(MILITARY AMERICAN REVOLUTION) The old master of manumitted

Sale 2598 - Lot 308

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(MILITARY--AMERICAN REVOLUTION.) The old master of manumitted slave Brister Warner claims his back pay. Manuscript document, 5 x 9 1/4 inches, and partly-printed document, 5 1/4 x 7 inches; folds, minor foxing. East Haddam and Hartford, CT, April-June 1781

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Brister or Bristol Warner was manumitted by his master Daniel Warner (1717-1801) in East Haddam, CT, and immediately enlisted in the 7th Connecticut Regiment in June 1777. The regiment fought in the Battles of Brandywine and Germantown that summer, contesting with the British over the possession of Philadelphia. Brister died in the service on 11 January 1778. Three years later, his former master successfully asked to receive the dead soldier's back pay--as seen in these documents.

These documents begin with testimony from the selectmen of the town of East Haddam, CT on 19 April 1781: "Daniel Warner's Negro man named Brister of East Haddam served in the Seventh Battalion in the Connecticutt Line of Continental Troops untill his death, being inlisted for three years. The said Brister had his freedom from his said master, but was not made free by any law of this state, but his said master stood accountable for his maintenance in case he had ever come to want." On the back, on 14 June 1781, Warner asks the selectmen to submit an order to the state "for the sum that shall be found to be due for the within named Brister's service as a soldier."

The second document is a receipt signed the next day by Warner's agent Robert Hungerford to the Pay Table Committee for "the payment of eight pounds, three shillings, & two pence [to] Daniel Warner, master & owner of a Negro man named Bristol."