Andrew J. Orr and Dickinson W. Orr, typically advertising as A. J. & D. W. Orr, were brothers, merchants, planters, railroad contractors, and slave traders based in Macon, Georgia, United States. The Orrs were originally from the Charlotte, North Carolina area, but moved to central Georgia early in their lives and remained there, first working as local merchants and then transitioning into the interstate slave trade, buying in the Carolinas and Richmond, Virginia, and selling to planters in the vicinity of Macon and Augusta, Georgia. They then became railroad contractors as well, using groups of enslaved men to build three separate Georgia railroad lines. A. J. Orr was beaten to death by a slave in 1855. D. W. Orr continued working as a railroad contractor until at least 1863. He died in 1867.
Early lives and careers The Orr brothers were natives of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, which has Charlotte as its county seat. A. J. Orr was born about 1815, and D. W. Orr was born in 1819. D. W. Orr came to Georgia "when he was quite young" and made it his home for the rest of his life. During the 1844 U.S. presidential election, the Orr brothers opposed the candidacy of Henry Clay. By 1843, when they were in their 20s, the Orrs were partners in a retail shop at the corner of Cotton Avenue and Cherry Street in Macon, Georgia, from which they sold hardware, dry goods, clothing, accessories, and shoes. D. W. Orr also had some kind of business in Columbus, Georgia, where $3,000 worth of property was destroyed in October 1846 in a fire that leveled almost six square blocks.
In 1846, D. W. Orr wrote a letter to South Carolina planter and slave trader John Springs III:
In 1847 D. W. Orr purchased a 31-year-old enslaved preacher named Ralph R. Watson, who was originally from Louisa County, Virginia. According to Watson's biography, "He labored in Virginia till 1847, when he was sold for debt. He was bought by Mr. D. W. Orr, who carried him to Macon, Georgia." D. W. Orr was a registered guest of the Powhatan House hotel in Richmond, Virginia on February 19 and 20, 1847. In the summer of 1847, the brothers Orr decided they were done with retailing dry goods and clothing, and announcing they were selling their inventory "at cost" in order to get out of the business hastily. The following January, they wrote Springs that the reason for the sale was "to enable us to give our exclusive attention to the Negro trade, and we have sold this winter about sixty Negroes." Springs continued funding the Orrs' trading ventures until at least 1849. In May 1848, D. W. Orr placed a runaway slave ad in the Augusta Daily Constitutionalist that indicated the Orrs had been buying in Richmond, and had ties to Augusta, Georgia and the Hamburg, South Carolina slave market immediately across the Savannah River, which was used until 1856 as a means to circumvent Georgia's anti-slave trading law.
In 1850, D. W. Orr was a resident of Richmond, Virginia, where he shared a household with fellow slave trader Silas Omohundro. Their nearest neighbor was slave trader Hector Davis. Davis (and presumably Omohundro and Orr) "occupied buildings in the city's Shockoe Creek area north of East Franklin Street near Fifteenth Street."
A. J. Orr was one of three residents of Macon at the time of the 1850 U.S. federal census who listed their occupation as "negro trader," along with Robert Beasley and Joseph Cooper. Orr reported that he owned $4,000 in property. Orr seemingly ran a "negro house" on Cotton Avenue in Macon circa 1849–1850, and frequently advertised specific people he had for sale, including a "valuable blacksmith," a "superior tanner and currier," and a "number-one Meat, Bread, and Pastry Cook, she can make Pickles, Preserves, &c." One individual sold during this time was nine-year-old Fanny, sold to Travis Huff, a landowner in the vicinity of Macon, for $400 on April 13, 1850; a later dispute over Fanny's "soundness" as a slave would result in lawsuit that went to the Georgia Supreme Court. On the day of the census, August 13, 1850, A. J. Orr was the legal owner of 17 people, the oldest being a 33-year-old man, the youngest being a one-year-old baby girl. By September 1850, however, the Orrs had left that location and another firm was advertising "100 Negroes for Sale" at the "old stand of Messrs. A. J. & D. W. Orr." The following year, the Orrs were again advertising that they had a "negro mart" at a store in Macon, specifically "the building next to Messrs. Field & Adam's Fire-Proof Warehouse, where can be found at all times a choice lot of likely young Negroes for sale."
As property-owning white males, the Orrs were legally permitted to participate in democratic processes in Georgia, such as in 1852 when D. W. Orr served on the Bibb County grand jury. The same year, the Orrs sued Bibb County for the cash value of 26 "certificates or orders, drawn by the Clerks of the Superior and Inferior Courts of Bibb County, on the Treasurer thereof, in favor of various Jurors therein named, and payable to the Juror or bearer, and amounting in the aggregate to the sum of $264.92." D. W. Orr served on the Bibb County grand jury again in 1855.
D. W. Orr married Lizzie Slappy, daughter of Uriah Slappy, on February 19, 1852. For a period ending August 1, 1854, the South-Western Railroad Company paid $2,489.03 to A. J. & D. W. Orr. Another one of the railroad contractors paid that year was a Reuben H. Slappy.
