physical landscape and climate, which in turn affected settlement patterns, demo graphic development and agricultural practises on plantations, the dominance of a coercive system of race-based slave labour, and the common use of white overseers to supervise plantation business, allow important parallels to be drawn between the two regions when analysing broader themes such as the impact of the American Revolution on the colonial inhabitants of the South.1' ways" and characterizes overseers, although members of the free white population, as dependants rather than men with ambition or agency. James Baird, "Between Slavery and Independence: Power Relations between Dependent White Men and Their Superiors in Late Colonial and Early National Virginia, with Particular Reference to the Overseer-Employer Relationship," PhD thesis, Johns Hopkins University, 1999, ii; Baird, "Paternalism and Profit: Planters and Overseers in Piedmont Virginia, 1750-1815," in Robert Olwell and Alan Tully, eds., Cultures and Identities in Colonial British America (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2.006), 147-68. 15 Philip Morgan outlines differences between the labour routines, work patterns, and resulting slave culture that developed in the South Carolina Low Country (which predominantly grew rice and indigo) and the Chesapeake region (which predominantly grew tobacco, corn and wheat). However, broader comparison makes it clear that the majority of slaves in both regions who worked on large slave plantations laboured under gruelling conditions and received similar treatment with regard to welfare, provisions, reward and punishment, and thus had some important shared experiences despite the differences in plantation structure and labour systems. For more detail see Philip Morgan, "Work and Culture: The Task System and the World of Lowcountry Blacks, 1700-1880," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, 39 (1981), 563-99; Morgan, Slave Counterpoint-, Morgan, "Three Planters and Their Slaves: Perspectives on Slavery in Virginia, South Carolina, and Jamaica, 1750-1790," in Winthrop Jordon and Shelia Skemp, eds., Race and the Family in the Colonial South (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1987), 37-79. For a broader comparison of slavery and plantation management in across these two regions see Laura Sandy, "Between Planter and Slave: The This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  366 Laura Sandy In South Carolina, planters generally chose not to reside permanently among those who toiled to make them rich. Many chose to live either in comfortable town houses or in absentia, dwelling in Europe, rather than confront the fevers and heat of rice plantations.14 Thus the overseer performed an essential supervisory task, as recognized by legislation; for example, in 1711, a deficiency law (revised and expanded in scope in 1726 and 175 s) was passed in South Carolina that penalized the owners of plantations "wherein six negroes or slaves shall be employed without one or more white person living and residing on the same plantation."15 However, in Virginia and the Chesapeake region, overseers were no less important. Although the majority of planters resided on or near their plantations, the need for overseers was also recognized by the law. While the laws regulating the supervision of slaves on Virginia plantations were not quite as specific as those passed in South Carolina, early and recurring Virginia legislation penalized plantation owners in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries who did not employ "free," white, "Christian Overseers" to supervise their slaves and prevent them from taking part in unruly and criminal activities.16 Even elite planters who made their plantation their permanent residence were continuously drawn away to govern and protect the development of the colonies, and thus relied on the support of overseers. As a result, by the time revolution broke out both the South Carolina and Virginia legislatures not only had declared overseeing crucial to the success of southern plantations and the defence of the surrounding countryside, but they also decreed it to be the domain of the white man.17 Thus the role of the overseer was of paramount importance for a variety of reasons. The overseer, wherever he was hired, served as an intermediary link between the owner and the slaves, between the big house and the fields, and between the core and the periphery Social and Economic Role of Plantation Overseers in Virginia and South Carolina, 1740-1790," PhD diss., University of Manchester, 2.006, passim. 14 For a detailed discussion of the South Carolina landscape and analysis of the development of plantations in South Carolina in the eighteenth century see Edelson, 13-53 and 92-116. 15 Thomas Cooper and David McCord, eds., Statutes at Large of South Carolina, 10 vols. (Columbia, SC: A.S.Johnson, 1836-41), Volume II, 363; 3, 193, 172; 97, 175. 26 William Hening, ed., The Statutes at Large: Being a Collection of All the Laws of Virginia, from the First Session of the Legislature in the Year 161p (Charlottesville, VA: Published for the Jamestown Foundation of the Commonwealth of Virginia by the University Press of Virginia, 1969), Volume II, 481; Volume III, 451, 436, 460, 336. 17 The need for overseers on plantations in North America did not start with the institutionalization of slavery in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Laws and court records suggest that in the seventeenth century black, white and Indian overseers were used to supervise plantations on which mixed (free and unfree men and women, black and white) groups of labourers worked. Towards the end of the seventeenth century, however, overseeing became racially prescriptive. With the decline of the system of indentured servitude and the rise and institutionalization of black slavery, legislators made overseeing, before the law, exclusively a white man's profession. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 3 67 of plantation business. He would encourage, motivate or force slave labourers to be active and diligent, and, in so doing he represented an integral part of labour management systems across the southern plantation landscape. Successful southern planters and leading American revolutionaries such as Henry Laurens, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson often depended heavily on overseers. The expectation of overseers and the variety of backgrounds from which they came belies the notion that overseers were all men of "low circumstances" who lacked experience and were of questionable morals, drawn from the poorest echelon of society.2-8 Reviewing the role, backgrounds, and behaviour of some overseers not only defies conventional stereotypes but also provides useful detail that helps us understand the different choices overseers made, regarding their conduct and loyalties, during the American Revolution. Bearing in mind that a planter's wealth, in the form of slaves, livestock, tools, buildings, provisions and the crop, was entrusted to his overseer, on top of the basic task of supervising slaves many planters expected their overseers to come to the job from backgrounds that fostered practical skills, agricultural knowledge, literacy and sometimes wealth, qualities the poorest members of society rarely possessed. Planters insisted that overseers fulfil every article in their contracts; the great variety of tasks and expectations made this difficult, however, and most white men who undertook the job struggled to some extent to reconcile the conflicting social and economic demands put upon them