Samuel Pattison (b. circa 1801 - d. 1877)
MSA SC 5496-2605
Slave Owner, Dorchester County, Maryland
Biography:
Samuel Pattison was born around 1801 to Jeremiah and Amelia Pattison in Cambridge, Dorchester County, Maryland. On December 11, 1820, Pattison married Ann Skinner (b. circa 1799). The couple had four children: John Richard Pattison (b. circa 1822), Robert Henry Pattison, Elizabeth Amelia Pattison Stewart (b. circa 1828), and Mary Augusta Lenhart Pattison Hooper (b. circa 1834).1
At his father's death in 1814, Samuel Pattison inherited a male slave named George and adjoining tracts of farmland called Chance and Preston. Pattison purchased at least two more slaves, Hercules and Kit, in 1837 from Charles W. Reed.2 By 1840, Pattison owned a dozen slaves ranging in age from children under the age of ten to adults under thirty-six years of age.3 A wealthy farmer, the 1850 federal census records Pattison as the owner of twelve slaves with real estate valued at $10,000.4, 5 His real estate holdings in 1852 included the 414 acre planatation, Daniel's Choice, and several other tracts of land, which totalled another 347 acres.6
In 1852, Pattison owned sixteen slaves including: Adam (age 2), Lloyd (age 2), Jane (age 10), Isaac (age 12), Joseph (age 12), Henny (age 12), Joe (age 21), Noah (age 24), George (age 26), Kit (age 30), Hercules (age 32), Frances (age 3 months), Mary (age 1), Jane (age 18), Leah (age 21), and Susan (age 30). By 1857, Pattison had two additional slaves: an infant boy (2 weeks old), Gabril (age 3 years), and "Murry Boy" (age 1 year).7
Despite maintaining large slaveholdings, Pattison freed some of his slaves during his lifetime, mostly through gradual manumission. On January 16, 1832, Pattison recorded manumissions for six slaves: Thomas (to be free in 1847), James (to be free in 1864), George (to be free in 1849), Sally (to be free in 1842), Jane (to be free in 1858), and Joseph (to be free in 1864).8 Sally, James, and George received certificates of freedom shortly after the dates of their promised manumissions.9 On April 8, 1843, Pattison outright manumitted another slave, the forty-three year old Moses Cork.10
In 1856, Pattison donated $5 to the Maryland State Colonization Society, whose mission was to help free blacks emigrate to Liberia.11 Many Maryland slaveholders supported the Colonization Society because they believed that colonization would remove free blacks as a threat to the institution of slavery within Maryland.12 Nevertheless, Pattison did not require emigration to Liberia as a condition of freedom for the slaves whom he manumitted.
Several of Pattison's slaves sought freedom on their own terms on at least two separate occasions. In November 1846, Pattison's slave, Maria, escaped with her husband William, who belonged to the estate of the late Mrs. Sophia Murray.13 While it is uncertain if Maria and William reached freedom, another advertisement was placed for them two weeks later, suggesting that they may have successfully avoided capture.14
Pattison suffered his greatest loss of slaves on the night of October 24, 1857. He awoke the next morning to find that farm chores were undone and that no one had made his breakfast. This led to the discovery that fifteen of his slaves had fled the previous night in a mass escape that totaled at least twenty-eight slaves from neighboring plantations in Dorchester County.15 This incident is significant both for the large number of slaves who ran away and for the fact that family groups with small children escaped together. Pattison's fugitive slaves included Kit and Leah Anthony, who escaped with their children, Adam, Mary, and Murray; Joseph Hill, who ran away with his free wife and son, Alice and Henry; Susan Viney, who fled with her four children, Lloyd, Frank, Albert, and J.W.; and Henry, Joe, and Tom Viney, sons of Susan's husband, Joseph, who joined his family in flight. Joseph Viney was owned by a Charles Bryant, a Virginia planter, but had been hired out to work in Dorchester County. Samuel Pattison, along with neighboring slave holders Reuben E. Phillips and Willis Brannock, placed a joint advertisement for their fugitive slaves, offering a reward of $3,100 for their capture.16, 17
A few days later, Pattison discovered that a fifteenth slave, Sarah Jane, had also escaped. The sister of Joseph Hill, Sarah Jane's absence was probably initially missed because she had been hired out.18 Joseph Hill may be the same Joseph whose manumission Pattison recorded in 1832 with his freedom to commence in 1864. Despite this promise, the opportunity for immediate freedom with his family would have been more appealing than seven more years of enslavement.