Sally of Richmond, Virginia In April 1853, D. W. Orr was apparently buying people in Richmond, as the newspaper mentioned him in a police docket item about the legal status of a woman named Sally. A report in the Richmond Dispatch stated, "Sally, an aged free negress, slave to Mrs John Wade, was arrested for going at large without a pass, on Sunday evening last. Mr. Hill stated that he sold the woman to D. W. Orr for $35 without warranty of soundness of mind, on the 20th instant. Since then, Mr O. believing that Sally was insane, refused to keep her or to pay the $35, and she has been wandering to and fro in our streets until arrested by the police." Sally was put in a jail until her legal owner could be identified and held responsible for her. The following day the Dispatch reiterated the facts to that time and reported, "Captain Wilkinson stated, that on two several occasions the watch found Sally sitting on the side walk and took her to the cage." Orr was ordered to pay $100 bail guaranteeing his future appearance in the court on the matter.
Killing of A. J. Orr On July 25, 1855, A. J. Orr was brutally murdered, apparently by a recaptured escaped slave, while Orr was working as a "railroad contractor" for the Savannah, Albany, and Gulf Railroad. Railroad contractor in this context meant he had "ninety hands (negroes) in his employ." These were likely chain gangs of slaves clearing the right-of-way and laying ties and track, although it's unclear who legally owned the workers. The murder of Orr is poorly documented, with the majority of detail found in Charleston and Savannah newspapers. The Charleston Courier reported on the discovery of Orr's body on August 1, 1855:
The same day the body was reported found, the Savannah Morning News reported "The slave supposed to have murdered his master, Mr. A. J. Orr, was arrested on Monday at Dillon's Bridge, by the keeper of the Toll Gate, John Hart, and Cornelius Connelly, who brought him to the city and lodged him in jail."
The Liberator, abolitionist newspaper of Boston, briefly covered the incident on October 19, 1855. In November 1855, D. W. Orr listed "FOR sale Cheap for Cash, or in exchange for Negroes, the Warehouse and Lot formerly occupied by A. J. Orr for the sale of Negroes."
Orr v. Huff, 27 Ga. 422 (1859)
Shortly before A. J. Orr was killed, a Georgia planter named Travis Huff filed suit against him, seeking $1,000 in damages resulting from the purchase of a nine-year-old named Fanny. The issue before the jury was whether A. J. Orr had knowingly sold Huff a "defective" slave, and whether or not her declining health and eventual death could have been foreseen by the slave dealer who sold Fanny to Huff. In addition to Fanny, according to the court record, Travis Huff later purchased a "negro woman and two children" from A. J. Orr in 1853 or 1854, and did not report an issue with Fanny to Orr until 1854 or 1855.
Huff presented evidence from two doctors who had examined Fanny stating that she presented with "chorea, or St. Vitus dance," had epileptic seizures seven to eight times a day, microcephaly, was minimally verbal, "was scarcely able to stand," and had "idiotic expression of countenance" and was "almost entirely senseless." Fanny apparently died at the Huff place in about March or April 1855, at approximately age 14. According to the published case record, Huff's son William Huff testified, "...witness worked with her, and soon discovered that she was very dull, and afterwards that she was of unsound mind; she gradually grew worse as long as witness remained; left home in 1853; thought she was older than described in the bill of sale; never grew much after his father bought her; won't say she was a confirmed idiot when he left his father, but she was worthless; did not comprehend what was said to her; never considered her sound in mind after she was put to work, and had no sufficient opportunity of judging before."
D. W. Orr testified that he was only the administrator of his brother's estate and thus had no personal stake in the outcome, and that he had purchased Fanny in Virginia for his brother to resell in Georgia about four months prior to her sale to Huff and "saw her frequently before the sale. Witness has bought and sold negroes, several hundred; hardly ever made a mistake in the soundness of one..." Orr also testified that he offered a guarantee that he "...after he has examined and purchased a negro, and pronounced him or her sound, would release a seller from his warranty for five dollars; is perfectly satisfied that the girl, Fanny, was sound in mind and body, at the time she was sold to plaintiff." On cross-examination he explained that "was sometimes a partner of A. J. Orr, in the purchase and sale of negroes, both before and after the sale of Fanny to plaintiff, but had no interest whatever in her; sometimes bought on his own account, and sometimes A. J. Orr bought on his account. Bought the girl Fanny, with the funds of A. J. Orr, and was not interested in her purchase; was not then in the trade." The jury found for the plaintiff and awarded him the $400 he paid for Fanny, plus interest from the date of purchase. Orr requested a new trial and appealed when it was denied; no new trial was granted.
D. W. Orr, from 1856 to 1867 Railroad contracts and railroad-shanty runaways In June 1856, Orr advertised heavily for the recapture of two slaves, offering $100 for the return of the pair. His ad read, "Ran away from my Rail Road Shantees, (in Liberty county, Ga.,) on Sunday night, the 11th of May, two negro fellows, Jim and Jack Gill, both black and of medium size, Jim is 24 years old, and was raised by John Nivens, of York District, South Carolina. Jack Gill is about 30 years old, and was purchased by A. J. Orr, at Thomas Massey's sale, in Lancaster District, South Carolina, in December, 1854. I think they will try to make their way back to where they were raised...Address me at Winchester, Macon county, Georgia, or James Hennigan, Pineville, Mecklenburg county, N. C."
In August 1856, there was another escape from Orr's Liberty County "railroad shantees." The fugitive was a 24-year-old black man of medium build named Ephraim who was "raised by Mr. Ship of Lincoln County, and sold to me by W. P. Bynum of said county, last February." Orr surmised that Ephraim was in Charlotte, North Carolina, or near "W. P. Bynum's in Lincoln county, or Wm. Ship's, of Gaston county, as he has relations at all those points."