by their employers. Planters desired men whom they employed as overseers to have some experience of agriculture and planting; however, men with litde or no experience in planting were not discounted if they had other skills that were useful to the operation of a plantation. Generally overseers were expected to supervise the activities of slaves while at work, from sunup to sundown. Overseers distributed and organized labour activities, and although the majority of slaves performed agricultural labour, overseers also supervised slaves working in a variety skilled and semiskilled occupations such as carpentry, blacksmithing, gardening milling and weaving and were expected to organize and keep track of slaves who moved and worked beyond the confines of the plantation. Most importantly, overseers were required to work the slaves they supervised hard enough to achieve a level of profit that satisfied their employer. As the white man who was in closest contact with bonded labourers, and who carried out unpopular directives to elicit maximum labour, the overseer was, however, frequently the focal point of the resentment and anger of slaves. This placed the overseer at the most vulnerable interface between the coerced slave 18 Robert Pringle, Robert Pringle Letter Book, ed. W. Edgar (Columbia, SC: Published for the South Carolina Historical Society and the South Carolina Tricentennial Commissioned by the University of South Carolina Press, 1972.), 474, 577. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  368 Laura Sandy and the profit-seeking (but ideally paternalistic) master. Regarding his slaves, South Carolina planter Henry Laurens advised all of his overseers, "with the well ones use gentle means ... mixed with authority at first," while for the more resistant and rebellious slaves he recommended punishment, but with "mercy so that they may be convinced that the end of their correction is to be amendment."2-9 However, in another typically ambiguous instruction, Laurens stated, "Frighten the two boys till you make them tremble but don't Whip them."'0 It is hard to imagine how an overseer could make the slaves under his supervision "tremble" without resorting to physical punishment, as slaves were inured to the authoritarian approach and unlikely to be frightened by strictness alone. The traditional image of an overseer as the cruel whip-cracker on the plantation is not surprising when one reviews the incompatible instructions he received from his employer. Whilst threatening slaves and withholding privileges was likely to have some effect in discouraging their misbehaviour, mild punishments were unlikely to scare the most determined and rebellious. Given that the slaves had nothing to lose but their physical well-being, it is the sad truth that in most cases physical punishment and torture were the overseer's most effective means to enforce discipline. Those overseers who treated slaves with mercy and attempted to tame them gently also often found themselves in a problematic situation. Undue leniency often resulted in low productivity, which was equally unacceptable. The correct balance between care and coercion was a difficult one to strike, and overseers were just as likely to be dismissed for treating too leniently as too harshly.31 Many planters also charged their overseers with numerous other responsibilities. Overseers were expected to ensure that all plantation property was well maintained. Overseers were to inspect land, crops, buildings, fences and tools and to arrange repairs and improvements where necessary. It was often the overseer's job to arrange and supervise the transportation of all goods and livestock to market as well as to oversee incoming shipments of plantation supplies. The welfare of livestock and slaves was also of prime importance. Livestock needed to be well kept and accounted for.31 With regard to slave welfare overseers distributed provisions and rations among slaves and were expected to tend to sick slaves and weed out those who were feigning illness. Planters expected their overseers to diagnose illnesses and to administer PHL, Volume IV, 633. 50 Ibid, Volume V, 16. Sandy, "Between Planter and Slave," 149-83. 32 Laura Sandy, "Supervisors of Small Worlds: The Role of Overseers on Colonial South Carolina Slave Plantations," Journal of Early American History, 1, i (zon), 178-110; Sandy, "Between Planter and Slave," 74-107. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 369 treatment and medicine.33 Doctors who visited plantations "fleeced" planters, agreed Laurens and his fellow planter Ralph Izard, who both felt that "where there is a careful Overseer & a good Medicine Box, cost could be kept to a minimum."34 Furthermore, overseers were expected to provide their employer with regular, detailed written or verbal reports on all plantation matters.35 Defying the stereotypes, many men employed to take on the role of overseer were actually plantation- and landowners, artisans, indentured servants, professional overseers, sons of the planter elites, and even preachers. Leading planters such as George Washington and Henry Laurens employed men from a variety of backgrounds, as illustrated by Table 1 and Table 1 (see Appendix). From the sample it is clear that at least one-third of overseers employed by both Washington and Laurens had a definite tie to planting or some agricultural experience. Tenant farmers; small landowning planters; the sons of small, medium and wealthy planters took up the job. Yeoman farmers or small-scale planters and their sons who needed experience, money and the support of their social superiors often used overseeing as a stepping-stone to independence. For example, James Bloxham and John Green, both well qualified farmers, served as overseers for Washington. Gilbert Simpson, Nelson Kelly and Samuel Johnson were tenant farmers who took up jobs as plantation overseers for Washington at various times before returning to their occupation as planters. Many other leading Virginia planters, such as Robert Carter, Landon Carter and William Cabell, also employed men with proven experience and expertise in farming as overseers.36 In South Carolina leading planters also looked to hire experienced planters as overseers. John Christian Grenginger, a planter, and Robert James, first a planter and then a canal " Henry Laurens supplied his overseers with "a good Medicine Box" and medical literature, as did other planters. PHL, Volume VIII, 375, 522. 34PHL, Volume XI, 375; Volume V, 123. 35 PHL, Volume VIII, no; William Ancrum to Mr Givings, 17 Oct. 1778, William Ancrum Letterbook, Caroliniana, University of South Carolina (hereafter USC); George Washington to Howell Lewis, 13 July, 10 Nov. 1793, 6 Jan. 1794, George Washington Papers, series 4 and 9, LC; See also a number of overseer agreements in J. Bear and L. Stanton, eds., Thomas Jefferson Memorandum Books: Accounts with Legal Records and Miscellany, 1767-1826 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1000), Volume I, 238. 36 George Washington, The Diaries of George Washington, 1732-1799, ed. D. Jackson and D. Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1976-79) (hereafter DGW), Volume I, 296; George Washington, The Papers of George Washington, 1732- 1799, ed. D. Twohig and D. Jackson (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1976-79) (hereafter PGW) Volume I, 217. After being employed by George Washington as an overseer, and overseeing for a year, Nelson Kelly returned to his occupation as a tenant farmer. Similarly, Samuel Johnson Sr. went back to being a tenant farmer after being employed by Washington as an overseer for a number of years. For example, Cabell's overseer, Lansum, was a tenant before he became an overseer. William Cabell Common Place Books (hereafter CCB), 5, Virginia Historical Society (hereafter VHS). This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  370 Laura Sandy overseer, were both employed by John Ewing Calhoun as plantation overseers at the end of the eighteenth century.37 However, approximately a third of those employed as overseers by Washington in Virginia and Laurens in South Carolina were drawn from a variety of backgrounds beyond agriculture. Artisans, tradesmen, military and religious men, skilled and unskilled indentured servants, and the sons of wealthy gentlemen who lived in the American colonies or in Europe became overseers. Skilled artisans who could not find work in their trade or who wished to expand their business turned to overseeing to ease or improve their situation. Some craftsmen wished to branch out into the sphere of planting and used overseeing as a means to achieve this in terms of education and networking. John Patterson was employed by Washington as head carpenter and overseer in the 1760s. He worked for Washington for four years to the mutual satisfaction of both employer and employee.'8 Similarly, John Ehlers, a German gardener with twenty years' experience and excellent credentials, took a position at George Washington's home plantation, Mount Vernon, hoping that a job as an overseer would offer an opportunity to increase his own wealth, reputation and autonomy and facilitate a move into the planter class.39 In South Carolina in 1771, Josiah Smith employed George Mollineaux and his apprentice from England. Mollineaux, a wheelwright and a carpenter, was to be overseer of the slave carpenters, and the other "Young Man to be brought up as an overseer."40 Some established craftsmen wished to branch out into the sphere of planting, and used overseeing as a means to achieve this in terms of education and networking. Peter Horlbeck had worked in England and Germany as a "master mason" before he moved to America. He initially pursued his trade in ,7John Palmer to John Ewing Calhoun, 2.9 April 1974, John Ewing Calhoun Papers, Caroliniana, USC; "The Henry Laurens Papers," South Carolina Historical Magazine (hereafter SCHM), 17 (1916), 41, 43, 76. Lauren employed many experienced planters as overseers, including Abraham Schad. Schad was granted land in South Carolina in the 1750s and owned a small number of slaves, which suggests he was a yeoman planter. In 1763 he took up a position of overseer on one of Henry Laurens's plantations and used the role, and his ownership of slaves, to his advantage and return to independent planting with increased skill and resources. 38 R. Dalzell and L. Dalzell, George Washington's Mount Vernon: At Home in Revolutionary America (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 155. " Ibid., 15$. For more examples George Washington contracts with his overseers see DGW, Volume I, 196; Volume II, 164; Volume IV, 1, 15-16, 2.0-21, 141-43, 315, 337; Volume XXXVI, 64-65; PGW, Volume V, 174-75. 418-19; Volume VI, 377, 378; 8, 100-2, 145; Volume XXXVI, 64-65; Dalzell and Dalzell, 155; George Washington Papers, Ledger A, 294, LC. Washington also employed John Askew, Thomas Green and other carpenters to specifically oversee the slave carpenters on his plantations at various times, George Washington Papers, series 4, LC; Sandy, "Between Planter and Slave," 37-73. 40Josiah Smith to George Austin, 17 June 1771, Josiah Smith Letter Book (hereafter JSL), Southern Historical Collection. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 371 Charleston, then took a job as an overseer for Henry Laurens on his Mepkin plantation. Horlbeck later returned to masonry and, through his association with Laurens, gained patronage that gready aided his ventures, so much so that he was eventually able to establish himself as a planter.41 Stephen Brown, a ropemaker from England, was advised by an acquaintance who had progressed from overseer to independent planter that he should follow the same route. Brown took the advice and his friend commented further that "a few more years experience, gained through overseeing ... would make him an able planter."42 Many planters also employed indentured servants and at the other end of the spectrum "gentleman overseers." The indentured servants who were bought or hired in to act as overseers were evidently of a higher status than those of the previous century.43 In 1768 Laurens indentured a Dutch or German man named Casper Springer to work on his plantations. Over the next few years, Springer worked in various capacities on Laurens's plantations. Laurens thought Springer "very industrious," "honest and grateful," and "a tolerable good planter," enough so to reward his efforts. Springer was promoted from indentured servant to the position of overseer and Laurens "entertained great expectation of his management."44 Casper remained in this role after his indenture ended. Other South Carolina planters, for example Isaac Hayne, also proved eager to employ indentured servants from Europe as overseers.45 "Gentleman overseers" were the sons of wealthy planters who viewed their job as an overseer as an apprenticeship. Under the watchful eye of their fathers' peers or friends, they enhanced their practical knowledge of plantation management. Henry Laurens took James Rossel and John Lewis Gervais under his wing as gentleman overseers. When they first came to him, he noted that, while they were clearly "gentlemen," they were "no planters." However, Laurens hoped that, after living on his plantations for a couple of years and with his guidance and the "tuition and assistance of a capable overseer," both men had the potential to settle in the region as 41PHL, Volume IV, 575, 585; Volume VIII, 339; For more examples see Sandy, "Between Planter and Slave," 37-73. 41Josiah Smith to George Austin in England, 30 Jan. 1771, JSL. 4' David Galenson, White Servitude in Colonial America (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981). As Galenson notes, in the eighteenth century most servants came to North America with skills. These men were then trained on the plantation to be overseers. PHL, Volume VIII, 89, 339; Volume IX, 104, 334. 44PHL, Volume VIII, 89, 339; Volume IX, 2.04, 334. Henry Laurens' Account Book, 1763-1773, Robert Scott Small Library, College of Charleston, 186, 387-38,441. The items Henry Laurens gave to Casper Springer, a German or Dutchman, on his arrival in South Carolina in 1768, such as a suit of clothes, a coat, a hat, and a pair of shoes, suggest that he was an indentured servant. 45 Isaac Hayne Register, South Carolina Historical Society, Charleston. