John Robinson (b. circa 1815 - d. ?)
MSA SC 5496-3351
Accomplice to slave flight, Baltimore County, Maryland, 1841
Biography:
Beginning in the seventeenth century,
concerning principally runaway indentured servants, Maryland's lawmakers
hoped to deter citizens from aiding fugitives by stiff penalities and prison
terms. By the nineteenth century, with the focus primarily upon enslaved
black runaways, laws targeted free black would-be accomplices most notably
(see Laws
of Maryland, 1796, ch. 67; and, Laws
of Maryland, 1818, ch. 157). Demographics in Maryland created
a close, personal aquaintance -- often familial -- between enslaved blacks
and free blacks. Because of this, slaves on the run could be provided
with all manner of assistance (information, hidding places, food, money,
transportation, travel papers, etc.). Where family or familiarity
were absent, sometimes it seems simple empathy caused free blacks to risk
themselves for the sake of a slave on the run. Such was likely the
case for John Robinson of Baltimore. A native Norfolk, Virginia,
Robinson came to Baltimore to practice his trade, stone cutting.
Though details of the case have yet to be recovered, in February 1841,
the twenty-six year old Robinson began a three year sentence in the Maryland
Penitentiary for aiding and abetting a slave to runaway.
Return to John Robinson's Introductory Page
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