L. H. Roper

The 1701 "Act for the better ordering of Slaves": Reconsidering the History of Slavery in Proprietary South Carolina

ON August 28, 1701, the leaders of South Carolina paused in the latest chapter of their internecine political struggle to ratify the fourth version of "An Act for the better ordering of Slaves" in their colony's history and the first in five years (Figure I). The text of this legislation, which had disappeared from the historical record by the nineteenth century, fills the gap in the record of the development of the law of slavery in South Carolina that had existed between the statutes passed in 1696 and 1712, and it supplies evidence of the strong link among politics, social relations, and the development of slavery during the province's early history. Most particularly, the endemic factionalism of the proprietary period (1670–1719) continually cracked the political leadership, thereby encouraging slave resistance to such an extent that those who generated the factionalism felt obliged to issue periodic reminders of the proper relationship between blacks and whites and had to take increasingly harsher steps against slaves in their effort to maintain control of that relationship.¹

Figure I
First page of the rediscovered manuscript of "An Act for the better ordering of Slaves" (1701), in Rawlinson MSS C155, fol. 273r, Bodleian Library, Oxford, Eng. Courtesy, Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.

By the dawn of the eighteenth century, South Carolina had already readily proceeded down the slippery slope of race-based slavery. Migration from Europe had never met expectations, thanks to a demographic plateau in Britain, competition from other colonies, and well-warranted fears of the low country climate and of frequent epidemics of malaria and yellow fever. Explosive politics also discouraged immigration. At the same time, South Carolina's planters, a number of whom had connections with the West Indies, found Barbados a handy model for creating a New World society, and the enslavement of neighboring Indians furnished an early and lucrative economic lifeline. White South Carolinians quickly began importing an unprecedented number of Africans, pursuing in earnest the cultivation of rice for export. They recognized the importance of African and Indian slave labor to their situations and recommended it to prospective immigrants.²

Indeed the need to control and preserve the Indian slave trade was the raison d'être for the Goose Creek faction (so named for the location of its members' plantations), whose ruthless behavior supplied the fuel for the political fire that threatened several times to consume the province during the first fifty years of its existence. Those Carolinians who objected to the Indian slave trade, which the Lords Proprietors had prohibited, did so not on moral grounds but in the belief that the cycle of war and enslavement that ensued threatened peace on the colony's frontiers and stymied orderly settlement of Europeans.³

These factions paused at various points in their disputes to deal with the paradox they had created for themselves through their political and socioeconomic behavior: they lived with an ever-larger number of black slaves and increasingly feared them. In 1691 proprietor Seth Sothell and the Goose Creek men took control of the government, illegally seized records and offices, and jailed and assaulted their enemies. Amid this brouhaha Sothell and his associates passed the colony's first statute for "ordering" African (and Indian) slavery. The Lords Proprietors recalled Sothell in disgrace in November 1691. They also ordered an inquiry into his administration and commanded Governor Philip Ludwell to clean up the mess. For the next four years, the Goose Creek men and their enemies hurled accusations, tried to deflect blame, appealed to the proprietors, and halted what passed for the machinery of government as they jostled for political position, though they agreed on the continued need to keep a law prescribing the management of slaves on the books. They ratified the revised ordering act in 1693, after Ludwell had resigned in disgust at the refusal of the factions to make peace, and renewed it two years later.⁴

Ludwell's departure failed to calm the waters. The Lords Proprietors, dismayed by the behavior of Sothell and his cronies, resorted to sending another proprietor, John Archdale, to Charles Town (present-day Charleston) with instructions to end the factionalism and to annul all laws enacted after Sothell had come to power. The Carolinians, though, did not hesitate to create replacement slave-ordering legislation in 1696. The presence of a proprietor brought the Goose Creek men and their enemies to heel, and South Carolina enjoyed an unprecedented five-year period of political peace during the successive administrations of Archdale and Joseph Blake. Perhaps coincidentally, except to renew the 1696 law in 1698, the colony did not revisit the slave management issue during this time in contrast to the flurry of reviews and renewals from 1691 to 1696. Blake's death on September 7, 1700, however, ignited even more ferocious political strife.⁵

Under the terms of the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina—the governmental blueprint devised by the Lords Proprietors for their colony and, though never ratified by the colonists, obeyed in the breach at this time—the senior landgrave on the Grand Council automatically succeeded to the governor's chair when it became vacant.⁶ Therefore either Joseph Morton Jr. or Edmund Bellinger should have assumed the office. But both men opposed the Indian slave trade. Council member James Moore, the leader of the Goose Creek men, and other slave traders saw an opportunity to seize a new advantage over their enemies. With Grand Council ally Robert Daniel, Moore successfully objected to the accession of Morton and Bellinger on the grounds that they held royal appointments, which purportedly prohibited them from accepting a proprietary office, and had himself installed as governor instead.

Predictably, a series of disputes ensued during the next two years, including finger-pointing over enforcement of the Navigation Acts, accusations over attempts to regulate trade with the Indians, and denunciations of Moore's desire to attack Saint Augustine in anticipation of renewed hostilities with Spain. The parliamentary objections raised by the respective parties degenerated into an exchange of blows in the street and the dissolution of an uncooperative Commons House of Assembly by a furious governor in February 1702. A disastrous assault on Florida, which nearly bankrupted the colony, inflamed hostilities between the Moore and Morton camps to fever pitch by 1706.⁷

With Africans arriving in the colony in greater numbers and Indian slaves constituting a significant part of the population, owners in politically charged South Carolina knew that they had to take firm steps to prevent slave insurrection; as the 1696 and 1701 statutes put it, they had to "prevent the mischieves which (as the number of slaves shall increase) so much liberty may occasion." Though the record cannot show how much knowledge South Carolina slaves had of the colony's political tumults or whether they saw greater opportunity to rebel or otherwise resist their enslavement because of these political struggles, it includes numerous partisan complaints about the behavior of the province's factions and the possible consequences of their conduct. Most alarmingly, to the minds of their opponents, the Goose Creek men purportedly allowed blacks to vote in the series of provincial elections held after 1702.⁸

Certainly, the coincidence between political strife and the ratification of new slave-ordering acts in South Carolina continued. The province passed its next law in 1712, after joining North Carolina in a war against the Tuscarora and enduring another outbreak of factional disorder following the sudden death of Governor Edward Tynte. This statute was revised on December 18, 1714, and then again on December 11, 1717, after the calamitous Yamassee War. After the Carolinians rebelled against the proprietary government, they passed one more slave management statute during lengthy and fraught negotiations with the Crown to take over the colony, before the proprietors finally ceded their rights back to the king in 1729.⁹

