"I saw old Cato, Lavine's father at Newark, while I was at Col. Ogden's; he is living with Mrs. Governeur—is well taken care of & blind—poor fellow came to feel me, for he could not see, he asked affectionately after the family."
In the will of the well-known Colonel John Butler of Butler's Rangers there are bequests to his son Andrew of "a negro woman named Pat": to his grandson John of "a Negro Boy named George ... until the said negro arrives at the years that the Law directs to receive his freedom" and to John's sister Catharine "a negro girl named Jane" for a similar time.
[14] Michigan Hist. Coll., XIV, p. 659. But the actual effect of the Ordinance of 1787, even after 1805 was not absolute. "As late as 1807 Judge Woodward refused to free a negro man and woman on a writ of habeas corpus, holding in effect that as they had been slaves at the time of the surrender in 1796, there was something in Jay's Treaty that forbade their release." Michigan as a Province, Territory and State, 1906, p. 339. "There is a tradition that even as late as the coming of Gen. John T. Mason, as Secretary of the Territory in 1831, he brought some domestic slaves with him from Virginia. It is not improbable that a few domestic servants continued with their old Masters down to the time of the adoption of the State Constitution" (in 1835) ibid., p. 338, note.
Before Detroit and its adjoining territory were given up by the British to the Americans under Jay's Treaty, August, 1796, there were many instances of slaves escaping from the United States territory to British territory in that neighborhood and vice versa. One instance of escape from British territory will suffice.
Colonel Alexander McKee, a well-known and very prominent Loyalist of Detroit, lost a mulatto slave in 1795 and his friend and colleague Captain Matthew Elliott sent a man David Tait to look for him in what is now Indiana. Tait's success or want of success is shown by his affidavit before George Sharp a justice of the peace for the Western District of Upper Canada residing in Detroit. The whole deposition will be given as it illustrates the terms on which the two peoples were living at the time in that country, and shows that even then the charges were made which were afterwards made one of the pretexts for the War of 1812. It is given in the Mich. Hist. Coll., Vol. XII, pp. 164, 165.
"Deposition
"I being sent by Captain Elliott in search of a Molato man name Bill the property of Colonel McKee, which was thought to be at Fort Wayne, But on my Arrival at the Glaize was inform'd by the officer there that he was gone, they said he had gained his liberty, by getting into their lines he being stole from their Country.
"They abused the Gentlemen in this place very & Told me that Governor Sancom (Simcoe) Colonel England and Captain Elliott caused bills in print to be dropped near their fort, Encouraging their Soldiers to desert.
"They called Coll McKee & Capt Elliott dam'd rasculs and said that they gave the Indians Rum to make them Drunk to prevent them from going to Counsil & That Capt Brent they said was a Dam'd rascul and had done everything in his power against them. But they said in Course of Nine Months that they Expected to be in full possession of Detroit and all the Country between their & it & I begged liberty to withdraw when Major Hunt told me to make the best of my way from Whence I came, while I was getting ready to return the Serjeant of their Guard came & Told me it was the Majors orders that I should leave the place immediately & not to stay about any of the Indian Camps. Which Orders I obeyed.
(signed) David Tait.Sworn before me at Detroit 4th August 1795.
Geo Sharp, J. P. W. D."
Indian Affairs, M. G. VII.
[15] I have found no reliable accounts of slaves in this region—some traditions which I have investigated proved unreliable and illusory.
[16] I cannot trace many Panis slaves in Upper Canada proper; that there were some at Detroit is certain and equally certain that some were at one time on both shores of the Niagara River. I do not know of an account of the numbers of slaves at the time; in Detroit, March 31, 1779, there were 60 male and 78 female slaves in a population of about 2,550 (Mich. Hist. Coll., X, p. 326); Nov. 1, 1780, 79 male and 96 female slaves in a somewhat smaller population (Mich. Hist. Coll., XIII, p. 53); in 1778, 127 in a population of 2,144 (Mich. Hist. Coll., IX, p. 469); 85 in 1773, 179 in 1782 (Mich. Hist. Coll., VII, p. 524); 78 male and 101 female (Mich. Hist. Coll., XIII, p. 54). The Ordinance of Congress July 13, 1787, forbidding slavery "northwest of the Ohio River" passed with but one dissenting voice, that of a delegate from New York was quite disregarded in Detroit (Mich. Hist. Coll., I, 415); and indeed as has been said, Detroit and the neighboring country remained British (de facto) until August, 1796, and part of Upper Canada from 1791 till that date.
[17] This is indicated by a number of facts none of much significance and all together far from conclusive—but it is a mere estimate perhaps not much more than a guess and I should not be astonished if it were proved that the estimate was astray by 100 either way. Indeed contemporary estimates gave for the Nassau District alone in 1791, 300 Negro slaves and a few Panis. Col. Mathew Elliott in 1784 brought more than 50 slaves to his estate at Amherstburg.
[18] See letter of Sheriff Sherwood, Papers &c., Ontario Historical Society 1901, Vol. 3, p. 107. Justus Sherwood came from Vermont, originally from Connecticut, joined Burgoyne's army in 1777 and came to Canada in 1778, joined Rogers' Rangers and served during the war. He came to Prescott in 1784. He had had a not unusual experience with the Continentals. His "Negro wench and two negroe children" had been seized and "sold to Wm. Drake." (Second Ont. Arch. Rep., 1904, p. 820.) Daniel Jones, father of Sir Daniel Jones of Brockville, came from Charlotte County, New York (ibid., p. 398). He was also a native of Connecticut.