John Allen Thomas
MSA SC 3520-1243
Biography:
A wealthy planter and lawyer, John Allen Thomas of St. Mary's County, Maryland, was one of the state's leaders of the movement for American independence in the 1760s and 1770s, and "took an Early, and Active part to Accomplish the Revolution," as a contemporary phrased it. Thomas led an infantry company in 1776, serving under George Washington and fighting at the Battle of Brooklyn that August. After the war, he played a leading role in an incident that was, in a way, a betrayal of the Revolution. [1]
Thomas was born on August 17, 1734, in St. Peter's Parish, Talbot County. He was the eldest son of William Thomas (1705-1767) and Elizabeth (Allen) Thomas, who had four other children: Mary, Nicholas (1737-1783), William, and James. Elizabeth died, and in 1757 William Sr. remarried. His second wife, Margaret Finney Edmondson, was herself a widow. Her husband John had died in 1743, and she brought a daughter of her own, named Rachel, into her marriage with William Thomas; Margaret's son Samuel had died in 1751. [2]
The Thomases were a prominent family in Talbot County. William Thomas served in the Lower House of the Maryland General Assembly for many years, and held a number of other local offices. Both John Allen and Nicholas trained as lawyers, although Nicholas seems to have established himself in practice before his older brother. John Allen began practicing in 1765 and 1766. Prior to that, he was the clerk of the Lower House 1761-1762. When William died in 1767, John Allen inherited a great deal of property from his father, including over 300 acres of land in Talbot. However, in 1771, Thomas sold the land, and took up residence across the Chesapeake Bay, in St. Mary's County. [3]
Thomas was a prominent figure in St. Mary's County during the 1760s and 1770s. In 1771, he was appointed the deputy commissary for the county, putting him in charge of the county's orphan's court, comparable to the register of wills. The position was primarily a stepping-stone to better offices, and was not terrible lucrative, compared to other clerkships. That same year, Thomas was also named one of the justices of the Court of Oyer and Terminer, the county's criminal court. As the American Revolution began, Thomas emerged as one of St. Mary's County's pro-independence leaders. In 1774 and 1775, he was a member of the Convention of Maryland. The Convention was the state's self-declared legislative body, which began meeting after Robert Eden, the colonial governor, dissolved the old assembly in an effort to stop the independence movement. [4]
In early 1776, Maryland began to raise troops for the Continental Army and to defend the state from a feared British invasion. Fearing that the British would launch an attack from the Chesapeake Bay, the state formed seven units of regular (i.e. full-time, professional) soldiers, known as independent companies. Thomas received command of the Fifth Independent Company, based in St. Mary's, and set about recruiting soldiers and organizing supplies. By the spring, he had enlisted his full compliment of 106 men. With many military units being formed, firearms were in great demand, and so Thomas's men were armed with a mix of muskets and rifles. He also convinced the state to pay for "leathern Caps for his independent Company instead of Hats." [5]
The Fifth Independent Company spent several months serving in Southern Maryland, turning out amid fears of British attacks. In July, however, the independent companies were dispatched to New York, to help reinforce the Continental Army as it prepared to defend the city from the British. In total, twelve companies of Maryland troops traveled to New York that July and August: nine companies that comprised the First Maryland Regiment, commanded by Colonel William Smallwood, and the Fourth, Fifth, and Seventh Independent companies, the only three that were ready to travel then. Thomas's company was delayed just as it departed, so it did not reach New York until several weeks after the rest of the Marylanders. [6]
When the long-anticipated British attack on New York finally came on August 27, 1776, the Fifth Independent Company played only a small role, possibly because its men had only recently arrived. The battle was a rout: the British were able to sneak around the American lines, and the outflanked Americans fled in disarray. During the retreat, the Maryland troops fought their way towards the American fortifications, but were blocked by the swampy Gowanus Creek. While half the regiment was able to cross the creek, the rest were unable to do so before they were attacked by the British. Facing down a much larger, better-trained force, the Marylanders mounted a series of daring charges. These men, now known as the "Maryland 400," held the British at bay long enough for the rest of the Continental Army to escape, at the cost of many lives. In all, 256 Marylanders were killed or captured by the British; some companies lost as much as 80 percent of their men. The Fifth Independent Company did not cross the East River from Manhattan to Brooklyn until after the fighting had begun, and did not venture into the field of battle. They did, however, perform valuable service assisting the Americans retreating through the Gowanus Marsh. [7]
Over the next months, Thomas and his men continued to struggle against the British. They did so despite serious supply shortages. In early September, barely a week after the Battle of Brooklyn, Thomas wrote to Maryland's Council that
The unhappy situation of the Maryland Troops now here, makes it absolutely necessary that you should be acquainted with it...We have now and have had for some time a number of our men sick, a number very ill. I have had from fifteen to twenty of my men extremely ill and have not yet been able to procure them the least assistance... From the best authority I can assure you we have at this time near two hundred men unfit for duty and most of them without any assistance from the Doctor.
