Detail from "The Death of Major Pierson," 1782-84, oil painting by John Singleton Copley depicting a black soldier fighting for the British during the American Revolution. Black soldiers in Dunmore's Royal Ethiopian Regiment had "Liberty to Slaves" embroidered on their uniforms.-Tate Gallery.

"Patriots"

Blacks involved in the events of the American Revolution are not unknown. The first shot heard around the world may have actually been buried into Crispus Attucks' chest, a runaway slave born to an African father and a Natwick Nantucket Indian mother. He, along with what later Founding Father John Adams would derisively refer to as "a motley rabble of saucy boys, negroes and mullatoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs," confronted a British guard at the local customs house of Boston--the climax to ongoing tensions between sailors and soldiers competing for work. In an ensuing melee British soldiers marched on the group of thirty, firing directly into the crowd and killing Attucks. Patriot activists such as the Sons of Liberty would whitewash the actors in this deadly confrontation, making it more palatable to white colonists, and dub it The Boston Massacre of 1770--a key symbol of British repression.

When the Revolutionary war finally broke out numerous blacks joined the ranks of the Continental Army. Free blacks like Cuff Smith and Cesar Prince enlisted to fight the British. The founder of African American freemasonry, Barbadian-born Prince Hall, is himself listed in military records of the Revolution. And it is said he fought at Bunker Hill. Pictures also show free black infantrymen in the first Rhode Island Regiment or speak of them among other troops. A great deal of these free blacks enlisted in the Continental army hoping their service would help the newly forming nation live up to its creed of freedom, and grant it to their black brethren held in bondage. Many enslaved blacks also attempted to join the Continental army, some of them successful and others of them returned to their masters. Quite a few offered to fight for the colonists, if they would be ensured freedom for themselves and their family in return.

Black and white Minutemen of the colonial militia

Of particular interest were the regiments of free men of color from Haiti. About 750 Haitian freemen, then the French colony of Saint-Domingue, fought alongside colonial troops against the British in the Siege of Savannah on Oct. 9, 1779. Later Haitian revolutionary and ruler Henri Christophe--at the time only a 12-year-old-boy-- is also thought to have served with French forces on the side of the colonists in the American Revolution.

Where blacks probably figured the greatest in the Continental forces was within the navy, where sailors were not as rigidly restricted by color or race. The Continental Navy openly recruited both free and enslaved blacks, mostly sought after for their prior experiences on merchant and British military vessels. Numerous blacks, many of them slaves seeking escape and freedom, sought refuge in the navy where they served in battles against the British. A common practice among some white slave owners was to in fact substitute a slave for military service rather than enlisting themselves. Taking on tasks such as pilots, laborers and more these blacks earned an impressive reputation for their invaluable skills. One of the most famous black seamen was James Forten, who enlisted on the privateer Royal Louis. Altogether, it is believed some 5,000 free black patriots served in the armies and navies of the Continental forces. However the majority of blacks who remained enslaved in the 13 colonies did not fight for their masters; they instead chose the other side.

"Loyalists"

While there were blacks among the colonists ranks, many of them free, large numbers of enslaved blacks who became part of the Revolutionary War found themselves on the side of the British. Threats by the British of "arming slaves" against its rebellious colonies instilled fear in places like Virginia and helped unify varied classes of white colonists. These fears and threats became reality when in 1775 the Royal Governor of Virginia Lord Dunmore, under seige by an encroaching colonial militia, issued in desperation his famous proclamation granting freedom to those slaves who would rally to his side.

 "...I do require every Person capable of bearing Arms, to resort to His MAJESTY'S STANDARD, or be looked upon as Traitors to His MAJESTY'S Crown and Government, and thereby become liable to the Penalty the Law inflicts upon such Offenses; such as forfeiture of Life, confiscation of Lands, &. &. And I do hereby further declare all indented Servants, Negroes, or others, (appertaining to Rebels,) free that are able and willing to bear Arms, they joining His MAJESTY'S Troops as soon as may be, for the more speedily reducing this Colony to a proper Sense of their Duty, to His MAJESTY'S Crown and Dignity."--Lord Dunmore's Proclamation, Nov 7 1775.

