Slavery: Colonial Era
Note: most of the information concerning the Mudd family and slavery in the following four chapters is derived from The Mudd Family in the United States, by Dr. Richard D. Mudd. This large 2-volume work, compiled over the course of several decades of research, is the most extensive and detailed genealogical reference work on any American family on file at the U.S. Library of Congress.
Slavery has existed throughout recorded history. The urban society of ancient Greece and the pyramids of ancient Egypt were built by slaves. Slaves from Germany, Britain, France, Africa, and other conquered people maintained the Roman Empire. From the eighth century to modern times, millions of black Africans were sold in Islamic slave markets around the Mediterranean. Islamic expansion and conflict with the Christian countries of medieval Europe resulted in the enslavement of captives on both sides of the conflict.
In 1492, the Italian navigator Christopher Columbus was the first European to set foot on Cuba, Jamaica, and other Caribbean Islands. He never saw or set foot in what is now the United States of America, although there is now a U.S. national holiday in his honor. On later voyages, Columbus and the Spanish conquerors who followed him enslaved the islands’ native populations to grow sugar cane, tobacco and other crops for sale in Europe. As the native islanders died off due to harsh working conditions and sickness, the Spaniards began to import large numbers of African slaves to replace them. By the late seventeenth century, the British had displaced the Spanish to become the dominant plantation owners and slave traders in the Caribbean islands.
While the British were displacing the Spanish in the Caribbean, they were also beginning to displace the native Indian population on the American continent. The first permanent colony of English settlers arrived at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. The sister colony of Maryland was established in 1634. Colonists soon learned that tobacco would bring them the greatest income from European markets, so it became their main cash crop. However, tobacco was a labor-intensive crop, and required more workers than the colonists themselves could provide.
For a while, indentured servants from England and other parts of Europe were the answer. Indentured servants were poor young men and women who signed a contract, called an indenture, by which the servant bound himself or herself to a master for a given length of time. In return, the master agreed to pay for the servant’s transportation to the colony, to furnish him or her with adequate food, clothing, and shelter during service, and to give the servant a specified reward when service was completed. In Maryland, freed servants were commonly provided 50 acres of land. The usual period of servitude varied between two and seven years, with the most common being four years.
As the 1600s came to an end, so did the supply of indentured servants. An improving European economy meant that poor men and women no longer had to leave home to seek a better life. To fill the void, slaves were brought up from the plantations of Barbados, Jamaica, and other British Caribbean islands to work in the tobacco fields. As European demand for American tobacco continued to grow, the need for slaves grew, and slaves were brought to the American colonies directly from Africa. The ready availability of land, servants, and slaves, plus the constant demand from Europe for high-quality tobacco, all combined to produce good profits for colonial tobacco growers.
Initially, living and working conditions for the new slaves and existing indentured servants were much the same. They worked the tobacco fields side-by-side. The idea of slave-for-life had not yet fully taken hold. Many slaves served a period of indenture and were then freed, just like European indentured servants. By 1700, however, Maryland tobacco was grown almost exclusively by slave labor, and these slaves were now slaves for life. The Mudd family's use of slaves to plant and harvest tobacco during the two centuries before the Civil War was typical of Southern Maryland farmers during this time.
Slavery has existed throughout recorded history. The urban society of ancient Greece and the pyramids of ancient Egypt were built by slaves. Slaves from Germany, Britain, France, Africa, and other conquered people maintained the Roman Empire. From the eighth century to modern times, millions of black Africans were sold in Islamic slave markets around the Mediterranean. Islamic expansion and conflict with the Christian countries of medieval Europe resulted in the enslavement of captives on both sides of the conflict.
In 1492, the Italian navigator Christopher Columbus was the first European to set foot on Cuba, Jamaica, and other Caribbean Islands. He never saw or set foot in what is now the United States of America, although there is now a U.S. national holiday in his honor. On later voyages, Columbus and the Spanish conquerors who followed him enslaved the islands’ native populations to grow sugar cane, tobacco and other crops for sale in Europe. As the native islanders died off due to harsh working conditions and sickness, the Spaniards began to import large numbers of African slaves to replace them. By the late seventeenth century, the British had displaced the Spanish to become the dominant plantation owners and slave traders in the Caribbean islands.
While the British were displacing the Spanish in the Caribbean, they were also beginning to displace the native Indian population on the American continent. The first permanent colony of English settlers arrived at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. The sister colony of Maryland was established in 1634. Colonists soon learned that tobacco would bring them the greatest income from European markets, so it became their main cash crop. However, tobacco was a labor-intensive crop, and required more workers than the colonists themselves could provide.
For a while, indentured servants from England and other parts of Europe were the answer. Indentured servants were poor young men and women who signed a contract, called an indenture, by which the servant bound himself or herself to a master for a given length of time. In return, the master agreed to pay for the servant’s transportation to the colony, to furnish him or her with adequate food, clothing, and shelter during service, and to give the servant a specified reward when service was completed. In Maryland, freed servants were commonly provided 50 acres of land. The usual period of servitude varied between two and seven years, with the most common being four years.