Amid fierce divisions over everything else, early South Carolina politicians readily reached a remarkable unanimity on the need for ordering slaves, taking regular opportunities to retool the official framework within which black-white relations took place. On what exactly did the great fish in this small pond—Governor Moore and councillors Morton, Daniel, and Bellinger—agree, and how and why did their August 1701 law differ in significant respects from its predecessors?¹⁰

The 1701 legislation opened by reiterating the unequivocal principle, first codified in South Carolina five years earlier, that consigned "all Negroes, mulattos, & Indians which at any time heretofore have been sold or now are held or taken to be or hereafter shall be bought and sold for slaves" to slavery, excepting those freed "for some particular merit" or those who could prove free status to the satisfaction of the authorities. In 1696, though, some whites had not yet developed a proper understanding of what enslavement meant, a neglect that, if left to fester, directly threatened the slave regime philosophically and politically. The question of freedom of movement constituted the core issue, as slaves and owners knew: the provisions of the 1701 law indicate that members of the enslaved population had tested the length of their chains to a degree the provincial government considered dangerous. Early Carolina slave owners had yet to develop any belief that enslavement furnished a paternal, caring environment in which their slaves waxed content. Rather the statutes they passed for ordering slaves during the proprietary period demonstrate that these planters operated under no such self-delusions: they suspected their slaves, who insisted on shopping and socializing away from the prying eyes of whites, would invariably seize any chance to escape or rebel.¹¹

Prior statutes had set out punishments for "runaways," including branding and gelding for repeat offenders, and for those who assisted them. For the first time in 1696, in a provision retained in 1701, lawmakers had offered rewards to those who helped recapture escaped slaves, including twenty shillings to "every Indian and slave which shall take up any runaway slave" and return them. Legislation from 1696 and earlier had also ordered fines for masters and overseers who allowed their slaves to leave their plantations without tickets, established courts composed of two justices of the peace and three freeholders to punish slaves in criminal cases, created increasingly detailed procedures for holding escapees until their owners could be located (and fining those remiss in complying), proscribed the practice of granting slaves Saturday afternoons off and increased the fines levied against negligent owners, required monthly (and, after 1696, weekly) searches of slave houses for weapons and contraband, and set rates for compensating slave catchers for their time and effort. To further encourage cooperation, the colony agreed in 1696 and again in 1701 to pay £20 (Carolina) to owners whose slaves were executed or gelded as a consequence of criminal proceedings.¹²

Notwithstanding these earlier strictures and the exigencies that underlay them, owners had continued to permit their slaves "to do what and go whither they list, & to work where they please" and to allow them to keep a portion of the money that they earned from these activities. This laxity not only contributed to the perpetration of crimes and to drunkenness but also facilitated the independent and unsupervised movements of slaves, especially at times of political distraction. Thus, "for the prevention thereof," the 1701 law granted whites more discretion and assigned them additional duties when addressing their suspicions. It gave any white person "that shall endeavor to take any runaway or shall examine any slave for his ticket" the right to "beat maim and assault" and, if necessary, "kill any Negro or slave" who resisted; indeed, it incorporated a new provision granting public relief to "any person" injured while pursuing "any runaway Negroes or slaves." The compensation to owners for executed slaves was increased to £50 (Carolina). In addition the 1701 statute maintained the fines levied against those who negligently allowed their slaves to leave without a ticket, failed to keep their guns under lock and key, or sold their slaves "strong drink." For the first time, South Carolina expressly prohibited any "Negro or slave" from carrying firearms outside "his master's fenced ground" without permission.¹³

If the statute supplies any hint, the colony in 1701 seemed more reluctant than previously to defer to owners and overseers on the handling of the "mischievous devices" of slaves. And though the statute, like its earlier counterparts, makes reference to Indian slaves, its language strongly suggests that "Negroes" constituted the real concern; the legislation uses this term repeatedly, either by itself or in conjunction with "slaves," but never uses "Indian" in either way.¹⁴

Moreover the new provisions of 1701 mention only "Negro" slaves. Most particularly, the branding and gelding punishments for runaways first set out in 1696 were deemed insufficient for some incorrigible cases, though, curiously, South Carolina did not deem "running away" a summary offense. The 1701 law established that gelded slaves—slaves already punished twice for this same offense—who left their masters again for more than thirty days should have one of their Achilles tendons severed; owners who did not perform this duty within a week of recovering their property could lose that slave to anyone who came to court with a suit alleging their negligence. Once in possession, of course, that petitioner remained responsible for carrying out the punishment.¹⁵

The most radical intervention of 1701 (which was reiterated in 1712) addressed the continuing habit of slaves from around the colony to visit Charles Town on Sundays "to drink, quarrel, curse, swear & profane the Sabbath, besides the contriving of other dangerous plots & designs which may in time tend to the harm of the inhabitants of this colony as well as it is already a scandal to the religion we profess." For the first time, the law gave constables of the town the power to form patrols and even to impress men to search through Charles Town and "as much further up the neck as they shall be informed or have reason to suspect any meeting or conceive of any such Negro is at that time." A twenty-shilling penalty was imposed on those who refused to be impressed; any constable who neglected to perform this duty received a forty-shilling fine. To fulfill these requirements, constables received authority to enter and search homes, to seize the slaves they found without tickets, and to "cause [them] to be publicly and severely whipped in Charlestown." The slaves, treated as runaways, would then be handed over to the marshal, who received five shillings per slave from the province, a sum recoverable from the slaves' masters along with the costs incurred in holding the slaves.¹⁶

Though they expressed no apparent concern for the humanity of their slaves (the ordering statutes go so far as to distinguish slaves from "inhabitants" and legalize such punishments as slitting noses and gelding), South Carolina officials had to fit the square peg of a society based on the ownership of human beings into the round hole of contemporary English celebrations of the rule of law, liberty, and Christian religion. The 1701 law illustrates two ways they sought to resolve this conundrum, at least in their own minds. Predictably, both these measures relied on the premise that fundamentally separated slaves from and rendered them inferior to freemen.¹⁷

First, creating courts in 1691 (modeled on those created earlier on Barbados) to hear criminal cases that involved slaves as parties, the colony for the first time admitted as good evidence "the confessions of any slave or Negro or the evidence of any slave" in trials "for any crime, matter or thing whatsoever as if the same had been proved by a Christian witness." The slave courts assumed the duty of assessing the credibility of slave evidence in the course of rendering their judgments. Thus, though slaves could not serve on juries, convictions of slave offenders rested on the evidence of their peers in proper English fashion, which happened to make the securing of convictions for conspiracy and insurrection easier. The primary motive for allowing the admission of slave evidence, however, may have been to exempt the masters of convicted slaves from civil damages arising from the actions of those slaves.¹⁸