With an eye towards the future, anticipating that the war was not destined to end quickly, Thomas reminded the Council that "The neglect of the troops when sick discourages them more than any other circumstance, and I am convinced if it was generally known, would have the worst of consequences both as to recruiting for the Troops already raised or in raising new levies." [8]
Although the Americans had favorable results at the battles of Harlem Heights (September) and White Plains (October), they were nevertheless pushed out of New York by November. At the end of the year, the enlistments of the independents' soldiers expired, and the companies were disbanded. Many of the men joined the newly-created Second Maryland Regiment, but Thomas opted to remain at home. He remained active in the war effort, however. He was appointed major of the Upper Battalion of St. Mary's County Militia in August 1777, and helped to raise supplies for the army for the rest of the war. [9]
Thomas also resumed his career as a public officeholder. He was a member of the the House of Delegates in 1778 and 1779, and again from 1781 to 1782. In 1789, he tried to obtain an appointment as a federal judge, but was unsuccessful. During the 1780s, Thomas was a political power broker, working behind the scenes to help others secure political offices, with the side benefit that he would himself reap the rewards of such appointments. [10]
In addition, Thomas continued his legal practice. In several cases, he represented people who sought to be freed from slavery. In 1779, he represented Rosamund Bentley, who asserted that she should have been free, because she descended from a free woman. Two years later, he was the attorney for Rosamund's two sisters, Eleanor and Mary, when they claimed their freedom. Unfortunately, all three Bentley's petitions were denied. Likewise, in 1797, Thomas took the case of William Thomas, who sued his master for his freedom; he too, was unsuccessful. [11]
However, Thomas's most notable series of cases were the ones he filed in June 1786. The state's economy was in poor shape, and there was a shortage of money, making it a challenge for people to pay their debts. Thomas appeared in Charles County Court filing claims against local residents who owed money to British tobacco merchants. When these men were unable to pay, Thomas moved to have them jailed, the standard procedure at the time. To jail people for debt was considered a hard fate, particularly in such a bad economy. But the fact that Thomas was working on behalf of British merchants seemed an utter betrayal of the Revolution. It was bad enough that many of the ordinary people were suffering such financial hardship in the new republic, and it led many to wonder what the Revolution had really accomplished--had they just replaced one master for another? [12]
That such actions were taken to enrich wealthy British merchants made the situation worse, and the idea that Thomas was the one to institute the suits was further troubling. As the Charles County judges noted, "Mr. Thomas (with many thousands besides) took an early, and Active part to Accomplish the Revolution, [and] has always behaved himself as a true and faithful Citizen of the State of Maryland, and has Uniformly Supported and Maintained the freedom and Independence thereof." And yet there was Thomas, having "undertake[n] to distress the People by bringing upwards of a hundred Suits for one Company." Was that why Marylanders had fought and died, some under the command of Thomas himself? It was too much to take. [13]
On June 12, 1786, as the court moved through Thomas's lengthy list of suits, the judges began to express regrets that they were compelled to jail people for these debts. As word spread through the community of the suits, a crowd began to assemble outside the courthouse. Around that time--and perhaps in response to the gathering crowd--the court's judges began to find reasons to excuse themselves from the bench. However, the situation soon devolved into a riot, as the crowd entered the courthouse and stopped the proceedings, demanding that Thomas withdraw his cases, and scattering the participants. Thomas himself was forced to flee. [14]
The judges claimed that they had attempted to maintain the court session in normal order, though Thomas believed they had been swayed by the presence of the mob, and had encouraged the riot. In his statements afterward, he described the incident as a grave threat to the rule of law, and wondered whether "all civil Liberty is at an End." After months of accusations and depositions from the participants, court eventually resumed. Thomas refiled all of his suits and the court moved forward on them, this time uninterrupted by any mob action. [15]
What sort of effect the riot had on Thomas's reputation is not known. In a close-knit community like Southern Maryland, it is probable that the memory of the event lingered for many years. There were surely those who saw Thomas as a defender of order and justice, and a friend of the merchant class, just as others undoubtedly never forgave him. Thomas never held elected office after 1785, but there is no way to tell if that was his choice, or if public opinion was not favorable to his election. He did hold public positions after the riot however. He was a member of the vestry of St. Andrew's Church 1790-1793, and the trustee of the St. Mary's County poorhouse in 1795. [16]
Thomas married twice. His first wife, named Sarah, died in 1786. Within ten years, Thomas married his second wife, Isabella. He had no known children, although Sarah had several children from a previous marriage. When Thomas died in late 1796 or early 1797, he owned over 750 acres of land and 15 slaves. He left his property to his wife Isabella, his brother James (the only one of the siblings who was still alive), and two nephews. [17]
Owen Lourie, 2019
Notes:
1. Deposition of Walter Hanson, John Dent, and Samuel Hanson, Jr., July 1786, Maryland State Papers, Series A, box 59, no. 2/11, Md HR 6636-59-2/11 [MSA S1004-81-14325, 1/7/3/63].
