As is usual it would appear that most of these slaves ran away in pairs, presumably from a small number of major slaveholders. With the popularity of the name Thomas and John a slave holder certainly required a roster including sir names. A look at the list, in which most seemed to have escaped from the same large slave holder, shows that runaways tended to pair up for success. Thomas Starkie [apparently the unlucky in his first attempt] ended up escaping again with William Beall.
Johnstone, John MG, 16 Nov. 1752
Gilpin, Thomas MG, 16 Nov. 1752 [1]
Brown, Thomas MG, 14 Dec. 1752 [1]
Taylor, Samuel MG, 22 Feb. 1753
Cunningham, James, stole goods, MG, 1 Mar. 1753
Kelly, Thomas , stole goods MG, 1 Mar. 1753 [1]
Barneby, John, apprentice MG, 8 Mar. 1753 [2]
M’Donald, John, apprentice MG, 8 Mar. 1753 [2]
Starkie, Thomas, stole horse, MG, 22 Mar. 1753 [1]
Morris, Thomas, stole horse, MG, 22 Mar. 1753 [1]
Jones, James, stole horse MG, 5 Apr. 1753
Beall, William MG, 19 Apr. 1753
Blackwood, Hamilton, stole clothes, MG, 19 Apr. 1753
Brown, Thomas MG, 26 Apr. 1753 [1]
Welsh, John, stole clothes, MG, 26 Apr. 1753
Beall, William MG, 17 May 1753
Godfrey, George MG, 17 May 1753
Williams, John MG, 17 May 1753
Archer, John MG, 24 May 1753
Weldon, John MG, 24 May 1753
Smith, Thomas MG, 24 May 1753 [1]
Dennison, John, stole horse, MG, 7 June 1753 [3]
Dennison, Hannah, stole horse, MG, 7 June 1753 [3]
Williams, Philip MG, 14 June 1753
Gibbons, Henry MG, 14 June 1753
Dennis, Rowland, stole clothes MG, 5 July 1753
Bare, George MG, 5 July 1753
Reynolds, John, apprentice MG, 12 July 1753 [2]
Beall, William 5th time MG, 28 June 1753
Starkie, Thomas MG, 28 June 1753 [1]
Notes
1. In the first draft I misread the many Thomas listings as sir names instead of Christian names. Thanks to Lynn Lockheart for correcting my mistake.
2. These are the first three runaway apprentices listed in these three publications since 1728 [when printing commenced in Maryland], which says two things, that servants were much more numerous than apprentices, and that servants were not, according to mainstream American historians, apprentices working off an indenture, but chattel condemned to slavery for a fixed term of years.
3. John and Hannah Dennison, appear to have been brother and sister, possibly stealing the same horse together. The increased number of horse thefts in Maryland as the 1700s wore on indicates two aspects of servant life that had changed since the 1600s, life was no longer being lived under the shadow of the dense forests, but more often in expanses cleared for pasture by earlier generations of servants, making hiding problematic even as the theft of a horse made abrupt flight a more tempting proposition.
America in Chains
James,
There are a number of people with the surname Beall in Allegheny county in fact there is a Beall Highschool...I wonder if the Beall lad made his way west and put down roots there?. Notice too that 1753 was about a year before things got hot and heavy in that murderous mercantile pissing match otherwise known as the French and Indian War.
I wonder what affect the French and Indian war had overall on indentured/slave life...
Nero The Pict
Most of the runaway listings are from this period, as the Indians in the pay of the English slave masters were weakening in relation to the Indians in the pay of the French, reducing their effectiveness as slave catchers.
The result of the French and Indian War and the Revolutionary war was a flood of over 25,000 former or escaped servants migrating into the Ohio Valley.
Two questions:
1. What does "MG" signify in these lists?
2. All the Thomases look like first names so I think some of them must be transposed.
The last names are given first in this list,
TMG stands for Maryland Gazette.