Second, the 1701 statute accepted for the first time the possibility of Christianizing slaves and "declared [it] lawful for any slave or slaves to receive the Christian faith & be thereunto baptized," though it retained the prohibition of conversion as a means to manumission or to alter the "estate & condition he was before," first articulated in 1691 and later retained in 1712. Conceivably, though the scant nature of the record has yet to produce any direct evidence, the Carolinians had become aware that in June 1701 the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (S.P.G.) had finally secured its charter with a charge to advance the Church of England's position in the American colonies, in part by converting Indians and Africans. Governor Moore and his successor and political ally, Sir Nathaniel Johnson, had well-connected metropolitan patrons with close ties to the established church; they used religion as a weapon against Morton and other Dissenters shortly after the ratification of the ordering law when they established the Church of England and passed a religious test for officeholders in 1704. Moreover, in an ecclesiastical sense, the Goose Creek men may have been aware of S.P.G. plans to send missionaries to South Carolina and found it politically useful to pave the way for the first serious clerical presence in the colony. Though slave baptism became an accepted part of the official comprehension of slavery, missionaries complained that owners hindered their efforts even as they moved to establish the Church of England in the colony. Proclamations of the sort made by the "best Scholar of all the Negroes" in the parish of Dr. Francis Le Jau to his master cannot have encouraged planters to warm to the S.P.G. effort. The enslaved man reported that "he had a Book wherein he read some description of the several judgmts that Chastise Men because of their Sins in these latter days" and that "there wou'd be a dismal time and the Moon wou'd be turned into Blood, and there wou'd be dearth of darkness."¹⁹

Aside from these glimpses and the statutes themselves, the record remains frustratingly cloudy about the degree of control that was actually exercised over black-white relations. How rigorously did the constables patrol Charles Town and its environs? How often did slaves evade the regulations and those charged with enforcing them? To what extent did slaves collaborate? To what degree did slaves continue to maintain lives outside the purview of those who required their labor and subservience and feared their autonomy? What effects did the 1701 act have on the ordering of slaves?

South Carolina did not officially revisit these questions until eleven years later. By then the uproar that followed Moore's takeover of the government had quieted, and the Church of England had been established in the province. Indeed Goose Creek leader Moore, his foe Morton, his ally Johnson, and most of those who had dominated the scene in 1701 had died, replaced by a new generation that included James Moore Jr. and Thomas Broughton, Johnson's son-in-law.²⁰

Yet slaves, through the neglect or collusion of their masters and despite the implementation of patrols, still left their plantations on Sundays and holidays without tickets, "resorting in great companies together" to Charles Town, where they had "an opportunity of executing any wicked designs and purposes." To combat this enduring problem, the 1712 law maintained patrols and their powers, brandings and geldings for escapees, and public relief for those whites injured while capturing runaways, as well as fines levied against those who neglected to order their slaves and against officials lax in carrying out their duty to apprehend slaves away from their plantations.²¹

Something seems to have happened in the minds of South Carolina's authorities between 1701 and 1712 to trigger further clarification of the official scheme for maintaining order in a slaveholding society. Most likely, the increasing flood of African imports into the low country during the previous decade obliged the government to announce its acceptance of the paradoxical yet essential proposition that "the plantations and estates of this Province cannot be well and sufficiently managed and brought into use, without the labor and service of negroes and other slaves," though these "are of barbarous, wild, savage natures, [which] renders them wholly unqualified to be governed by the laws, customs, and practices of this Province" and they threatened "the safety and security of the people of this Province and their estates." The new statute answered this self-imposed conundrum not by prohibiting further imports or ameliorating the situations of South Carolina's slaves but by attempting to demarcate further the lines drawn to separate blacks from whites and to ensure that all whites understood—and to make it in their interests to understand—their duty to nip threats to the slave regime in the bud.²²

The new ordering statute contained harsher proscriptions against trading with slaves, slave "mischiefs," those (both white and black) attempting to "steal away" slaves, and "mutiny or insurrection," earmarking one-half of the fines collected from those whites who neglected their statutory duties for informers and one-half for the parish system of poor relief created under the establishment act of 1706. It also mandated the death penalty for runaways who intended to leave the province, increased the punishments for other escapees, and increased the compensation for slaves executed under the law to fair market value. (The number of executions of "criminal" slaves during the ensuing two years "exhausted" the colonial treasury, necessitating the implementation of a new cap of £50 [Carolina]). These provisions remained essentially in effect until after the overthrow of the proprietary government in December 1719.²³

There is no record of any slave insurrection occurring in South Carolina prior to the Stono Rebellion of 1739. Slaves may have lacked sufficient knowledge of or interest in what passed for high politics in South Carolina in the early eighteenth century, remaining ignorant of possible opportunities that the disagreements of their masters may have furnished. Or they may have taken chances to rebel, but their activities did not make any imprint in the fragmented historical record of early South Carolina. This latter hypothesis seems unlikely, however, since white Carolinians took every chance to revile each other in print. The outbreak of any sort of slave unrest, especially if it could have been linked to factional strife, would have supplied additional fodder for the pamphleteers and petitioners to metropolitan authority who spilled so much ink blaming each other for the province's problems.²⁴

Reading between the lines of this legislation suggests that slaves had an awareness of what transpired politically in the low country and may have acted in more subtle ways on that knowledge individually or even collectively. Though the battery of white complaints about slaves' dangerous behavior during the last twenty-five years of the proprietary era and the correspondingly regular enactment of legislation designed to curb their movements hint at these possibilities, they leave historians still peering for direct insights into the behavior and thoughts of black Carolinians themselves.

[fol. 273r] An Act for the better ordering of Slaves²⁵

Be it enacted by his Excellency John Earl of Bath Palatine the rest of the true & absolute Lords and Proprietors of this Province by and with the advice & consent of the rest of the members of the General Assembly now met at Charlestown for the southwest part of this province.

That all Negroes, mulattos, & Indians which at any time heretofore have been sold or now are held or taken to be or hereafter shall be bought and sold for slaves are hereby made & declared they and their children slaves for all intents and purposes; except all such Negroes, mulattos, mustees, or Indians which heretofore have been or hereafter shall be for some particular merit made free by their respective owners or masters and except all such Negroes, mulattos, mustees, & Indians which can prove they ought not to be sold for slaves.

