Samuel Davis (b. circa 1810 - d. ?)
MSA SC 5496-050569
Accomplice to slave flight, Cracklin District, Montgomery County,
Maryland, 1842
Biography:
On September 10, 1842, a free African American farmer named Samuel Davis helped a slave named Henry to escape from Ann Griffith's farm. Davis did not appear in the 1832 census of free African Americans in Montgomery County, so he may have only recently acquired his own freedom. He was unmarried and illiterate.1 That month, another freeman, Charles Toogood, assisted in the escapes of Ann Griffith's slave Phile and Frederick Gaither's slave Nick. According to the court papers, Toogood provided information regarding Davis's involvement in Henry's escape.2
The Montgomery County Circuit Court sentenced Samuel Davis to five years and eight months in the Maryland Penitentiary for "enticing, advising and aiding" Henry in running away. The trial's minutes show Henry Gaither and George F. Kidwell as the state's witnesses against Davis. His sentence began on November 22, 1842.3
On November 28th, the Baltimore Sun briefly mentioned Davis and Toogood as "two negroes...convicted for enticing slaves to leave their masters" in Montgomery County. The article also mentioned another slave who was incarcerated "for attempting to poison the family of a Mr. Clements."4 The slave, named Harriet, had supposedly tried to poison the Clements' in September, through the encouragement of a slave named Cyrus. Although Harriet's and Cyrus's court papers were stored with Davis's and Toogood's, so far only the September dates and the Sun's record link the the two sets of conspirators.
Unfortunately, we lose track of Samuel Davis following his release from
prison on July 22, 1848. An 1826 Maryland law required all free blacks
exiting the state's prisons to leave Maryland by the end of sixty days.
If Davis had remained in Maryland past the deadline, he would have faced
enslavement for the same number of years as the sentence he had just completed.
The law also instructed prison authorities to pay these banished prisoners
a sum "not exceeding thirty dollars, at their discretion," but did not
specify a minimum sum.5
1. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Samuel Davis, 1840, Montgomery County, Cracklin District, Page 21, Line 14 [MSA SM61-113, M 4722].
2. MONTGOMERY COUNTY, CIRCUIT COURT, (Court Papers), [MSA T414-52], November Term 1842: State of Maryland vs. Samuel Davis, vs. Charles Toogood, and vs. Negro Harriet [Miscellaneous Papers].
3. Ibid.
4. "[Untitled]." Baltimore Sun 28 November 1842: 2. Baltimore Sun Historical Archive. Enoch Pratt Free Library.
5. GENERAL ASSEMBLY (Laws), 1826-1827. Description: Acts of 1826, Chapter 229, Section 9. MdHR 820911, 2/2/6/13.
6. Christopher Phillips.
Freedom's Port: The African American Community of Baltimore, 1790-1860
(Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1997) 193.
Return to Samuel Davis's Introductory Page
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