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  372- Laura Sandy creditable planters. Similarly, Washington and other Virginia planters apprenticed the sons of their peers as overseers. These men went on to be successful planters, lawyers and politicians.46 Furthermore, sometimes over seers who were employed on plantations in both Virginia and South Carolina were themselves slave-owners.47 Slave-ownership, according to Robert Olwell, turned a man into "a master and, in a slave society, into a member of the ruling class."48 Though the elite planters who ruled the South were unwilling to allow any but the most prosperous and well-respected men into their circle, it is clear that overseers who owned land and slaves or possessed sought-after skills were certainly not members of the lowliest classes in colonial society. Finally, some planters selected slaves from within the plantation to act as overseers.49 The conventional historiography about plantation culture has minimized the opportunities that were presented to some slaves in order to improve their fortunes. It has been acknowledged that slaves received material rewards and praise, and curried favour with their employers, but even recent studies have claimed that "black men served as 'drivers' over slaves, but they never served as overseers."50 In fact, it was not uncommon for skilled or trustworthy slaves to be promoted to the position of overseer as a reward for their hard work and dedication. Furthermore, the infrequency with which planters and attorneys noted down job titles with regard to slaves suggests that many slaves may have performed the duties of overseers without carrying that title. Though the law clearly stated that white overseers were to be employed to assist planters in controlling slaves, slaves who had taken on the role in a temporary capacity often remained in the post permanently. The most obvious advantage of black overseers for planters was that they were unfree and could be subjected to long and uninterrupted periods of service and encouraged to remain dutiful through the offer of exceptional rewards. Eighteenth-century 46 PHL, Volume IV, 338, and Volume VIII, 421; Joseph Ball Letterbook, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation; Brown, Good Wives, Nasty Wenches and Anxious Patriarchs, 352; DGW, Volume IV, 143; Sandy, Between Planter and Slave, 54-60. 47PHL, Volume VIII, 88; the Henry Laurens Papers, SCHM, 17 (1916), 42, 43. 76- Henry Laurens, a prominent planter in South Carolina and leading revolutionary, employed at least eleven overseers who owned slaves. CCB, 3, 17 March 1771-21 Dec. 1771, VHS; Lorena Walsh, "Carters Grove Biographical Notes." The biographical notes about employees who worked for Lewis Burwell at Carters Grove plantation were kindly given to me by Lorena Walsh. The original notes remain in her possession. Though not as common in Virginia, planter records also indicate that a small number of overseers in that state owned slaves. For example, the Virginian planter Lewis Burwell gave his overseer, John Ross, £9 per annum as "rent" for the overseer's slave, Phil, and William Cabell accounts include extra payments made to overseers for the use of their slaves. 48 Robert Olwell, Masters, Slaves, and Subjects, 44. 49 Sandy, Between Planter and Slave, 166-84. 50 Jacqueline Jones, American Work: Four Centuries of Black and White Labour (New York: Norton, 1998), 210. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 373 planters had serious problems with retaining white overseers for more than a couple of years, and during the Revolution the problem worsened as overseers enlisted, fled or found it increasingly difficult to maintain control over slaves. Black overseers, however, could be subjected to long and uninterrupted periods of service, and as property, if they proved satisfactory, could be retained as overseers for life. Black overseers were still subject to the will of their master and could be demoted or punished if they did not follow instructions and work hard; hence slaves, especially those with privileges and a high status on the plantation, were far less likely to run away or shirk their duties. Indeed, this was of great advantage to some planters during the Revolution. Many planters, such as George Washington, who resorted to the use of slaves as overseers had more confidence in their slaves' abilities to manage their interests than in the white men they used as overseers, and valued them "for their ability to take decisive and independent action."51 Black overseers, therefore, had the potential to provide plantations and labour forces with the consistency they often lacked under white overseers and the stability they needed during wartime. The value and importance tied to some black overseers was reflected in their market price, which could reach as much as five times that of an average slave labourer or field  hand.sl  Incorporating the experiences of black as well as white overseers during the Revolution adds a new dynamic to the history of slavery and plantation management during the conflict. The "class" of overseers to which wealthy planters habitually referred inevitably did include men who abused their position and took part in criminal activities; however, the profession was in fact manned by a heterogeneous mix. As an occupational group, overseers, if not quite representative of colonial society as a whole, were, nevertheless, clearly drawn from a surprisingly wide social spectrum and employed in an environment where gentlemen's sons might rub shoulders with indentured servants. The plantation environment of overseers was not a "subaltern world" restricted to the lowly, but a world in which men of different backgrounds, subalterns and their "betters," might work and live (and drink and gamble) together. When war broke out, these men, whose common tie was that they inhabited a world that revolved around coercive slavery, would not simply act in accordance with a lower "class" mentality they all shared, but instead respond in a variety of ways which reflected their backgrounds, skills and personal beliefs and loyalties. 5> Morgan, Slave Counterpoint, 343; For George Washington's use of black overseers see Table 3 (Appendix). 51PHL, Volume V, 574; Volume IV, 202. Laurens paid £600 currency for a black overseer before the price of Negroes was "very high." He also paid £1200 currency for "a mulatto named Samuel" who was a skilled bricklayer, "well versed in other methods of construction" and used as an overseer. He lived and worked on Laurens's plantations for 3 2 years. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  374 Laura Sandy Even before the Revolutionary clash of arms, white society had long understood that war posed the most dangerous of threats to their system of racial subordination. Hence, in the militarized, frontier societies that characterized the southern colonies, the overseer had a quite specific role in wartime; he was to defend not only against the external enemy, be he Amerindian or Frenchman, but also against the fractious and potentially rebellious enslaved population. From the seventeenth century onwards, statute books in both Virginia and South Carolina show that plantation overseers were exempt from military muster, in order that they might remain on the plantation, keeping watch over their slaves.53 Indeed, in 1753, "William Tucker an overseer who is exempted from appearing at musters" was fined "ten shillings or one hundred Pounds of tobacco according to the laws for his said offence" for appearing at a "private muster."54 Whether Tucker simply wanted to be involved in military activities or, perhaps more likely, in the entertainments that followed, is unclear. What is clear is that it was considered extremely important for overseers to remain at their posts, so much so that even those who were not slave-owners were exempted from military service in which their peers and even men of higher social status were expected to take part. Numerous alleged slave plots and insurrections shook the colonies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which evoked fear from among the white populace.55 The most dramatic of these was the Stono Rebellion that occurred outside Charleston, South Carolina in September 1739. A group of perhaps a hundred well-organised insurgents fought a running battle with militia for over a week, killing over twenty whites and plundering as they went, before finally being killed or captured. The memory of Stono haunted the white South for decades.56 Nervous and prescient voices recognized the 53 Hening, Virginia Statutes at Large, Volume VII, 93; Volume IX, 28; The matter is also discussed briefly in Holton, Forced Founders, 168; Fifth Virginia Convention, Friday 26 April 1776, in R Scribner and B. Tartar, eds., Revolutionary Virginia: The Road to Independence, Volume VI, The Time for Decision, 1776: A Documentary Record (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1981), 474-81. 