And for the better ordering of slaves and to preserve the mischief which as the number of slaves shall increase so much liberty may occasion.

Be it enacted by the authority aforesaid that every slave as that shall be taken hereafter out of his master's plantation without a ticket or leave in writing from his or their master or mistress, or some white man in his company to give an account of his business shall be severely whipped, & every person which shall not (when in his power) apprehend every slave which he shall see out of their master's plantation as aforesaid without license as aforesaid or after apprehending shall neglect to whip the same shall so forfeit twenty shillings, & that no slave may make farther or otherwise of any one ticket than was intended by his master every ticket shall particularly mention the names of every slave employed in the particular business & to what place they are sent & what time to return.

And for the better security of all such persons that shall endeavor to take any runaway or shall examine any slave for his ticket passing to & from his master's plantation it is hereby declared lawful for any white person to beat maim and assault, and if such slave cannot otherwise be taken to kill any Negro or slave that shall refuse to show his ticket either by running away or resistance endeavor to avoid being apprehended or taken.

And it is further enacted by the authority aforesaid that upon complaint made to any justice of the peace of any heinous or grievous crime committed by any slave or slaves, as burglary, robbery, burning of houses, killing or stealing any meat or other cattle, or other petty injuries, as maiming one of the other, stealing of fowls, provisions or such like trespasses or injuries the said justice shall issue his warrant for the apprehending the said offender, and for all persons to come before him that can give evidence and if upon examination it probably appear that the apprehended are guilty [fol. 273v] he shall commit them to prison or take security for their forthcoming as the case shall require, and also to certify to the next justice of the peace the said cause and to require him by virtue of this act to associate himself to him, which such justice is hereby required to do, and they so associated are to issue their summons to three able & sufficient freeholders acquainting them with the matter & appointing them a day, hour & place the said justice & freeholders shall cause the offenders & evidence to come before them, and they on hearing the ma[tter] (The freeholders being by the said justices sworn to judge uprightly & according to evidence) shall adjudge the criminal guilty of the offences complained of they shall give sentence of death if the crime by law deserves the same or such other punishment as the crime deserves, & forthwith by this warrant cause immediately execution to be done by the common or any other executioner on such manner as they shall think fit, and if the crime committed shall not deserve death, they shall adjudge the criminal or criminals to the party or parties injured, and to his and their heirs forever after they have received such corporal punishment as the said justices and freeholders shall approve, unless the owners shall pay to the person injured such sum or sums of money or the value at such time or times as the justices and freeholders shall appoint; and if any justice or freeholder shall neglect his duty above required he shall forfeit five pounds.

And be it further enacted that if any slaves shall commit any murder, or make any insurrection or rise in rebellion against the authority of the government or make any preparation of arms as powder, bullets, or any offensive weapons, or hold any conspiracy for raising mutinies or rebellions, the offender shall be tried by two justices of the peace and three able freeholders associated together as before expressed who are hereby empowered & required to try ye said slaves so offending & inflict death or any other punishment upon the said offenders, and forthwith by their warrant cause execution to be done by the common or any other executioner, in such manner as they shall think fit; and if any person shall make away or conceal any slave or slaves suspected to be guilty of the aforementioned crimes, and not upon demand bring forth the suspect offender or offenders such persons shall forfeit the sum of ten pounds current money.

Be it further enacted that the tes[ti]mony of any slave or the confession of the slave accused shall be taken & held for good & convincing evidence in petit larcenies or trespass not exceeding forty shillings, but no slave shall suffer the pains of the loss of life or limb, but such slaves as shall be convicted by Christian evidence.

[fol. 274r] And be it further enacted that every master mistress or overseer of a family in this province shall cause all their slaves houses to be diligently & effectively searched once every week for clubs, guns, swords and any other mischievous weapons, and finding any shall take them away & cause them to be secured, and also upon request made to search the same for stolen goods, or any other thing or commodity, and when they shall find anything suspected or known to be stolen the same shall seize and take into their custody & a full & ample description thereof shall send unto the Provost Marshall, or jailer the time being, who is hereby required to receive the same, & enter upon it the day of the receipt & set up notices in writing & publicly that such goods are found, to that end the owner giving the marshall or jailer proof by mark or otherwise that the goods lost belong to him, he may have the same paying twelve pence to the marshall or jailer for his entry and declaration of the same, & the parties by whom such goods are taken into custody are hereby required to make restitution of what is in being to the owners on penalty of ten pounds for every neglect by the master, mistress, overseer, marshall, jailer as aforesaid.

And be it further enacted that no Negro or slave shall carry out the limits of his master's fenced ground any sort of gun, or firearm without a certificate from his master, mistress or overseer for the same, and if any Negro or slave shall be apprehended or taken without the limits aforesaid with any gun or firearms shall be forfeited to him or them that shall apprehend or take the said arms so apprehended & taken shall be & are hereby deemed & esteemed the proper goods of him or them that apprehended & took the said arms as if he or they had purchased the same.

And be it further enacted that every master or head of every family shall keep all his guns when out of use in the most private & least frequented rooms in his house, and that every master or chief of every family which shall be convicted of negligence; or that shall suffer any slave to sell any sort of strong drink shall forfeit five pounds.

And be it further enacted that every slave above sixteen years of age that shall run away from his master, mistress or overseer, & shall so continue by the space of fourteen days at one time, shall by his master, mistress, overseer, or head of the family's procurement for the first offence be branded with the letter R on the right cheek and for the second time any male slave shall run away and so continue by the space of thirty days as aforesaid shall by order or procurement of his master, mistress, overseer or head of any family be gelt and female slaves shall lose an ear, and every Negro as aforesaid which the first time he runs away and shall so continue by the space [of] thirty days or more at any one time shall suffer the same punishment as by this act is appointed for a Negro which runs away a second time which punishment shall be inflicted by the same persons which are appointed to punish Negroes for running away the second time [fol. 274v] and under the same penalties & forfeitures, and if the owners or heads of families shall neglect by the space of seven days after such slaves are come into their custody or delivered to him to brand, geld or cause to be gelded or cut off one ear according as is hereby appointed, such owners or heads of families shall lose his property to the said slave to him or them that will sue for the same in a court of record & every person which shall so recover a slave by suit for the reason aforesaid shall within seven days after such recovery inflict such punishment upon such slave as his former owner or head of family ought to have done for neglect of which lost his property to the said slaves or for neglect thereof forfeit fifty pounds.

