WILLIAM   AND   MARY   QUARTERLY

36

at least recognized. Appraisers occasionally grouped slaves into family
units in inventories, giving explicit recognition to the bond between
husband, wife, and children.18 Some masters not only acknowledged the
existence of slave families, but granted those families considerable in-
dependence. Henry Ridgely, for example, had three outlying quarters
run by blacks. The quarters were amply supplied with livestock, bedding,
household utensils, and tools, and there is no evidence of direct white
supervision. Apparently Mingo, Dick, and Toby, whose names identify
the quarters, ran relatively independent operations, often making their
own decisions about the organization of work, with some responsibility
for the success of the farm and for the maintenance and discipline of
their dependents. Their lives perhaps resembled those of poor tenants or
of men who farmed shares.17

Mingo, Dick, and Toby  had acquired a measure of freedom  and
responsibility. Their positions required judgment and skill as well as
strength and stamina, but their experience was hardly typical. The work
of   the   majority   of  slaves   was   physically   demanding,   dull,   and   re-
petitive, offering blacks little challenge and only a slight possibility of
better employment. Most slaves were kept to the routine tasks of raising
tobacco and corn and tending livestock. For variety they could look only
to the nearly endless round of menial odd jobs necessary to the operation
of any farm. Opportunities  for  occupational  mobility—to  move from
field hand to house servant or overseer of a quarter, or to learn a trade
and work  as  a cooper, carpenter,  or blacksmith—were virtually  non-
existent in the seventeenth century. The inventories suggest that perhaps
a dozen of the 525 adult males appraised in the four counties before 1710
held positions that paralleled those of Mingo, Dick, and Toby, while only
four of the 525 were described as skilled craftsmen.18 Few masters could
afford the luxury of diverting slaves from tobacco to personal service,
and few plantations were large enough to require full-time craftsmen or
overseers.19 What supervisory, skilled, and service occupations were avail-
is For examples see Testamentary Proceedings, III, 23-24; Inventories and Ac-
counts  II   1-8   305, V, 143-145, ig'/iA, 28, VIII, 404-406, XA, 10, XIIIA, 122.

^idgely's inventory is in Inventories and Accounts, XXXIIB, 71. For other
examples see Testamentary Proceedings, V, 178-179; Inventories and Accounts,
VIIC 1015-107; Prince George's County Inventories, BB#i, I37-I4J-

"'See above, n. 17; Prince George's County Inventories, BB#i, 117; Charles
County Inventories, 1677-1717, 74, 290.

10 But see Gov Francis Nicholson's statement that most people have some ot
them as their domestick servants: and the better sort may have 6 or 7 m those