"The Governor, * * * * marched out with three hundred and fifty soldiers, Tories and slaves, to Kemp's Landing; and after setting up his standard, and issuing his proclamation, declaring all persons rebels who took up arms for the country, and inviting all slaves, servants and apprentices to come to him and receive arms, he proceeded to intercept Hutchings and his party, upon whom he came by surprise, but received, it seems, so warm a fire, that the ragmuffins ran away. They were, however, rallied on discovering that two companies of our militia gave away; and left Hutchings and Dr. Reid with a volunteer company, who maintained their ground bravely till they were overcome by numbers, and took shelter in a swamp. The slaves were sent in pursuit of them; and one of Col. Hutching's, with another, found him. On their approach, he discharged his pistol at his slave, but missed him; and he was taken by them, after receiving a wound in the face with a sword. The number taken or killed on either side is not ascertained. It is said the Governor went to Dr. Reid's shop, and after taking the medicines and dressing necessary for his wounded men, broke all the others to pieces. Letters mention that slaves flock to him in abundance: but I hope it is magnified."
Five months after he issued the proclamation, Lord Dunmore thus writes, concerning his success:
[No. 1]
"Lord Dunmore to the Secretary of State.
{Ship 'Dunmore,' in Elizabeth River, Va.,
{ 30th March, 1776.
"Your Lordship will observe by my letter, No. 34, that I have been endeavoring to raise two regiments here—one of white people, the other of black. The former goes on very slowly, but the latter very well, and would have been in great forwardness, had not a fever crept in amongst them, which carried off a great many very fine fellows."
[No. 3]
{"Ship 'Dunmore,' in Gwin's Island Harbor, Va.,
{ June 26, 1776.
"I am extremely sorry to inform your Lordship, that that fever of which I informed you in my letter No. 1 has proved a very malignant one, and has carried off an incredible number of our people, especially the blacks. Had it not been for this horrid disorder, I am satisfied I should have had no doubt of penetrating into the heart of this colony."
The dread in which the colonists held the negro was equal to that with which they regarded the Indians. The incendiary torch, massacre, pillage, and revolt, was ever presenting a gloomy and disastrous picture to the colonists at the South. Their dreams at night; their thoughts by day; in the field and in the legislature hall, were how to keep the negro down. If one should be seen in a village with a gun, a half score of white men would rush and take it from him, while women in the street would take shelter in the nearest house. The wrongs which they continued to practice upon him was a terror to them through their conscience, though then, as in later years, many, and particularly the leaders, endeavored to impress others with their feigned belief of the natural inferiority of the negro to themselves. This doctrine served them, as the whistle did the boy in the woods; they talked in that way simply to keep their courage up, and their conscience down.