Job Cole (b. circa 1792 - d. ?)
MSA SC 5496-014978
Escaped from St. Mary's County, Maryland, 1814
Biography:
Job Cole was enslaved on Hezekiah Dent's farm, Green Hills, in St. Mary's County. Dent had purchased the farm in 1804. When Dent died in 1809, the ownership of the slaves passed to his widow, Larine Dent.1 The Dent Farm likely stood near Cuckhold's or Kirkhold's Creek, overlooking the Patuxent River.2 In 1813, Job Cole was one of twenty-three slaves on Dent's farm.3 A free black named Minta Cole (b. circa 1780) also lived nearby in 1810, although her relationship to Job is unknown. She appeared in census records through 1860.4
On June 1 or 2, 1814, Job escaped his enslavement along with four other slaves: James Milburn, David Milburn, William Peterson, and Henry Dent. Cole and James Milburn enlisted on the British ship Dragon with First Company of the Colonial Marines. They likely fought in the Battle of St. Leonard's Creek, which occurred on June 10, 1814.5 Following the war, Cole settled in Trinidad. The British gave sixteen acres of land to each of the original arrivals, and records show that the First Company's village stood near Dunmore Hill, Mount Elvin (New Grant), and Monkeytown.6
The widowed Larine Dent later married Peter
U. Thomson, who filed a claim for the escaped slaves.7
1.
Claim of Peter Thompson, St. Mary's County, Case No. 650, Case Files, Ca.
1814-28, entry 190, Record Group 76, National Archives, College Park.
1.
Harry Wright Newman, Charles County Gentry (Baltimore, MD:
Genealogical Publishing Company, 1971) 95.
2. "Part Resurrection Manor, site," Inventory of Historic Properties, Maryland Historical Trust, www.mdihp.net.
3. ST. MARY'S COUNTY LEVY COURT, (Assessment Record, Slaves), MSA C1544-27, Hezekiah Dent, April 12, 1813.
4. U.S. Census Record (Census
Record, MD) for Minta Cole, 1810, Saint Mary's County, district not stated,
Page 28, Line 3 [MSA SM61-56, M 2061-3].
U.S. Census
Record (Census Record, MD) for Minty Cole, 1820, Saint Mary's County, District
1, Page 1b, Line 2 [MSA SM61-76, M 2067-2].
U.S. Census
Record (Census Record, MD) for Mary Cole, 1840, Saint Mary's County, District
1, Page 3, 2nd line from bottom [MSA SM61-116, M 4724-1].
U.S. Census
Record (Census Record, MD) for Minty Cole, 1850, Saint Mary's County, District
1, Page 10, Line 25 [MSA SM61-145, M 1500-2].
U.S. Census
Record (Census Record, MD) for Minta Cole, 1860, Saint Mary's County, District
1, Page 19, Line 38 [MSA SM61-216, M 7224-2].
5. Michael J. Crawford,
ed., The Naval War of 1812: A Documentary History, Vol. 3 (Washington,
D.C.: Naval Historical Center, 2002) 84.
John McNish
Weiss, The Merikens: Free Black American Settlers in Trinidad: 1815-1816
(London, UK: McNish & Weiss, 2002) 25.
6. Weiss 25.
Lorna
McDaniel, "Memory Spirituals of the Ex-Slave American Soldiers in Trinidad's
'Company Villages,'" Black Music Research Journal 14.2 (1994): 119-143.
7. Claim
of Peter Thompson.
Return to Job Cole's Introductory Page
|
Tell Us What You Think About the Maryland State Archives Website!
|