2. Edward C. Papenfuse, et al., eds, A Biographical Dictionary of the Maryland Legislature, 1635-1789 (Vol. II. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1985), 808-810, 813-814.
3. Papenfuse, et al., 808-810, 813-814; Alan F. Day, A Social Study of Lawyers in Maryland, 1660-1775 (New York: Garland Publishing, 1989), 652-655; Will of William Thomas, 1767, Prerogative Court, Wills, liber 35, p. 422 [MSA S538-51, 1/11/1/45]; Land Office, Debt Books, vol. 50, Talbot County, 1769, p. 422 [MSA S12-219, 1/24/3/10]; Deed, John Allen Thomas to William Thomas, 1771, Talbot County Court, Land Records, liber JL 20, p. 205 [MSA CE90-22].
4. Papenfuse, et al., 808-809; Donnell Owings, His Lordship's Patronage: Offices of Profit in Colonial Maryland (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1953), 40-41.
5. John Allen Thomas, Commission as Captain, 5 January 1776, Maryland State Papers, Scharf Collection, box 49, no. 73, MdHR 19999-49-73 [MSA S1005-52-74, 1/8/5/41]; Muster Rolls and Other Records of Service of Maryland Troops in the American Revolution, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, p. 25; Reiman Steuart, The Maryland Line (The Society of the Cincinnati, 1971), 140; Return of officers & soldiers, etc. of Smallwood’s Regiment, 20 July 1776, Maryland Historical Society, Smallwood Papers, MS 1875; Journal and Correspondence of the Maryland Council of Safety, August 29, 1775 to July 6, 1776, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 11, pps. 274, 367; Mark Andrew Tacyn, "'To the End:' The First Maryland Regiment and the American Revolution" (PhD diss., University of Maryland College Park, 1999), 33-45.
6. Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 11, pps. 511, 554; Journal and Correspondence of the Maryland Council of Safety, July 7 to December 31, 1776, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 12, pps. 50, 97, 196.
7. Return of the Maryland troops, 13 September 1776, Revolutionary War Rolls, NARA M246, folder 35, p. 85, from Fold3.com; Tacyn, 48-73; Steuart, 154-155. For more on the experience of the Marylanders at the Battle of Brooklyn, see "In Their Own Words," on the Maryland State Archives research blog, Finding the Maryland 400.
8. Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 12, p. 256. See also "The Unhappy Situation," on Finding the Maryland 400.
9. Papenfuse, et al., 808-809; Journal and Correspondence of the State Council, from March 20, 1777 - March 28, 1778, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 16, pps. 345, 426.
10. Papenfuse, et al., 808-809; George Plater to George Washington, 20 November 1789, Founders Online, National Archives; Thomas's intercessions in at least one instances not only failed, but caused a public feud with George Thomas, a member of a powerful Eastern Shore family. See George Thomas, Broadside against John Allen Thomas, 1787, Maryland State Archives, Special Collection, Mrs. T. Rowland Thomas Collection [MSA SC176-1-442, 0/21/14/41].
11. Courtney C. Hobson, "A Mother's Inheritance: Women, Interracial Identity, and Emancipation in Maryland, 1664-1820," O Say Can You See: Early Washington, D.C., Law & Family, 2016; Thomas v. Plowden, O Say Can You See. Although Thomas lost all three times he represented slaves, other Maryland slaves were adjudged to be free during the first decades of American independence, including several large families. See Loren Schweninger, “Freedom Suits, African American Women, and the Genealogy of Slavery," The William and Mary Quarterly 71:1 (2014), 35-62.
12. The definitive account of the Charles County courthouse riot is Jean B. Lee, The Price of Nationhood: The American Revolution in Charles County (New York: W.W. Norton, 1994), 232-239. On disillusionment with the Revolution, see for example Terry Bouton, Taming Democracy: "The People," the Founders, and the Troubled Ending of the American Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007).
13. Deposition of Walter Hanson, John Dent, and Samuel Hanson, Jr., July 1786.
14. Lee, 233-235.
15. Lee, 235-239.
16. Papenfuse, et al., 808-810.
17. Papenfuse, et al., 808-810.
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