And be it further enacted that every slave that hath been gelded for running away from his master, mistress or owner which shall after such gelding run away & shall so continuously by the space of thirty days at one time, such slave by his master, mistress, overseer or head of a family's procurement shall suffer the punishment of having the cord of one of his legs to be cut off above the heel, & if the owners or heads of family shall neglect by the space of seven days after said slave or slaves are in their custody to cut the said cord as aforesaid such owner or head of family shall forfeit & lose his property to the said slave to him or them that will sue for the same in court of record within this province and every such person which shall recover such slaves as aforesaid shall be under the same limitations, restrictions & penalties as persons recovering slaves for neglect of inflicting the punishment on slaves for running away thirty days the first day.

And be it further enacted that every slave which shall attempt to run away of this government & shall be taken at any time after such an attempt shall suffer the same punishment as runaways lying out above thirty days, by this act above provided to be inflicted by his owners as aforesaid, and in case of the owners neg[ligence] by him that shall recover the same.

And be it further enacted that whoever shall take up any runaway slave or slaves shall have and receive the sum of ten shillings for each slave & such person or persons who shall bring the runaway to his or their proper owner if they know them shall receive for their pains over & above the aforesaid ten shillings a real per mile for every mile, provided it exceed not twenty shillings in whole for mileage, but if they know not the owners then to the marshall or jailer upon pain of forfeiture for every day he or she shall keep such slave or slaves beyond four days & thereof be convicted by confession or verdict the sum of ten pounds so levied by the marshall or jailer or his lawful deputy upon the goods & chattels of the person neglecting to bring the said runaways, & if no persons shall receive payment for the taking up any slave or slaves until he give an account of his own name and place of abode with the place & time when & where the said runaway was taken up with the account of the mark & sex, which account of all such slave or slaves coming into the custody of the marshall he shall cause to be fairly written or fixed upon the public place in the jail, upon the penalty of [six] pounds, & ye said marshall or jailer shall enter the said action in a book, and also take receipt from the person to whom he delivered any runaway [fol. 275r] slave, & in case the marshall or jailer refuse to make payment for the taking of any runaway slave, & thereof oath be made before any justice of the peace the said justice is hereby authorized to direct his warrant to any constable to cause the value thereof to be immediately levied upon the goods of the said jailer, & the goods to be sold by public outcry & satisfaction to be made to the party grieved returning any surplus to the said marshall or jailer.

And be it further enacted that it shall and may be lawful for the marshall or jailer to detain & keep in custody the body of all such runaways until the owners of them or their assigns shall pay unto him the full sum of what he so paid for them with one shilling in the pound for laying out the money & so proportionally for a greater or lesser sum & also one real for every 24 hours the said slave hath been in his custody, & if the marshall or jailer shall willingly or negligently suffer any slave or slaves to be let out of his custody before he be duly delivered to the owner or his assigns, then the marshall or jailer shall forfeit to the owners ten pounds & full value of the said slave to be recorded by due course of law, for every slave or slaves escaping employed or being out of his custody as aforesaid.

And be it further enacted that every Indian or slave which shall take up any runaway slave as aforesaid & the same shall to his master, shall have twenty shillings given him by the owner of the said slave.

And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that no person whatsoever except the marshall or jailer shall keep any runaway slave or slaves above the aforesaid four days nor shall the marshall or jailer or any other person whatsoever employ any of them or suffer him or them in their custody to want sufficient food and water, on penalty of five pounds for every such offence, and if any person shall suffer any slave to die in their custody for want of food & water or dry and convenient lodging the marshall, jailer or any other person in whose custody the slave was, shall pay the owner forty pounds to be recovered by an action of debt in any court of record within this province.

And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that if any slave or slaves shall assault or beat any white person he shall for the first offence be severely whipped or caused to be whipped by the constable, who is hereby required to do the same, under penalty of forty shillings by order of any justice of the peace, and for the second offence by like order shall be severely whipped his, her, or their nose slit & faces burnt in some place by the constable & for a third offence, be left to two justices and three freeholders as is before appointed to inflict any other punishment and make such satisfaction to the assaulted, according to their discretion.

And it is also enacted by the authority aforesaid that if any Negroes or slave shall assault or beat any white person by which the said white person is maimed or disabled, in such case the said slave shall be punished as in the third offense of assaulting is provided, & if the said slave shall suffer death so much of twenty pounds to be paid by the country shall be paid to the white person so maimed & disabled by the slave as aforesaid as two justices of [fol. 275v] the peace and three freeholders shall order & direct, provided and it is hereby intended that such assault & beating was not in lawful defense of their owners' persons.

And be it further enacted that every captain or commander of a company within this province shall be and is hereby empowered on notice to him giving of the name, residence or hiding place of any runaway slaves to raise a convenient party of men not exceeding twenty (without special order from governor or Lieut. General) and with them to pursue, apprehend & take the runaway slaves either alive or dead & whatsoever officer shall neglect his or their duty therein shall forfeit the sum of twenty pounds.

And it is further enacted by the authority aforesaid that in case any person or persons whatsoever shall happen to be maimed or wounded or disabled either in pursuit, attacking, taking any runaway Negroes or slaves, that then it shall & may be lawful after the said persons making it appear by his own oath or otherwise to two justices of the peace & three freeholders for them to adjudge & determine what shall be allowed to the person or persons so disabled and by virtue of a warrant under their hands & seal directed to the public receiver order such sum or sums of money as they shall direct for the said person or persons' relief & the public receiver is hereby required to pay the same accordingly.

And it is further enacted by the authority aforesaid that the marshall or jailer shall give an account in writing at every session within this province as often as the same shall be held of what slaves he hath in prison with the marks, names & sex and the time they have been in custody, and as near as he can learn how long each hath been from his respective owner on penalty of fifty pounds for every default.

And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that if any person shall find any Negro or slave stealing (the said slave making resistance & refusing to submit himself) it shall & may be lawful for such person to kill the said Negro or slave, & he shall not be liable to any damage or action for the same, any late custom or usage to the contrary notwithstanding.

And it is further enacted by the authority aforesaid that no master, mistress, overseer, or manager of any plantation or owner of any slave or slaves in this part of this province shall after the ratification of this act give or allow any Saturday in the afternoon to any slave as hath been accustomed formerly but shall employ them as at other times on the penalty of ten shillings for every slave not employed on Saturday as at other times.

