Enslaved labor on United States military installations was a common sight in the first half of the 19th century, for agencies and departments of the federal government were deeply involved in the use of enslaved blacks.Starobin, Robert S. Industrial Slavery in the Old South Oxford University Press: New York, 1975, pp. 32–33. In fact, the United States military was the largest federal employer of rented or leased slaves throughout the antebellum period.Dibble, Ernest F. Slave Rentals to the Military: Pensacola and the Gulf Coast Civil War History Volume 23, Number 2, June 1977 pp. 101–113Ericson, David F. Slavery in the American Republic Developing the Federal Government, 1791-1861 (University of Kansas:Lawrence Kansas 2011), p. 135. In 1816, a visitor to the Washington Navy Yard wrote that master blacksmith, Benjamin King, estimated daily expense for a slave as twenty-seven cents and noted how lucrative the business had become. According to King, Navy was paying eighty cents per day for black workers while white blacksmiths were paid $1.81 per diem.Warden, D. B. A Chorographical and Statistical Description of the District of Columbia, the Seat of the Government of the United States. Paris: Smith and Co., 1816, pp. 46 and 64 Further south on April 27, 1830 at Gosport (Norfolk) Navy Yard, civil engineer Loammni Baldwin, transmitted a detailed report showing the "great economy of employing slaves" on the new dry dock. Baldwin by comparing the average cost of free white, stone masons with enslaved black hammers, lauded the saving gained by having blacks perform the work at 72 cents per day in comparison to white stone mason's paid 2.00 per day.Tomlins, Christopher, In the Matter of Nat Turner A Speculative History, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2020) pp. 157-158 An English visitor and author, Lady Emmeline Stuart-Wortley, writing in the late 1840s, noted the prevalence of slave labor at the Washington Navy Yard: "We saw a sadder sight after that, a large number of slaves, who seemed to be forging their own chains, but they were making chains, anchors, &c., for the United States Navy."Wortley, Emmeline Stuart, Travels in the United States, etc., during 1849 and 1850 New York: Harper and Brothers, 1851, p. 85.
George Teamoh (1818 to after 1887), a former enslaved laborer, ship caulker and carpenter toiled at the Norfolk Navy Yard and Fort Monroe in the 1830s and 1840s.Gottlieb, M. S., & the Dictionary of Virginia Biography. George Teamoh (1818 – after 1887). (2015, November 30). In Encyclopedia Virginia https://www.EncyclopediaVirginia.org/Teamoh_George_1818-after_1887.
Teamoh later wrote of his years of unrequited labor at federal shipyards and forts: "The government has patronized, and given encouragement to Slavery to a greater extent than the great majority of the country has been aware. It had in its service hundreds if not thousands of slaves employed on government works."Teamoth, George God Made Man Man Made the Slave The Autobiography of George Teamoh editors F. N. Boney, Richard L. Hume and Rafia Zafar Mercer University Press: Macon 1990, p. 83
Today, the history of the United States government's rental of slaves on federal installations still attracts "less scholastic analysis than other aspects of slavery."Hulse, Thomas, "Military Slave Rentals, the Construction of Army Fortifications, and the Navy Yard in Pensacola, Florida, 1824–1863," Florida Historical Quarterly, 88 (Spring 2010), 497–539, p. 499. Indeed, historians have primarily focused their research on the labor and intensive plantation economy of the South.Hulse, Thomas, "Military Slave Rentals, the Construction of Army Fortifications, and the Navy Yard in Pensacola, Florida, 1824–1863," Florida Historical Quarterly, 88 (Spring 2010), 497–539. In the formative years of the nineteenth century however, the federal use of enslaved labor was often the subject of public attention, discussion and commentary, with both slaveholders and critics voicing strong opinions. Recent scholarship has confirmed that blacks, both enslaved and free, comprised a significant and vital source of labor for military, installations.Sharp, John G., African Americans in Slavery and Freedom on the Washington Navy Yard 1799 - 1865 Hannah Morgan Press: Concord, 2011, p. 6., http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/portsmouth/shipyard/sharptoc/wny2.htmlSmith, Mark A. Engineering Slavery The U.S.Army Corps of Engineers and Slavery at Key West Florida Historical Quarterly, 88 (Spring 2008),497–539.Hulse, Thomas, "Military Slave Rentals, the Construction of Army Fortifications, and the Navy Yard in Pensacola, Florida, 1824–1863," Florida Historical Quarterly, 88 (Spring 2010), 497–539Clavin, Matthew J. Aiming for Pensacola Fugitive Slaves on the Atlantic and Southern Frontiers Harvard University Press:Cambridge 2015,
