Andrew Freeman (b. circa 1794 - d. after 1880)
MSA SC 5496-050628
Farm Laborer, Baltimore County, Maryland
Biography:
Born around 1794, Andrew Freeman was enslaved on John Griffin's farm in the 10th District of Baltimore County. The farm stood less than a mile south of the Clynmalira Methodist Church, with the Susquehannah Railroad line to the west and the Little Gunpowder River (the Harford County border) to the east.1 In 1850, Griffin's three slaves2 were raising cattle and hogs, as well as cultivating corn, oats, wheat, and potatoes.3
A veteran of the War of 1812,4 John Griffin (b. 1794)Idied in March 1860 after nearly a year of illness.5 He bequeathed two slaves and his 104-acre farm to his sister, Rebecca Ann Griffin.IJohn Griffin's will identified the two slaves as "the one named Andrew Freeman aged about sixty years (black), the other (mulatto) named Milton Griffin,"6 both slaves for life. The 1860 slave census, taken in August, listed Rebecca Ann Griffin as owning four slaves, including a sixty-two-year-old man who was likely Andrew Freeman.7
Maryland records do not indicate if Freeman received his liberty through manumission (liberation by the slaveholder) or emancipation (liberation by law). Since John Griffin's will designated Freeman a slave for life, he likely received his freedom on November 1, 1864, under Maryland's new Constitution. Baltimore County manumission records only survive up to 1851, and therefore cannot show if Rebecca Griffin manumitted Freeman before 1864.
In 1869, Freeman successfully sued the estate of Rebecca Ann Griffin, who had died intestate.8 Judges Richard Grason, George Yellott, and Alfred W. Bateman presided. Unfortunately, the civil papers containing the details of the case no longer exist.9 However, the one-page civil docket entry shows that Freeman received $521 in "damages with interest."10
The 1870 and 1880 census records for Baltimore County listed Freeman, a widower, as a farm laborer living with William and Mary Chatman.11 Mary Edwards Chatman (b. 1838)12 had joined Freeman in suing Rebecca Griffin's estate in 1869, and had received $483 in damages.13 William B. Chatman, an African American landowner,14 purchased the Griffin farm in 1871,15 although he was already listed as the owner in 1870.16 As a farm laborer, Freeman would have helped harvest the 500 bushels of corn, 340 bushels of oats, and 30 bushels of potatoes that the land produced in 1870.17
Andrew Freeman passed away sometime after 1880, when he last appeared
in the census. Unfortunately, Maryland's 1890 census no longer exists.
However, Maryland counties began keeping death records in 1898,19
so the absence of a death certificate for Freeman suggests that he died
before that year.
1. Baltimore County District
10, J. C. Sidney, Map of the City and County of Baltimore, 1850, Library
of Congress, MSA SC 1213-1-468.
Maryland Historical
Society. Maryland Historical Magazine. Vol. 1 (Baltimore, MD: J.H.
Furst, Company, 1906) 10.
George W.
Hilton.
The Ma & Pa: A History of the Maryland & Pennsylvania
Railroad. Second edition, revised (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1999) 67.
Bryan MacKay.
Baltimore
Trails: A Guide for Hikers and Mountain Bikers (Baltimore, MD: The
Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002) 102.
2. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for John Griffin, 1850, Slaves, Baltimore County, District 2, Page 11, Line 13 [MSA SM61-158, M 1504-3].
3. U.S. CENSUS BUREAU, (Census Record, MD), 1850, Agriculture, [MSA S1184-1]. John Griffin, Baltimore County, 2nd District, Line 35.
4. BALTIMORE COUNTY, REGISTER OF WILLS, (Wills), 1859-1865, Liber JLR 2, Folio 72, Film Reel: CR 117-2, [MSA CM188-26]. John Griffin, February 28, 1860. Probated May 22, 1860.
5. U.S. Census Bureau, (Census Record, MD), 1860, Mortality, [MSA S1184-9]. John Griffin, March 1860, Baltimore County, Tenth District, Line 8.
7. BALTIMORE COUNTY, REGISTER OF WILLS, (Wills), 1859-1865, Liber JLR 2, Folio 72, Film Reel: CR 117-2, [MSA CM188-26]. John Griffin, February 28, 1860. Probated May 22, 1860.
8. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Rebecca Ann Griffin, 1860, Slaves, Baltimore County, District 10, Page 3, Line 3 [MSA SM61-228, M 7229-4].
9. BALTIMORE COUNTY, REGISTER
OF WILLS, (Wills, Index), 1851-1908, Liber JEB 1. Film Reel: CR 11438-1,
[MSA CM189-2].
U.S. Census
Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Rebecca Griffin, 1860, Baltimore County,
District 10, Page 31, Line 33 [MSA SM61-198, M 7214-1].
10. BALTIMORE COUNTY, CIRCUIT COURT, (Civil Papers), 1879-1999, T697.
11. BALTIMORE COUNTY, CIRCUIT COURT,
(Civil Docket), Date: 1868-1870, Description: Liber EHA 9, Folio 70, Location:
02/48/14/008, MdHR Number: 20,222-8, MSA Citation: MSA C358-8. Andrew Freeman
vs. R. R. Boarman and J. T. Ensor, Admrs. of R. A. Griffin, dec'd.
"Proceedings
of the Courts."
Baltimore Sun 16 October 1869: 4. Baltimore Sun
Historical Archive. Enoch Pratt Free Library.
12. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record,
MD) for Andrew Freeman, 1870, Baltimore County, District 10, Page 46, Line
28 [MSA SM61-263, M 7235].
U.S.
Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Andrew Freeman, 1880, Baltimore County,
District 249, Page 19, Line 34 [MSA SM61-307, M 4732].
13. BALTIMORE CITY, HEALTH DEPARTMENT BUREAU OF VITAL STATISTICS, (Death Record), Film Reel: CR 48241, [MSA CM1132-198]. Irving Chatman, July 26, 1936, Baltimore City, Certificate Number F-26060.
14. BALTIMORE COUNTY, CIRCUIT COURT, (Civil Docket), 1868-1870, Liber EHA 9, Folio 70, [MSA C358-8]. Andrew Freeman vs. R. R. Boarman and J. T. Ensor, Admrs. of R. A. Griffin, dec'd.
15. BALTIMORE COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT, (Land Records), 1867-1868, Liber EHA 57, Folio 223, [MSA CE 62-57.] Edward R. Price and Penelope Price to heirs of Jonathan Chatman, October 5, 1867.
16. BALTIMORE COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT, (Land Records), 1871-1871, Liber EHA 70, Folio 429, [MSA CE 62-70]. Elizabeth Ann Ensor to William Chatman, May 17, 1871.
17. U.S. Census Bureau, (Census Record, MD), 1870, Agriculture, [MSA S1184-11]. Wm. Chatman, Baltimore County, Tenth District, Line 34.
18. Baltimore City began keeping death
records in 1875, but Freeman does not appear in these records, either.
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