And for the better encouragement of all owners of slaves to put in execution of all the penal clauses in this act contained,

It is hereby enacted that every slave which by virtue of this act shall be adjudged to death, & every slave, according to the tenor of this act that shall be gelded & punished thereof die, shall be paid to the owner out of the public treasury any sum not exceeding fifty pounds for each slave, the owner whereof having first made it appear to two justices of the peace & three freeholders this slave died as aforesaid and that not for want of care, then said [fol. 276r] justices and freeholders shall send their order to the public receiver to pay the sum not exceeding fifty pounds to the owner which order shall a full & sufficient warrant & discharge to the public receiver for so much.

And be it further enacted that if any free man or servant shall persuade or seduce any slave or slaves out of their owner's plantation with intention to run away with them out of this government such freeman or servant so taken in the fact & lawfully convicted thereof shall be deemed a felon & suffer accordingly.

And whereas several owners of slaves have used to suffer their said slaves to do what and go whither they list, & to work where they please upon condition that the said slaves do bring their aforesaid masters so much money as between said masters & slaves is agreed upon, for every day the said slave shall be so permitted to employ himself, which practice hath been observed to occasion such slaves to spend the time aforesaid in looking for opportunity to steal & stealing goods to raise money to pay their masters as well as to maintain themselves & other slaves their companions in drunkenness and other more mischievous devices & consultations.

For the prevention thereof

Be it enacted by the authority aforesaid that no owner or chief of any family shall from & after ratification hereof directly or indirectly suffer or permit any slave to do what go whither & work where they please upon condition aforesaid or for any other thing, reason or consideration whatsoever under the penalty and forfeiture of ten shillings for every day he, she, or they shall suffer any slave to as aforesaid.

And whereas great number of slaves which do not dwell in Charlestown do on Sundays resort thither to drink, quarrel, curse, swear & profane the Sabbath, besides the contriving of other dangerous plots & designs which may in time tend to the harm of the inhabitants of this colony as well as it is already a scandal to the religion we profess.

For the prevention whereof

Be it enacted that all & every of the constables of Charlestown shall separately on every Sunday after the ratification of this act, together with so many men as they shall think necessary to accompany them, which they are hereby empowered for that end to press, & every man so pressed, is hereby under the penalty of twenty shillings, commanded to obey, to go through all the streets & round Charlestown & as much further up the neck as they shall be informed or have reason to suspect any meeting or conceive of any such Negro is at that time, & to enter into any houses at Charlestown or elsewhere to search for such slaves, & as many of them, as they can apprehend shall cause to be publicly and severely whipped in Charlestown, & then deliver to the marshall & the marshall for every slave that shall be so whipped and delivered to him shall pay the respective constables which deliver any slave as aforesaid to him, five shillings, which five shillings shall be repaid to the said marshall by the owner or head of that family to which the said Negro or slave doth belong, together with such other charges as shall become due to him for keeping runaway slaves, & the marshall shall in every respect [fol. 276v] keep & dispose of such slaves, as if the same was delivered as a runaway under the penalty of forfeiture as in that case provided, & every constable of Charlestown who shall neglect or refuse to make search as aforesaid shall for every neglect forfeit the sum of forty shillings.

And be it further enacted that no owner or head of any family shall give a ticket to any slave to go to Charlestown or from plantation to plantation on Sunday except it be for & about such particular business as cannot reasonably be delayed to another time, under the forfeiture of ten shillings, & in every ticket in that case given shall be mentioned the particular business that slave is sent about, or that slave shall be dealt as if he had no ticket.

And be it further enacted that no person whatsoever after the ratification of this act shall settle or manage any plantation, cow pen or stock house without one or more white men living or residing thereupon upon the forfeiture of fifty shillings for each month so offending.

And it be further enacted by the authority aforesaid that all penalties mentioned in this act, & not declared where they shall be recovered or disposed of nor exceeding forty shillings be recovered by warrant from any justice of the peace, & all penalties exceeding forty shillings shall be recovered by action of debt in the Court of Please in this province, one moiety or half part of all such forfeitures shall be to the public use of this province & the other moiety or half part shall be to the informer, or he that shall sue for the same.

And it is further enacted by the authority aforesaid that this act be read and published by the clerk of the Court of Please at the next court of pleas after the ratification of this act as also by the Clerk of the Crown at the next session and also at the head of every company by each respective Captain or commander of his respective company at his first muster after the ratification of the act or penalty of five pounds for each default.

And it is further enacted by the authority aforesaid that every Negro or slave that shall be killed or suffer death in pursuance of the directions of authority of this act, & no provision thereof being made to satisfy the owner of the same shall be paid for out of the public treasury not exceeding twenty pounds proof thereof being made before any two justices and three freeholders who are hereby required to judge the same, & their order to the public receiver shall be his discharge.

Be it therefore enacted by the authority aforesaid that it shall & is hereby declared lawful for any slave or slaves to receive the Christian faith & be thereunto baptized, notwithstanding that slave or slaves shall thereby be exempt of the civil dominion his master or owner had over him, but shall be in all other things in the same estate & condition he was before, provided always, & it is hereby enacted that any master or owner of any slave which shall be convicted of murder by two justices of the peace & three freeholders & condemned & executed for the same as by this act is appointed [fol. 277r] shall be paid for his said slave out of the public treasury, and that the confessions of any slave or Negro or the evidence of any slave if the same be circumstanced as the justices and freeholders have no just reason to suspect the truth thereof of which they are hereby made judges, shall be taken & allowed for as good evidence for any crime, matter or thing whatsoever as if the same had been proved by a Christian witness, any thing in this act contained notwithstanding.

And be it further enacted that every two justices of the peace which shall try as aforesaid any slave against whom they shall give judgment & see execution done thereupon either for life or member, or which shall cause execution to be done for any sum of damages (or restitution or satisfaction for stolen goods) against the owners of any slave, shall fairly write such judgment, execution & other proceedings thereon & thereto put their names, & the same for life or member into the Crown office shall return, & there to be filed gratis & for damages, restitution & satisfaction for stolen goods to the Clerk of the Court of Pleas & there to be kept as records of the respective Courts & every person which shall hereafter be arrested, impleaded, sued or molested for or by reason of any matter or thing done by power & direction of this act may plead the general issue & give this act in evidence.

Whereas a Negro man named Dick slave of Mrs. Martha Jones being now in custody of the law for killing a Negro woman slave of the said Jones's when the late act for the better ordering of slaves was expired

Be it therefore enacted by authority aforesaid that the Negro man shall be tried impleaded & prosecuted & if found guilty thereof condemned & executed thereon in such manner & form as in like part is in this act ordained & appointed, & if the said slave shall be found guilty & executed for the same, she the said Jones shall be allowed so much money to be paid out of the public treasury in manner & form as in such cases in this act is made & provided.