Pattison followed in pursuit of the fugitives, closing in on them quickly. He heard that they were headed to Wilimington, Delaware. However, the runaways had been warned that their captors were in pursuit and therefore stayed clear of Wilmington. Althought the group split up to avoid detection, they faced many other obstacles. Poorly provisioned, the group battled severe rainstorms. On October 31, part of the group was attacked by several Irishmen with clubs. One of the fugitives insured their escape by shooting one of the Irishmen in the head. William Still, an abolitionist and conductor on the Underground Railroad, recorded the safe arrival of the party to Philadelphia. However, a fourteen year old boy was separated from the rest during the journey, and it is unclear if he rejoined the group.18 Joseph Viney, one of the escapees, described the Pattisons to Still. According to Viney, Pattison was "a great big man," "who drank pretty freely." Mrs. Pattison was "mean, sneaking, and did not want to give half enough to eat."20
The runaways likely received information from Harriet Tubman, a native of the area, to aid their escape. Following this and a rash of other slave escapes, Dorchester County whites feared that northern abolitionists and free blacks were conspiring to destroy the institution of slavery. As a result, community leaders passed resolutions resticting the personal liberties of free and enslaved blacks. Nevertheless, slaves in Dorchester County continued to run away to freedom.21
Even with the loss of so many slaves, Pattison continued to prosper and to own slaves. According to the 1860 federal census (where his name is spelled Samuel Patterson), Pattison owned real estate with a value of $20,000 and a personal estate worth $6,000. He also owned five males slaves, ranging in age from four to fifty years old.22, 23 Four years later when Maryland abolished slavery in the 1864 state constitution, Pattison owned three male slaves: Harkes Anthony (40 years), Isaac Nicols (24 years), and Gabriel Hill (7 years).24 They may be the same Hercules, Isaac, and Gabril that were recorded on the 1852 and 1857 tax assessments.
Pattison died in 1877 at the age of seventy-six. He left a vast inheritance to his heirs including his plantation, a smaller farm, a life insurance policy of $2,000, and $1,500 cash.25 He is buried in Cambridge Cemetery.26
Footnotes -
1. DORCHESTER COUNTY COURT (Marriage Licenses) CM447, 1780-1841.
2. DORCHESTER COUNTY COURT (Chattel Records) MSA C691, 1833-1842, ER 2, p. 94. 1/4/4/42
3. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Samuel Pattison, 1840, Dorchester County, District 8, Page 41, Line 8. Continued on Page 42, Line 8.
4. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Samuel Pattison, 1850, Dorchester County, District 1, Page 37, Line 6.
5. U.S. Census Bureau (Slave Schedules, MD) for Samuel Patterson, 1850, Dorchester County, District 1, Page 26, Lines 1-12.
6. DORCHESTER COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS (Assessment Record) for Samuel Pattison, 1852-1910 C687, Election District 7, p. 161. 01/04/05/019
7. Ibid.
8. DORCHESTER COUNTY COURT (Chattel Records) MSA C691, 1827-1833, ER 1, p. 404. 1/4/4/41
9. DORCHESTER COUNTY COURT (Certificates of Freedom) C689, 1806-1851, pp. 131, 159, 162. 01/04/04/040
10. DORCHESTER COUNTY COURT (Chattel Records) MSA C691, 1842-1847,WJ 2, i,1/4/4/43.
12. Guy, Anita Aidt. Maryland's Persistent Pursuit to End Slavery, 1850-1864. (New York: Garland Publishing, 1997), p. 251.
13. .$175 Reward, Cambridge Chronicle, November 7, 1846.
14. One Hundred Dollars Reward, Baltimore Sun, November 20, 1846.
15. Larson, Kate Clifford. Bound for the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman,Portrait of an American Hero. (New York: Ballantine Book, 2005), p. 145.
16. $3,100 Reward, Baltimore Sun, October 28, 1857.
17. "More Runaways," Easton Star, 4 November 1857.
18. Larson, p. 145-146.
19. Larson, p. 146-149.
21. Larson, p. 146-148.
22. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Samuel Patterson, 1860, Dorchester County, District 7, Page 370, Line 22.
23. U.S. Census Bureau (Slave Schedules, MD) for Samuel Patterson, 1860, Dorchester County, District 7, Page 45, Lines 22-26.
24. DORCHESTER COUNTY COMMISSIONER OF SLAVE STATISTICS (Slave Statistics) C738, 1867-1868, p.145.
25. DORCHESTER COUNTY REGISTER OF WILLS (Wills) 1872-1885, E.W.L. 2, pp. 213-217.
26. Marshall, Nellie M., compl. Tombstone Records of Dorchester County, Maryland. (Cambridge, Mary.: Cemetery Records Committee, 1965), p. 163.
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