54 Early Albemarle County Court Orders, 15 Sept. 1753, Collection 2.02.7, Box 1, University of Virginia. 55 Herbert Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943), 86-90, 162-208. sé For more details on the Stono Rebellion and slave resistance, see John Thornton, "African Dimensions of the Stono Rebellion," American Historical Review, 96 (1991), 1101-13; Edward Pearson, "A Countryside Full of Flames: A Reconsideration of the Stono Rebellion and Slave Rebelliousness in the Eighteenth-Century South Carolina Lowcountry," in Gad Heuman and James Walvin, eds., The Slavery Reader (London and New York: Routledge, 1003); Wood, Black Majority, 308-9, 313-20; Aptheker, 86, 187-89. For a recent revisionist account of the Stono Rebellion see Peter HofFer, Cry Liberty: The Great Stono River Slave Rebellion 0/1739 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 375 particular dangers to racial subordination posed by civil conflict. In 1755, after "signs of unrest [were] noticed among the slaves in Virginia and Maryland," which were attributed to the upheaval of the French and Indian War, Governor Dinwiddie of Virginia warned that "any Emergency that divided white Americans" could give blacks the opportunity to launch rebellions.57 The extent, long obscured, to which many slaves did in fact valiantly strive for freedom during the American Revolution which divided white colonists is now a matter of historical record.58 The fears of the latter were further heightened by a deliberate British strategy that encouraged slave insurrection and offered slaves freedom if they fought for the British.59 This promise was more than a mere war measure. As Christopher Brown has noted, it reflected a growing vision of Africans not as property but as subjects of the king and "drew upon concepts of inclusion, allegiance' and protection that were strengthened, if not generated, by the accession of hundreds of thousands of aliens to the British Empire."60 Slaves, who were looking for the opportunity to revolt, escape their bondage or, in some cases, serve their sovereign, responded to Dunmore's offer by fleeing their owners to the British. Defenceless or ineffectively supervised plantations were especially suscep tible to the enlistment of slaves. Michael Kranis, who has recently written on Thomas Jefferson's experiences during the Revolutionary war, highlights the fact that even though "Virginians increased their patrols, guarded the waterways, and posted men at the highways," and widely publicized that runaways would be punished with death, it was not enough to prevent Loyalists plundering the plantations and running off with slaves or encouraging them to flee to their camps and boats. On visiting his plantations after British attacks and occupations, Thomas Jefferson discovered that up to thirty slaves had been "carried off" by the Loyalist army. His overseer was 57 Aptheker, 87; Robert Dinwiddie to Charles Carter, 18 July 1755, in R A. Brock, ed., Dinwiddie Records, transcribed in Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, 105 (1997), 157-93. s8 Frey, Water from the Rock, passim. Sylvia Frey's work, for example, has demonstrated how, during the British campaign launched in the South in 1780, slave insurrectionists effectively formed a third force, apart from both Loyalists and Patriots. 59 After capturing Williamsburg in 1775, Governor Lord Dunmore issued a proclamation that freed all slaves who joined the British Army. This proclamation only applied to slaves owned by Patriots; Loyalists' slaves were left in bondage. A further proclamation in 1779 gave freedom to all slaves, North and South, who joined the British Army. See "Lord Dunmore Promises Freedom to Slaves Who Fight for Britain, 1775," in H. Niles, edPrinciples and Acts of the Revolution in America (Baltimore: W. O. Niles, 1811), 375. 60 Christopher Brown, "Empire without Slaves: British Conceptions of Emancipation in the Age of the American Revolution," William and Mary Quarterly 3rd series, 56 (1999), 2.73-306, 2.86; See also Alfred Blumrosen and Ruth Blumrosen, Slave Nation: How Slavery United the Colonies and Sparked the American Revolution (Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks, 2005), who argue that perception of a British threat towards slavery in the aftermath of the Somerset decision of 1771 was an important factor in causing the revolution. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  376 Laura Sandy clearly unable to prevent the British troops stealing his charges or aiding their escape. Many other Virginian slave-owners recorded the loss of their human property during the conflict. The Carters lost at least eleven slaves who fled to the British, stealing goods and weapons from their owners and an overseer before they absconded. John Willoughby returned to his plantation to find that all eighty-seven of his slaves had escaped to the British.61 Though it has been argued by some historians that South Carolina plantations did not suffer the same loss of slave manpower or face the same threat of slave rebellion as their counterparts in Virginia, planters' correspondence reflects that slaves in both regions fled their masters in numbers significant enough to threaten the viability of the labour system. Even in defeat, when the British finally withdrew from the South, it is estimated that between eighty and a hundred thousand "stolen slaves" accompanied them.62 Furthermore, it is clear that in both regions the planter elite shared similar sentiments concerning the impact of warfare on slavery and the material losses they suffered during the conflict.63 In his plantation accounts South Carolinian planter John Ball recorded the loss of fifty-three slaves to the redcoats. Ball was just one of many planters in South Carolina whose slaves ran away in the hope of securing their freedom.64 Interestingly, many of these slaves who initially took up arms for the king in the South Carolina and Georgia Low Country fought on even after British defeat. The radical historian Herbert Aptheker noted how some of the black soldiers who had served alongside the redcoats in Georgia were still waging a guerrilla campaign along the Savannah River in 1786. The following year, Governor Thomas Pinckney of South Carolina alluded to the "depredations" being committed in the south of that state by "maroons" and runaway slaves armed by the British.65 It is thus small wonder that "white authorities appear to have believed that slaves, in particular runaways, presented a greater than 6' Michael Kranis, Flight from Monticello: Thomas Jefferson at War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, ioio), 66, 67, 76, 77, 291; L. Carter, The Diary of Colonel Landon Carter of Sabine Hall, 1752-1778, ed. J. P. Greene (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1965) Volume II, 1051. The number of slaves taken from Jefferson's Elk Hill plantation has been a matter of debate among historians. Some historians have claimed that the British took as many as 30 slaves; however, others have claimed that only 11 slaves were stolen from Elk Hill. Though in some records Jefferson claimed he lost up to 30 slaves during the American Revolution, he noted in his farm book that he lost Z3 slaves in total from three different plantations and as many as 11 from Elk Hill. 61 David Brion Davis, Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of New World Slavery (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1006), 150. 