And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that all fines & forfeitures that shall accrue or become due by this act shall be prosecuted and impleaded within twelve months after such forfeitures are committed otherwise to be & remain as if they had never been made, anything in this act contained to the contrary notwithstanding.

And be it further enacted that this act & everything therein contained do continue in force the full term & time of seven years from & after the ratification hereof & no longer.

Read three times & ratified in open Assembly 28 August 1701

James Moore
Joseph Morton
Edmund Bellinger
Robert Daniel
Robert Gibbes

L. H. Roper is an associate professor in history at the State University of New York, New Paltz. He would like to thank Chuck Lesser for guidance on what had become a twisted chronology of South Carolina's early slavery laws and for his comments on a draft of this essay. Thanks also to Evan Haefeli, Jaap Jacobs, Don Roper, Bertrand Van Ruymbeke, Mary Young, and the anonymous readers for the William and Mary Quarterly for their encouragement and advice. Thanks to staff at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, and at the South Carolina Department of Archives and History for assistance in obtaining documents.

Notes

¹ A manuscript of the 1701 legislation has been discovered: "An Act for the better ordering of Slaves" (1701), in Rawlinson MSS C155, fols. 273r–77r, Bodleian Library, Oxford, Eng.; a transcription is reprinted on pages 408–18. The text of the 1701 legislation had disappeared by the time Thomas Cooper and David J. McCord compiled The Statutes at Large of South Carolina (see the editorial note for "An Act for the Better Ordering of Slaves" [1701], in Cooper, ed., Acts from 1682 to 1716, Inclusive, vol. 2, The Statutes at Large of South Carolina [Columbia, S.C., 1837], 182). Following the enactment of the first slave-ordering statute on Feb. 7, 1691, the South Carolina legislature employed comprehensive overhauls, slight revisions, and simple renewal of existing laws when it considered the issue of slave ordering in the early history of the colony. It revamped legislation at times of particularly fierce politics. The 1691 law was slightly revised on Sept. 11, 1693, and then renewed on July 16, 1695 ("An Act for the better ordering of Slaves" [1691, but mistakenly dated 1690], in McCord, ed., Acts Relating to Charleston, Courts, Slaves, and Rivers, vol. 7, The Statutes at Large of South Carolina [Columbia, S.C., 1840], 343–47; "An Act for the Better Ordering of Slaves" [1693], in Cooper, Statutes at Large, 2: 78; "An Act to Revive the several Acts within mentioned" [1695], ibid., 2: 96). In 1696 an entirely new act superseded the one originally passed in 1691 ("An Act for the Better Ordering of Slaves" [Mar. 16, 1696], in South Carolina General Assembly, Acts, Bills, and Joint Resolutions, 1691–2000, S 165001, vol. 1695/1696, Governor Archdale's Laws, 60–66, South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia). This legislation remained in effect, including a renewal on Oct. 8, 1698, for two years before its replacement by the 1701 statute, which was expressly repealed by its successor of June 7, 1712 ("An Act for the Better Ordering of Slaves" [1698], in Cooper, Statutes at Large, 2: 156; "An Act for the better ordering and governing of Negroes and Slaves" [1712], in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 365). All dates from the sources are rendered in Old Style with the year beginning January 1.

² "An Account of the Province of Carolina, by Samuel Wilson, 1682," in Alexander S. Salley Jr., ed., Narratives of Early Carolina, 1650–1708 (1911; repr. New York, 1967), 164–76, esp. 172; Governor and Council to Board of Trade, Dec. 7, 1709, in Colonial Office Series 5/1292, 84, National Archives, Kew, Eng.

³ Lords Proprietors of Carolina to Andrew Percival, Oct. 18, 1690, in J. W. Fortescue et al., eds., Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series: America and West Indies (London, 1901), 13: 331 (item no. 1,117); Lords Proprietors to Grand Council and Parliament, May 13, 1691, in CO 5/288, 180. For the history of the political struggles, including the related settler recruitment difficulties, see L. H. Roper, Conceiving Carolina: Proprietors, Planters, and Plots, 1662–1729 (New York, 2004). For the early connections between South Carolina and Barbados, which other historians have exaggerated, see Kinloch Bull, "Barbadian Settlers in Early Carolina: Historiographical Notes," South Carolina Historical Magazine 96, no. 4 (October 1995): 329–39. For the Indian slave trade, see Alan Gallay, The Indian Slave Trade: The Rise of the English Empire in the American South, 1670–1717 (New Haven, Conn., 2002).

⁴ Seth Sothell had become a proprietor through his purchase of the share originally held by Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon. He was a prominent London merchant who was captured and enslaved in 1680 by Algerian pirates en route to serve as governor of North Carolina. See CO 5/286, 146; W. L. Grant and James Munro, eds., Acts of the Privy Council of England, Colonial Series (Hereford, Eng., 1910), 2: 3–5. For Sothell's disgrace and Ludwell's resignation, see Lords Proprietors to Landgrave Thomas Smith, Apr. 24, 1694, in CO 5/288, 24; Lords Proprietors to Paul Grimball, Apr. 12, 1695, ibid., 25.

⁵ John Archdale not only oversaw the enactment of a series of laws, including the 1696 slave management statute now housed in the South Carolina Department of Archives and History, but also succeeded in collecting the quitrents due to the proprietors, the payment of which the Goose Creek men had made a thorny issue for almost fifteen years. See "Ledger of quit rents collected by J. Archdale in Carolina" (1696?), CO 5/288 (loose sheets folded in back of entry book).

⁶ The Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina created a hereditary aristocracy with holders of the titles of landgrave and cassique envisioned by proprietors as the governing bulwark of their colony. These nobles received, respectively, four and two baronies of twelve thousand acres of land and certain privileges in the parliament the Fundamental Constitutions also created. Though the constitutions remained in abeyance during the colony's early years and the colonists subsequently declined to ratify them, the proprietors continued to create landgraves and cassiques into the 1720s (Roper, Conceiving Carolina, 29–40).

⁷ Ibid., 117–31.