As the 1600s came to an end, so did the supply of indentured servants. An improving European economy meant that poor men and women no longer had to leave home to seek a better life. To fill the void, slaves were brought up from the plantations of Barbados, Jamaica, and other British Caribbean islands to work in the tobacco fields. As European demand for American tobacco continued to grow, the need for slaves grew, and slaves were brought to the American colonies directly from Africa. The ready availability of land, servants, and slaves, plus the constant demand from Europe for high-quality tobacco, all combined to produce good profits for colonial tobacco growers.
Initially, living and working conditions for the new slaves and existing indentured servants were much the same. They worked the tobacco fields side-by-side. The idea of slave-for-life had not yet fully taken hold. Many slaves served a period of indenture and were then freed, just like European indentured servants. By 1700, however, Maryland tobacco was grown almost exclusively by slave labor, and these slaves were now slaves for life. The Mudd family's use of slaves to plant and harvest tobacco during the two centuries before the Civil War was typical of Southern Maryland farmers during this time.
Thomas Mudd (1647-1697)
Dr. Samuel Mudd’s great-great-great-great-grandfather was Thomas Mudd (1647-1697), the first Mudd in America. His birth date is derived from a deposition he gave in 1681 saying that his age was “thirty four yeares or thereabouts.” Dr. Mudd’s great-great-great-great-grandmother was the second of Thomas Mudd’s three wives, Sarah Boarman Matthews Mudd.
Nothing is known of Thomas Mudd’s parents, or exactly when he came to America. Maryland land records show that he was granted 450 acres of land in 1680 as compensation for paying for the cost of transporting himself and eight indentured servants to Maryland. The land grant refers to Thomas Mudd as a Gentleman, a term used at the time to describe a person of some social standing and means.
There is some speculation that Thomas Mudd may have originally arrived in the colonies as early as 1665 as an indentured servant. The English seaport of Bristol maintained a register of indentured servants sailing to the American colonies. The register contains an August 14, 1665 entry that says: “Thomas Mudd to Anthony Noaks, 3 yrs Virginia.” Whether this is the same Thomas Mudd as the one who was later granted 450 acres in Maryland is unknown.
By the time he died in 1697, Thomas Mudd had tripled his land holdings from the original 450 acres to more than 1,500 acres. He had also acquired five slaves. In his will, Thomas Mudd gave four slaves to his third wife Ann, and one slave to his daughter Barbara. The slaves’ names are not mentioned.
The death of Thomas Mudd illustrates one of the great fears that slaves had all through the two centuries of American slavery. When an owner died, slaves were either divided among the surviving relatives, or sold. Either way, slave families were usually broken up on the death of the owner. Little regard was given to keeping husbands, wives, parents, or children together as a family.
Nothing is known of Thomas Mudd’s parents, or exactly when he came to America. Maryland land records show that he was granted 450 acres of land in 1680 as compensation for paying for the cost of transporting himself and eight indentured servants to Maryland. The land grant refers to Thomas Mudd as a Gentleman, a term used at the time to describe a person of some social standing and means.
There is some speculation that Thomas Mudd may have originally arrived in the colonies as early as 1665 as an indentured servant. The English seaport of Bristol maintained a register of indentured servants sailing to the American colonies. The register contains an August 14, 1665 entry that says: “Thomas Mudd to Anthony Noaks, 3 yrs Virginia.” Whether this is the same Thomas Mudd as the one who was later granted 450 acres in Maryland is unknown.
By the time he died in 1697, Thomas Mudd had tripled his land holdings from the original 450 acres to more than 1,500 acres. He had also acquired five slaves. In his will, Thomas Mudd gave four slaves to his third wife Ann, and one slave to his daughter Barbara. The slaves’ names are not mentioned.
The death of Thomas Mudd illustrates one of the great fears that slaves had all through the two centuries of American slavery. When an owner died, slaves were either divided among the surviving relatives, or sold. Either way, slave families were usually broken up on the death of the owner. Little regard was given to keeping husbands, wives, parents, or children together as a family.
Henry Mudd (1685-1736)
Dr. Samuel Mudd’s great-great-great-grandfather was Henry Mudd (1685-1736), the second of Thomas Mudd’s nine children. His great-great-great-grandmother was Elizabeth Lowe Mudd.
In his will, Henry left his wife Elizabeth his “three working negroes,” his bedding, and his household items. He left his daughter Sarah “a negro boy called Jack,” two cows, a feather bed, and furniture. He left his daughter Henereter “a negro boy called Tom,” a feather bed, furniture, cows, and a horse.
If Henry Mudd’s three adult slaves and two slave children were a family, the slave family was now destroyed, scattered among three descendant families. Slaves were passed from one generation to the next like any other form of property. Next to land, slaves were a farmer’s most valuable possession, and not passing one’s slaves on to one’s descendants would be quite unusual.
Slaves were usually known only by a first name, and no last name. Frederick Douglass, a Maryland slave, wrote:
"It was seldom that a slave, however venerable, was honored with a surname in Maryland..."