63 Mullin, British, Caribbean and North American Slaves in an Era of War and Revolution, 2.36; Morgan, "Black Society in the Low Country," 108. 64 Norton, "What an Alarming Crisis Is This," 213, 114, 115; Quarles, The Negro in the American Revolution, 163, 172. 65 Herbert Aptheker, "Maroons within the Present Limits of the United States," Journal of Negro History, 14 (1939), 167-84, 170. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 377 usual threat to white people," which evoked "fear everywhere" in the plantation South during the Revolutionary era.66 The extent to which the slave population as a whole became more assertive and willing to resist their bondage during the Revolution is a matter of ongoing debate among historians; however, what is clear is that slave runaways, rebels and their powerful British allies posed the profoundest threat to southern slavery. For the planter elite, therefore, if slavery was to survive the American Revolution, it was more important than ever that overseers remained at their station and upheld white supremacy. Overseers thus continued to be exempt from military service and many planters expected their loyalty to their role on the plantation to come before their desire to fight for their country.67 Yet the middle ground, upon which the overseers stood, soon proved an inhospitable position, for it placed them immediately at odds with their neighbours and the wider community. In Virginia, for example, smallholders, non-slave-owners and the poor were outraged at overseers' exemption from military service. Although the Virginia Statutes at Large only exempted "bona fide" overseers, the increased number of men who, allegedly, became overseers "that Otherwise wou'd not, on purpose to Secure themselves from Fighting in defence of their Country as well as their own property," caused a public outcry. Despite heated debate, the exemption of overseers from military service held, and represented an acknowledgement of their key role in slave management, and thus in the stability of a nation built on institutionalized slavery.68 Indeed, the determination of the southern colonies to maintain and support the work of overseers, even at the expense of denying manpower to Patriot forces in the field, may have been one important factor in ensuring that the foundations of slavery, while shaken by the war, did not actually collapse. The significance of the overseer in the wider Patriot cause thus becomes apparent; he is a crucial figure in maintaining some sense of order in the colonial South, even as the Revolutionary war threatened to humble the mighty and liberate the slave. Upholding racial hierarchies, or fulfilling obligations to an employer, carried with them a significant personal cost, and the war tested the loyalties of men to the extreme. Although rarely battlefields, plantations were military objectives, either for punitive expeditions or as a useful source of resupply and, in that sense, the overseer found himself in a post which carried little honour but much danger. In Virginia and South Carolina, plantations owned by both 66 Philip Schwarz, Twice Condemned: Slaves and the Criminal Laws of Virginia, iyos~iS6$ (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1988), 169; Kranis, 67. 67 Fifth Virginia Convention, Friday 16 April 1776, Scribner and Tartar, Revolutionary Virginia, 474-81. 68 Ibid.; Hening, The Statutes at Large, Volume VII, 19, 93; Volume IX, 2.8; Holton, Forced Founders, 168. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  378 Laura Sandy Loyalists and Patriots suffered great losses. Ralph Wormeley, a Loyalist, sent a letter to a fellow planter in Virginia complaining that the plunder of his plantation and loss of slaves and other possessions had cost him "upward £1500 sterling." John and Margaret Colleton lived in England as absentee owners of an estate in South Carolina. In spite of their loyalty to the Crown, their friends and agents in America continued to manage the estate as best they could during the Revolution. William Ancrum, a successful planter in his own right, took over the management of the Colleton estate in 1779, after the death of Margaret Colleton. In 1780 he reported that he found the "plantation much distressed for provisions," and that the estate had "suffered much by the different Armies." Other agents for the Colletons' estate reported that the stock and slaves had been ravaged not just by soldiers, but also by "plunderers who go about in parties & distress the different plantations exceedingly."69 Eliza Pinckney, a plantation mistress and Patriot, summarized the effects of the Revolution on her family's plantation operations: I tell you I have been rob[b]ed and deserted by my Slaves, my property pulled to pieces, burnt and destroyed; my money of no value ... Such is the deplorable state of our Country from two armies being in it for nearly two years; the plantations have been some quite, some nearly, ruined - and all with very few exceptions great sufferers - their Crops, stock, boats, Carts gone, taken or destroyed; and the Crops made must be very small by the desertion of the Negroes in planting and hoeing time.70 Henry Laurens also commiserated to a friend in 1783 that, at one plantation, The British have carried off all my Negroes and they have either destroyed or carried off all my horses, cattle and stock of all sorts in a word they have left me nothing but the land which thank God they could not carry away, they made a hospital of my house in town and plundered all my furniture.71 Similarly, in Virginia armies occupied and plundered plantations, in many cases wreaking havoc. When Jefferson visited his Elk Hill plantation after Cornwallis had occupied it his overseer informed him that not only had he been unable to stop his slaves from being "carried off" but that the crops had been destroyed, his horses slaughtered, fences burnt and animal stocks confiscated for the use of the British Army. Jefferson noted in his farm book that his Elk Hill plantation, like many other southern plantations, was reduced 69 Ralph Wormeley to Mr. Welch, 18 April 1784, Ralph Wormeley Papers, 1773-1801, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation; William Ancrum to James Colleton, 14 July 1780, and Mr. Muncrief to Mr. Swaiston, 17 Feb. 1781, Margaret Colleton Papers, Caroliniana, University of South Carolina. 