Many slaves, weighing their options between their masters and their masters' enemies, chose the latter. In truth, Dunmore's hand had in a way been pushed by the slaves themselves. Earlier, when first making the threats he thought would cow the colonists, Dunmore was surprised when several slaves appeared at the Governor's mansion, eager and ready to take up arms. Alarmed that he had overplayed his hand, Dunmore quickly sent the slaves away. However the news of Dunmore's intent spread rapidly among the slave populace, and when the actual call was made, hundreds came to his aid, securing his escape at one point and routing the colonial militia. As tales of Dunmore's proclamation spread, the institution of slavery in the colonies was thrown into tumult.

During the war an estimated 100,000 slaves took advantage of the disruption to run away, many of them heading directly to join British forces. Others fled to Canada, Florida, or Native American lands. Thomas Jefferson estimated that Virginia lost 30,000 slaves in just one year. Fugitive slave Boston King was one of these individuals, risking punishment or death to flee from bondage. He endured numerous harrowing adventures during his escape, finally making it to the British forces stationed in New York where most black runaways were gathered.

Some of these runaways joined the British armies and navies outright, becoming fighters who wreaked havoc on American forces. One of the most well known of these was Colonel Tye, an escaped slave who joined the British as a guerilla fighter. In 1778 at the Battle of Monmouth, New Jersey Tye captured a captain of the American militia, earning a reputation and name among the British. Comprised of enslaved blacks and lower class whites loyalists, Colonel Tye's rag-tag band became known as "cow-boys". They carried out daring militia attacks throughout New Jersey, often attacking military outposts, former masters' plantations and other Americans in rebellion against the British.

During the brutal winter of 1779, Tye was among an elite group of twenty-four black Loyalists, known as the Black Brigade, who joined with the Queen's Rangers: a British guerrilla unit charged with protecting British held New York City and carrying out raids for supplies. By 1780 Tye and his band were feared by white members of the American forces: capturing and killing Continental militia members, destroying their military equipment and more.

As news of Colonel Tye's feats reached an excited slave community, the American governor of NJ in a desperate move invoked martial law - hoping to stop many slaves from going over to the British. Tye's end came in the Autumn of 1780 after a minor wound in a skirmish turned fatal. But his military exploits would become the stuff of legends.

And not only enslaved blacks joined the British forces. Some free blacks, believing the British would guarantee a better freedom for their black brethren in bondage, urged blacks to join the redcoats as well. In 1775, Jeremiah Thomas, a pilot, fisherman, "and Free Negroe of considerable property", was hanged and burned in Charleston in an insurrection plot in which he enticed free and enslaved blacks to join the Royal British navy.

Treatment by the British however was not often better than that of the Continental army. Many blacks found themselves placed in slave-like conditions in disease-ridden British camps, to perform menial tasks and hard labor to support white troops. Others were forcibly returned to their Loyalist owners. And some were even captured and traded as prizes of war by British soldiers and officers.

With the end of the Revolutionary War and the defeat of the British, many blacks who had allied with the British found themselves in a dangerous predicament. Fearing punishment and death if captured by American militiamen, many fled to New York and sought refuge with the British forces gathered there. But part of the treaty signed with the colonies demanded the return of property--especially slaves, whose owners came looking for them. Heart-wrenching stories tell of slaves jumping in the water after departing British ships, whose sailors hacked away at their grabbing arms with cutlasses. Some British partially kept their reward. General Guy Carelton, calling the British agreement to return slaves a "breach of faith," drew up a list of some 3,000 blacks--the Book of Negroes--that would be rescued. Many were resettled in Nova Scotia--where they eventually faced poverty, starvation and neglect, some leaving for the African colony of Sierra Leone. Some of the unfortunate blacks that escaped to Savannah and Charleston were allowed to evacuate with their British allies as well, who promptly resold many of them back into bondage in the Caribbean. Most of however were returned as "stolen property" to their colonial American owners

Maroons

The notion of black "Loyalists," or even perhaps "Patriots," has been the subject of debate. While there were blacks who fought for the colonists and the British, their fate was always precarious at best. Runaway slaves often faced capture and abuse in the tumult of war by bandits and fighters on all sides. And there was always the harsh possibility that their British allies--to whom they were often little more than valuable property--would quickly sell them off. Worse still, many found themselves relegated back to slave status in British camps, where they worked as hard labor or at subservient menial tasks. Facing complete disorder and fearing economic instability, many British forces actually turned back slave runaways, trying to dampen expectations their earlier proclamations had produced. Some historians tend to suggest that in the end blacks fought and allied themseles on the side of freedom--with whomever and wherever that lay--rather than either competing forces.

There were slave runaways who refused to fully join either the American or British forces, waging guerrilla campaigns of their own even long after the Revolution had ended. