Enslaved Persons
As part of research for her Gold Award Project, Amelia Johnson uncovered the history and names of enslaved persons that played a role in the Rice Rivers Center property.
Amelia Johnson's Gold Award report
The role of enslaved people in supporting agriculture, industry and lifestyle, while building wealth and prosperity for white colonists, must be recognized. Through primary documents like wills and deeds, and Emmaus Baptist Church records, the following names have been identified, as the beginning of a narrative that might be told:
Littlebury Cocke’s daughter Rebecca Cocke inherited 36 enslaved people along with Westbury in 1773, upon her marriage compact with James Bray Johnson: “Betty, Pam, Rachel, Will, Tom, Frank, Taga, Suky, Jenny, and Lucinda” after the death of her mother Rebecca Hubbard Cocke, 16 “Slaves from Tyree” named “Rosamond, Lucy, Dick, Abram, Affrica, Beck, Moses, Diley, Wilson, Jacob, Aaron, Mary, Jenny, Mourning, Judith, and Kitty”, and 10 enslaved persons belonging to Littlebury Cocke’s estate- “Dick, Scott, Glasgow, Sarah, Cutehenah, Judith, Harry, Sam, Betty, and Silvia.”38
Littlebury Cocke’s will also names at least 21 enslaved household members, many which seem to overlap the list above. This is retained separately due to inclusion of some age and occupation details that may be useful for ancestry searches: “Dick, Glasgow, Scott (a carpenter), Harry (a boy), Sall and two children (Suky and Jenny), Rachel (a girl), Cutte (a girl), Judith and two children (Lydia and Sarah), Betty and two children (Lucy and Frank), Sara and child Taga, Tom (a boy), Sam (a boy), Betty (a girl), Billey (a boy).”39
Mariner Robert Walker’s 1780 will named at least 7 enslaved people to be given to his wife and daughter: Peter, Grace, George, children of Old George, and Sukey and Hannah, daughters of Nan.40
Samuel Tyler, cousin of 10th US President John Tyler, owned at least 11 slaves who contributed to the development of what is now the Rice Center property. As listed in minutes from the Emmaus Baptist Church: Edmund Tyler, Ned Watkins, Wilson Tyler, Kitty, Sary, Betty, Jinney Sweat, Lonnon, Charlotte, Feby, and Peter Royster. Other enslaved persons were attributed to his son Lewis Tyler: Betty Reed, Salley, Kinny, and Rose Smith.41 Records from Lewis Tyler’s estate name more enslaved people: Maria and three children, Old Abby, Patty, Armistead, his wife, two children, Godfrey, James Ellis, Old London, Peter Leppin, Lockey, Zach, Letty, Rose, Anne, Nancy, and Milly and three children. More information may be found in the cited estate papers.
Furthermore, an 1863 Confederate map by Jeremy Francis Gilmer confirms accommodations for enslaved persons on Rice Rivers Center land. Dots indicating probable enslaved quarters are located between the house of an “Overseer” and residences of the Harrison family.
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38 CC Deeds & Wills, 1766-1774: 496-499.
39 Martha W. McCartney, “The Walter Aston Site (44CC178) and Westbury Plantation (44CC103, 44CC179, and 44CC180,” Virginia Department of Historic Resources, 1989: 113.
40 Robert Walker &C By Etc v. Exts of Robert Walker (1789), 1789-001, Virginia Memory, https://www.lva.virginia.gov/chancery/case_detail.asp?CFN=036-1789-001.
41 Emmaus Baptist Church, Emmaus Baptist Church Minutes 1792-1841, pages 18-21, 170, 173, 175, 176, 178, and 179.