70 Eliza Pinckney, The Letter Book of Eliza Lucas Pinckney, 1-739-1762, ed. E. Pinckney (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1972.), xxiii-xxiv. 71 PHL, Volume XVI, 153-55 This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 379 to "an absolute waste" during the Revolutionary conflict.71 The consequences for overseers, as well as planters, could be dire. Whether owned by Loyalists or Patriots, the fate of a plantation was usually the same. Crops, livestock, possessions and buildings were sequestered or looted by whichever army reached them first. Plunderers with no political agenda robbed and pillaged any plantations that were exposed and defenceless. Some slaves could not be controlled or forced to labour, and many deserted to join the British. Few plantations were left undamaged, and some were almost destroyed. In the eye of this storm was the overseer. Despite the difficulties many overseers faced during the Revolution, many men who were conscripted into the army and obliged to leave their jobs, farms and families continued to claim that "Overseers are aliving in ease & Affluence at the Expence of their Employers."73 In some cases the charge was not unjust. There were ways by which overseers who did remain on the plantation could profit and the Revolutionary war certainly presented opportunities that might appeal to the basest of self-interests. It was claimed by Henry Laurens that some overseers waged a "Predatory War," exploiting the disruption and seizing the opportunity to profit from conflict. A number of overseers used their privileged position to advance themselves materially, and in some cases socially. One of Henry Laurens's overseers, George Aaron, who lived and worked at New Hope, one of Laurens's more isolated plantations, seized the opportunity when he was left unsupervised to "seduce & carry off" five of Laurens's slaves. Whether they were coerced or encouraged, the slaves fled with Aaron to St. Augustine in East Florida.74 The backdrop of conflict and the success of this first "slave-stealing" operation provided Aaron with the confidence to plan a second attack on Laurens's plantation. Allied with "Floridians," Aaron "returned with a party in order to carry off as many more [slaves] as he could take."75 Eventually he was captured in Georgia and placed in gaol. While incarcerated in Savannah, Aaron announced his support for the Loyalist cause, and was thus detained as a prisoner of war rather than a felon. Mr. Clay, a prominent merchant of Savannah who presided over some of Laurens's business affairs in the Low Country, complained to Laurens that "All these Thieves claim the privilege of being prisoners of War as Soldiers in the service of the King of Great Britain." Those who managed Laurens's plantation affairs in his absence agreed that Aaron was a "Notorious Villain who robed & carried off your negroes." Mr. Baillie, Laurens's head overseer, who remained loyal to his employer and supervised his plantations throughout the conflict, vowed he would get Aaron "out of the hands of the Military to be Tried by the 71Kranis, 192-93. 73 Fifth Virginia Convention, Friday 2.6 April, in Scribner and Tarter, Revolutionary Virginia, 475. 74 PHL, Volume XI, 481. 75 Ibid. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  380 Laura Sandy Civil Law." If sufficient evidence could be procured to have Aaron transferred from military to civilian jurisdiction, he would be hanged for his crimes. Clearly, some men suddenly professed an allegiance to King George and the Loyalist cause in an attempt to evade prosecution for their crimes and avoid the hangman's noose.76 Laurens and his peers viewed men like George Aaron as traitors who had not only carried out assaults on their employer's property but also had allied with the enemy over their countrymen. Interestingly, many Loyalists also recognized that the Revolutionary war provided an escape route for "plunderers" and "villains." The Loyalist Thomas Brown informed Cornwallis that overseers and other men "who presumed to plunder or otherwise disturb the peaceable, inoffensive planters" and who then, if they professed their loyalty to the British crown, "received protection as prisoners on parole," should not be saved but instead should "hang without favour or distinction."77 Laurens's notion that men such as Aaron were fighting a "Predatory War," disregarding their duties, abusing resources and stealing slaves, was one shared by both Patriots and Loyalists. According to southern planters, little escaped the "pilfering & destroying hands" of "Negroes & Overseers" during the conflict and thus the treacherous acts of some overseers during the Revolution rapidly tarnished the reputations of many others who remained at their posts, were attacked by soldiers or slaves or fought bravely to defend their beliefs.78 As a consequence, many southern planters, regardless of their allegiance to the English crown or to American "liberty," placed overseers in the camp of men who battled for nothing more than self-advancement. Though in Aaron's case the evidence suggests that this was true, many other overseers did not betray their employers in a reckless effort to pilfer and destroy, but in fact remained on the plantation and performed their duties as best they could. Still others, though hard-working and honest, felt compelled to leave their overseeing positions in order to enlist and fight for the political cause they believed in. Disinterested neutrality or self-interest was not, however, an option for most overseers. The choices overseers made at this crucial time provide fascinating insights into the wider dynamics of class, patriotism and loyalty. At the start of the Revolution, Stephen Brown, the English rope maker turned overseer, worked for absentee plantation owner and Loyalist George Austin. Brown was imprisoned by the British when they occupied the estate. According to Josiah Smith, Austin's agent in South Carolina, Brown "contrary 76 PHL, Volume XIV, 190, 333. 77 Clyde Ferguson, "Carolina and Georgia Patriot and Loyalist Militia in Action, 1778-1783," in Crow and Tise, The Southern Experience in the American Revolution, 174-99, 19l< 191 78 PHL, Volume XI, 2.2.4 n, 169, 481. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 381 to my expectation" then "took protection, became a British Subject" and "soon rose to such consequence among the present rulers, as to accept a Commission as an Officer." Brown was not only employed as an overseer by a Loyalist who resided in Britain, but he was also an English-born immigrant to South Carolina. His allegiance to the British crown was therefore not all that surprising. However, Josiah Smith, a wealthy Patriot, who continued to supervise the business affairs of Loyalist planters like Austin during the Revolution, considered Brown's conduct "imprudent." Furthermore, he reported that from the moment Brown joined the British he became "obnoxious to the opposite party [the rebels]," and appropriated plantation resources and slaves for the use of the British Army. Until the outbreak of war Smith had sent glowing reports of Brown's conduct to Austin; however, when Brown placed his loyalty with the king and fought for the cause that his employer supported, he was chastised for his "misconduct" and alleged disloyalty. Shortly thereafter, Brown was imprisoned by the Patriot army, and a new overseer was appointed. Smith viewed Brown's allegiance to the British Army and his behaviour as an officer following orders during a war so "dishonourable" that when he applied to Smith for his wages and a one-fifth share of the last crop which was payment owed to him before he became embroiled in the Revolution, Smith, no doubt backed by Austin, refused, and further disagreements ensued. Surprisingly, the Loyalist planter Austin was similarly critical of his former overseer's behaviour, his neglect of his proper duties, and his social pretensions after he was commissioned as an officer. His loyalty to his king and his success as a British soldier, apparently, counted for much less than his presumed primary duty to the business interests of his British employer.79 Once again, the middle ground proved a tricky spot upon which to stand. Although many men were accused of choosing the occupation of overseer to avoid military service, it is apparent, then, that a number of men who were already in the occupation left their duties and families to voluntarily enlist with their fellow Patriots or in the service of King George. Like Stephen Brown, Henry Laurens's long-serving overseer Andrew Campbell enlisted with the "Enemy." However, he did not simply abandon his overseeing duties. He carried out his military duties when necessary, but also continued to supervise production at his Patriot employer's Mepkin plantation. Though Laurens was impressed by his conduct as an overseer and hoped to keep Campbell in his employ, after the war Campbell followed his beliefs and evacuated with the British. He settled first in the British West Indies and then, due to ill health, 79 Josiah Smith to George Austin, 30 Jan. and 15 Feb. 1772.; Josiah Smith to George Appleby, 16 June 1775, X3 March 1778, 15 March 1781, 30 April 1781, JSL, Southern Historical Collection. