Mar 01, 2012 - Sale 2271

Sale 2271 - Lot 8

Price Realized: $ 840
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION--COLONIAL.) SKIDMORE, JOSEPH & NATHANIEL TOEKER ("TUCKER"). Handwritten slave sale document wherein Joseph Skidmore purchases a slave named Ned from Nathaniel Toeker. 8vo, single page, written on one side, signed by Nathaniel Toeker, as well as Daniel Smith and Isaac Biggs, witnesses for Skidmore; red seal at the foot of the page, next to Toeker's signature. Brookhaven, 1761

Additional Details

Joseph Skidmore (1685-1773) was the owner of several slaves. In 1756, slaves made up about 25 percent of the populations of Kings, Queens, Richmond, New York, and Westchester counties. Free blacks lived in New York at risk of enslavement. The colonial courts ruled that if a white person claimed his black employee was a slave, the burden was on the black person to prove he was not. Blacks on the street who could give no plausible account of their movements or proof of their freedom were often picked up by the authorities and jailed on suspicion of being runaway slaves. Local authorities had all but unlimited power in such cases.