Henry Mudd’s wife Elizabeth acquired several more slaves after he died. When she herself died in 1761, she left her son Bennett Mudd “one negro named Dick and all the tobacco that shall become due for the hire of said negro.”
When a slave wasn’t needed by the owner, the slave was often rented to other planters, with payment in tobacco. The owner not only received the rental income, he was also temporarily relieved of the burden of clothing, housing and feeding the slave.
From the beginning of the Maryland colony until just a few years before the Revolutionary War, tobacco was the currency used to buy and sell goods. But there were many inefficiencies and inconveniences to using tobacco as money. In 1733 Maryland began to print paper currency, and by the time of the Revolutionary War, paper currency had largely replaced tobacco as the primary means to purchase goods and pay bills in Maryland. Elizabeth also left her daughter Mary Bibben “one negro wench named Jane and her increase and one feather bed.”
The reference to “her increase” illustrates the fact that slave owners not only owned their slaves, but also owned the children of their slaves. Slave children were little burden on slave owners, but as they grew, their value grew, both as field workers and in the slave market.
Elizabeth left her grandson Ezekiah Mudd “one negro boy named Clem,” and left Elizabeth Ann Salsbury “one negro boy named Peter, and one negro named Mary.”
Altogether, Elizabeth Mudd bequeathed seven slaves: one adult male named Dick, two adult women named Jane and Mary, and four boys named Jack, Tom, Clem, and Peter. It is unknown if they were related, but if so, any family relationship was destroyed when they were sent off to different owners after Elizabeth’s death.
In his will, Henry left his wife Elizabeth his “three working negroes,” his bedding, and his household items. He left his daughter Sarah “a negro boy called Jack,” two cows, a feather bed, and furniture. He left his daughter Henereter “a negro boy called Tom,” a feather bed, furniture, cows, and a horse.
If Henry Mudd’s three adult slaves and two slave children were a family, the slave family was now destroyed, scattered among three descendant families. Slaves were passed from one generation to the next like any other form of property. Next to land, slaves were a farmer’s most valuable possession, and not passing one’s slaves on to one’s descendants would be quite unusual.
Slaves were usually known only by a first name, and no last name. Frederick Douglass, a Maryland slave, wrote:
"It was seldom that a slave, however venerable, was honored with a surname in Maryland..."
Henry Mudd’s wife Elizabeth acquired several more slaves after he died. When she herself died in 1761, she left her son Bennett Mudd “one negro named Dick and all the tobacco that shall become due for the hire of said negro.”
When a slave wasn’t needed by the owner, the slave was often rented to other planters, with payment in tobacco. The owner not only received the rental income, he was also temporarily relieved of the burden of clothing, housing and feeding the slave.
From the beginning of the Maryland colony until just a few years before the Revolutionary War, tobacco was the currency used to buy and sell goods. But there were many inefficiencies and inconveniences to using tobacco as money. In 1733 Maryland began to print paper currency, and by the time of the Revolutionary War, paper currency had largely replaced tobacco as the primary means to purchase goods and pay bills in Maryland. Elizabeth also left her daughter Mary Bibben “one negro wench named Jane and her increase and one feather bed.”
The reference to “her increase” illustrates the fact that slave owners not only owned their slaves, but also owned the children of their slaves. Slave children were little burden on slave owners, but as they grew, their value grew, both as field workers and in the slave market.
Elizabeth left her grandson Ezekiah Mudd “one negro boy named Clem,” and left Elizabeth Ann Salsbury “one negro boy named Peter, and one negro named Mary.”
Altogether, Elizabeth Mudd bequeathed seven slaves: one adult male named Dick, two adult women named Jane and Mary, and four boys named Jack, Tom, Clem, and Peter. It is unknown if they were related, but if so, any family relationship was destroyed when they were sent off to different owners after Elizabeth’s death.
Thomas Mudd (1707-1761)
Dr. Samuel Mudd’s great-great-grandfather was another Thomas Mudd (1707-1761). Thomas was the first of Henry Mudd’s nine children. His wife’s maiden name was Gardiner, but her first name is unknown.
Thomas’ will made his son Henry the executor of his estate and left him a large amount of land. The rest of his land and property, including three slaves, was divided among his three other children.
He left his son Richard “one negro man called Anthony, also one cow and one heifer and one feather bed.”
He left his son Luke “one negro man called George, and also one feather bed, one cow, and nine hundred and fifty pounds of crop tobacco.”
And he left his daughter Mary Johnson “one negro girl called Judith, also the best feather bed and one cow.”
Thomas’ will made his son Henry the executor of his estate and left him a large amount of land. The rest of his land and property, including three slaves, was divided among his three other children.
He left his son Richard “one negro man called Anthony, also one cow and one heifer and one feather bed.”
He left his son Luke “one negro man called George, and also one feather bed, one cow, and nine hundred and fifty pounds of crop tobacco.”
And he left his daughter Mary Johnson “one negro girl called Judith, also the best feather bed and one cow.”