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  381 Laura Sandy removed to England. Also in South Carolina five of Ralph Izard's overseers left their posts, to Izard's dismay, and enlisted in the Continental Army in the first year of the war. In Virginia overseers also felt impelled to fight regardless of the legal exemption they were offered. Robert Wormeley Carter's overseer, John Reynolds, left his employer in the lurch when he enlisted in 1776. Carter, also a Patriot, was, like many of his fellow planters, dismayed and frustrated at his overseer's actions.80 For many planters, whether residing in the Upper or the Lower South, the loss of their overseers not only signalled disloyalty to their employer, but also proved disastrous for their plantation businesses. Laurens complained bitterly that two of his overseers, even after being offered immunity from military service, still went off to do their "duty," leaving a frontier plantation "without a White man upon it" and thus extremely vulnerable to enemy attacks or the rampages of men fighting a "predatory »0. war. 81 Once again, these incidents are telling; overseers who chose to enlist caused problems for planters who were attempting to conduct business as usual, in particular the tasks of keeping slaves on the plantation and at their work. Yet their actions demonstrate the considerable agency of men generally of the yeoman and artisan class and the fragility of the social hierarchy upon which elite claims to authority often rested. However, it was not simply their employers' interests that might suffer; those who chose to fight frequently left their families in a vulnerable situation, left alone in their quarters. Women were not immune from the violence of the war, as a report received by Henry Laurens concerning one of his plantations during the conflict indicated: "The Enemy certainly behaved very ill at Mepkin broke open every trunk and carried off every thing they could carry without a Cart and took from poor Roddick what little Money he had his Watch, Shirts Stockings and even the Shoes from his Wife's feet." Laurens's agent reported that an attack by the British on one of his plantations had left one of the overseers, William Roddick, very shaken up. Undoubtedly his wife, whose own person was threatened as she was forced to remove the shoes from her feet, was extremely distressed by the attack, which was perhaps worsened by the sense of physical and racial isolation overseers and their wives must have felt on the plantation. Though "much frightened," the couple dutifully remained on the plantation.81 It is not hard to imagine how the wife of an overseer, whose husband was 8oPHL, Volume XI, 138; 15, 301-6; 16, 30; Robert Wormeley Carter Diaries, 1764-1791, Swem Library, College of William and Mary. 81 PHL, Volumes XIV and XV. Although Henry Laurens uses this phrase to describe the actions of his overseer, George Aaron, he also uses it more broadly to characterize the opportunist war waged on plantations by Spanish Floridians and Indians who simply took advantage of the disarray to plunder and steal what they could. 81 From John Lewis Gervais, 13 May 1780, 15, 317. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  Divided Loyalties in a "Predatory War" 383 absent on plantation business or who had enlisted, felt while she remained living among slaves on the plantation that was a target for enemy attacks and the raids of bandits.8' Yet, despite the increased expectations and dangers, and public insinuations of cowardice, many overseers and their wives remained faithful to their employers even when attacked by the British or American armies or by the slaves who were under their supervision. By so doing they played their part in ensuring that slavery continued to function, even as the conflict raged around them and at a potentially grave personal cost. William and Susanna Roddick continued in their roles throughout the war; repairing buildings and dams, keeping slaves at work, tending to the sick and distributing supplies. The courage and continued diligence of the overseeing couple impressed Laurens throughout the war and encouraged him to admit, "I believe I am under great obligations to him [Roddick]." As a result, Roddick was promoted to head overseer in 1784 and the same year Laurens's agent reported that he had placed Roddick as overseer of two plantations which he assured "will be more to your advantage than to have employe'd Another Overseer at Small, last years crop justifies the supposition." The "plentiful" crop Roddick was able to produce, under wartime constraints and even after being attacked by the British, was a clear measure of his resilience, dedication and success during the Revolution.84 Similarly, Casper Springer, the former indentured servant who had been promoted to the job of overseer, sent reports that he was still able to make a "good crop" during the war. His employer noted during the conflict, "Casper seems to be held in contempt by the Negroes & I am afraid of some fatal accident." However, he continued to serve as an overseer, deal with the problems that arose as best he could and keep enough slaves at work to allow planting to continue. Laurens's "great opinion of Casper" proved accurate and as a recompense for his efforts he too was offered more responsibility and greater rewards.85 Remaining on the plantation, the only white face among a sea of slaves whose rebellious spirits had been roused by rumours of freedom, left overseers in an extremely vulnerable position physically. As has been noted, their situation was made even more dangerous by the constant threat of violence from soldiers and bandits. Attacks by both British and Patriot troops, as well as by bands of thieves, presented practical and material problems. In both South Carolina and Virginia, planters had difficulty obtaining food, clothes and other resources for their plantations during wartime. The chaos resulted in extensive loss of crops and livestock, due to neglect, destruction or theft. 8' Sandy, "Homemakers, Supervisors and Peach-Stealing Bitches," 1-6. 84PHL, Volume XVI, 2.58, 491, 389-90. 85 PHL, Volume VIII, 89, 189, 339, 515, 646; 108, 112, 104, 419; Volume XIV, 551. This content downloaded from 206.23.59.254 on Wed, 13 Oct 2021 03:29:15 UTC  All use subject to  https://about.jstor.org/terms  384 Laura Sandy The shortages were made worse by problems of transportation between ports and plantations. Food, clothes and provisions, as well as other items that were usually imported, were frequently stolen en route, leaving slaves undernourished, unclothed, susceptible to disease and unable to work to their full capacity. Although Virginian Joseph Ball expected his overseers to continue to maintain and care for his slaves as best they could during the Revolution, he admitted that "I would send proper Things, but for fear of their being taken this War time."86 Due to the lack of money in circulation and the disruption to agriculture and the econom

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