⁸ 1696 act, in South Carolina General Assembly, Acts, Bills, and Joint Resolutions, 1691–2000, S 165001, vol. 1695/1696, Governor Archdale's Laws, 60 (quotation). The wording in the 1701 statute was slightly different: "preserve the mischief which as the number of slaves shall increase so much liberty may occasion" (1701 act, in Rawlinson MSS C155, fol. 273r). A reported population of 9,580 in 1708 had an ethnic composition of 42.8 percent African, 42.6 percent European, and 14.6 percent Indian (Robert V. Wells, The Population of the British Colonies in America before 1776: A Survey of Census Data [Princeton, N.J., 1975], 167). For examples of complaints about destructive factional behavior, see, on one side, An Account of the Fair and Impartial Proceedings of the Lords Proprietors, Governour and Council of the Colony of South Carolina, in Answer to the Untrue Suggestions, contained in the Petition of Jos. Boon and others, and of a Paper Intituled, The Case of the Church of England in Carolina ([London, 1706]); on the other side, [Daniel Defoe], The Case of Protestant Dissenters in Carolina, Shewing How a Law to prevent Occasional Conformity There, has ended in the Total Subversion of the Constitution in Church and State. Recommended to the serious Consideration of all that are true Friends to our present Establishment (London, 1706); John Ash, "The Present State of Affairs in Carolina, by John Ash, 1706," in Salley, Narratives of Early Carolina, 269–76; John Archdale, "A New Description of that Fertile and Pleasant Province of Carolina, by John Archdale, 1707," ibid., 282–311.

⁹ 1712 act, in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 352–65. For the 1714 statute, see "An additional Act to an Act entitled 'An Act for the better Ordering and Governing Negroes and all other Slaves'" (Dec. 18, 1714), ibid., 7: 365–68. For the 1717 version, see "A further additional Act to an Act entitled An Act for the better ordering and governing of Negroes and all other slaves; and to an additional Act to an Act entitled An Act for the better ordering and governing of Negroes and all other Slaves" (Dec. 11, 1717), ibid., 7: 368–70. For the 1722 law that remained in effect until 1735, see "An Act for the better Ordering and Governing of Negroes and other Slaves" (Feb. 23, 1722), ibid., 7: 371–84. Though the rebellion of 1719 signaled the de facto end of the proprietary government, the Crown did not confirm its takeover of the colony until 1729 (Roper, Conceiving Carolina, 143–57).

¹⁰ There is no extant record of any vote or debate that the Commons House of Assembly may have conducted on the 1701 statute. A. S. Salley Jr. only records the three readings of the bill before it became law (Salley, ed., Journal of the Commons House of Assembly of South Carolina for the Session Beginning August 13, 1701 and Ending August 28, 1701 [Columbia, S.C., 1926], 11, 13, 15, 20).

¹¹ 1701 act, in Rawlinson MSS C155, fol. 273r, repeating sec. 1 of the 1696 act, in South Carolina General Assembly, Acts, Bills, and Joint Resolutions, 1691–2000, S 165001, vol. 1695/1696, Governor Archdale's Laws, 60 (quotation). With slight alterations the 1712 law retained this language (1712 act, in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 352).

¹² Branding and gelding were adopted in 1696 (1696 act, in South Carolina General Assembly, Acts, Bills, and Joint Resolutions, 1691–2000, S 165001, vol. 1695/1696, Governor Archdale's Laws, 62–63). For the twenty-shilling reward to "Indian and slave" collaborators, ibid., 64; 1701 act, in Rawlinson MSS C155, fol. 275r (where the wording is slightly different). For the twenty-pound compensation awarded to owners, see 1696 act, in South Carolina General Assembly, Acts, Bills, and Joint Resolutions, 1691–2000, S 165001, vol. 1695/1696, Governor Archdale's Laws, 62, 65.

¹³ 1701 act, in Rawlinson MSS C155, fols. 273r, 274r, 275r–276r.

¹⁴ Ibid., fol. 276r–v.

¹⁵ Ibid., fol. 274v.

¹⁶ Ibid., fol. 276r–v. The 1712 act uses slightly different language (1712 act, in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 354).

¹⁷ Leading South Carolinians proclaimed their Englishness and their sensitivity to perceived encroachments on it repeatedly, as the pamphlets cited in footnote 8 demonstrate.

¹⁸ 1701 act, in Rawlinson MSS C155, fols. 273r–v, 276v–277r. The 1712 act eliminated the ambiguity concerning the admissibility of slave evidence, including confessions to murder and rebellion, by clearly limiting it to cases brought against slaves. Curiously, though, the statute styled these suspects as "accused person[s]." Sec. 13 of that law further required that credible slave testimony come from at least two such witnesses (1712 act, in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 356–57). Under the 1696 law, justices of the peace had the responsibility for issuing warrants and hearing evidence in slave cases, and "three discreet and sufficient freeholders" had the authority to hear cases, determine guilt, and levy sentences (1696 act, in South Carolina General Assembly, Acts, Bills, and Joint Resolutions, 1691–2000, S 165001, vol. 1695/1696, Governor Archdale's Laws, 60–61).

¹⁹ 1701 act, in Rawlinson MSS C155, fol. 276v ("any slave or slaves"). For opposition to missionary activity to both Africans and Indians and the observation made by the enslaved scholar, see Frank J. Klingberg, ed., The Carolina Chronicle of Dr. Francis Le Jau, 1706–1717 (Berkeley, Calif., 1956), 68–70 ("best Scholar," 70). For the 1691 provision, see 1691 act, in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 343. For the 1712 version, see 1712 act, ibid., 7: 364–65. Sec. 107 of the first version of the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina, devised in 1669 by the Lords Proprietors of Carolina and their secretary, John Locke, allowed for slave baptism, but the colonists seem to have ignored this antecedent (John Locke, Political Writings, ed. David Wootton [New York, 1993], 230). The first S.P.G. missionary to South Carolina, Rev. Samuel Thomas, was appointed on July 3, 1702, arrived in the colony in December, and soon took up residence with Governor (and Goose Creek) planter Nathaniel Johnson, whom he found friendly to the established church (Gallay, Indian Slave Trade, 226–31). Moore seems to have had a more ambivalent attitude: the story that he was present when a bear was produced for a drunken clergyman to christen in a Charles Town tavern continued to circulate in 1706, twenty years after the alleged incident (A. S. Salley, ed., "A Letter by the Second Landgrave Smith," South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine 32, no. 1 [January 1931]: 61–63).

²⁰ Roper, Conceiving Carolina, 133–43.

²¹ 1712 act, in McCord, Statutes at Large, 7: 354.

²² Ibid., 7: 352.

²³ Ibid., 7: 352–60. For the fifty-pound cap on the valuation of executed slaves, see 1714 act, ibid., 7: 366.

²⁴ The works cited in footnote 8 are representative of these complaints.

²⁵ Paragraphs have been indented and a few interpolations where the manuscript had faded are indicated in brackets. Manuscript folios appear in brackets.

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