Early federal use of slave labor
Federal employment practices mirrored society, most especially in the slave holding Southern states and territories.Ericson, David F. Slavery in the American Republic Developing the Federal Government, 1791-1861 University of Kansas: Lawrence Kansas 2011,136. The patterns for the federal use of enslaved labor were set early. The prevalence of slavery in the new federal city of Washington, where in 1800, nearly forty percent of white householders were slaveholders, was remarked on by many early visitors such as Massachusetts Congressman Thomas Dwight. Dwight writing in 1803 complained, there was "no one thing of which the people universally in this part of the Country are so fond of as owing slaves." He marveled that even the poor, invested in slaves, but noted, they recouped their money by "hiring out".Adam Costanzo George Washington's Washington Visions for the National Capital in the Early Republic (University of Georgia Press: Athens Ga. 2018), pp. 55–56. In the new District of Columbia, hiring out was a tradition older than the city, beginning in 1792, the District of Columbia Board of Commissioners, charged with overseeing the construction of the first public buildings, began hiring construction workers; they also quickly made the decision to hire enslaved laborers.Thomas Johnson, David Stuart, and Daniel Carroll, Commissioners to Thomas Jefferson, 5 January 1793 Commissioners Letter book Vol. I, 1791--1793, NARA On average, the Commissioners hired 50 to 100 slaves each year.Allen William C. History of Slave Laborers in the Construction of the United States Capitol, U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, 2005 The Commissioners, composed solely of slaveholders, conceived of enslaved labor as "a very useful check & kept our Affairs Cool"; a useful check, that is, on the wage demands of free laborers.Allen, William C. p.5 In the 1790s, District owners were paid $60 to $70 a year for the rental of their bondsmen, the same wage paid unskilled white laborers. The Commissioners' decision to hire blacks caused no public comment in 1792, for enslaved labor was a legally recognized and sanctioned institution.Arnebeck, Bob Use of Slaves to Build and Capitol and White House 1791-1801, chapter three, accessed Oct 31, 2017 http://bobarnebeck.com/slavespt4.html. This pattern continued with the establishment of new federal naval shipyards such as the Washington Navy Yard in 1799, Norfolk Navy Yard in 1801 and Pensacola Navy Yard in 1826.As construction of the White House slowed, prominent slaveholders like James Clagett, George Clark, Samuel N. Smallwood and William B. Magruder began to supply their enslaved craftsman and laborers to the Washington Navy Yard.Arnebeck, Bob, Slave Labor in the Capital: Building Washington's Iconic Federal Landmarks, (Charleston, South Carolina: The History Press, 2014), p. 32.Sharp, John G. African Americans, Enslaved & Free, at Washington Navy Yard http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/portsmouth/shipyard/sharptoc/wny2.html Similar utilization of enslaved labor has also been discerned in United States Army installations such as Fort Zachary Taylor 1845 and Fort Jefferson 1846.Smith, Mark A. Engineering Slavery The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Slavery at Key WestFlorida Historical Quarterly, 88 (Spring 2008), 497–539, pp. 514–515Clavin, Matthew J. Aiming for Pensacola Fugitive Slaves on the Atlantic and Southern Frontiers Harvard University Press:Cambridge 2015.
Nature of the documents Demographic data for civilian employment in military installations situated in the middle and southern states is often incomplete, confusing and difficult to locate. In addition, the federal government did not with rare exceptions own slave's, they instead, leased or hired bondsmen from local slaveholders. Consequently, as one distinguished historian of slavery has cautioned slave "hiring practices were not based upon open contractual negotiations but unwritten gentleman's agreements which have only been discovered by searching for those little incidents or small moments where explanation in writing was demanded."Dibble, Ernest E. Antebellum Pensacola and the Military Presence Pensacola News Journal: Pensacola 1974, p. 62. Searching for enslaved and free blacks, in federal military and civilian personnel data can be daunting.John G. Sharp Researchers and Family Historians Guide to Documents Reflecting African Americans in Slavery and Freedom in the District of Columbia 2010. Accessed 30 November 2017 https://genealogytrails.com/washdc/slavery/slaveryintro.html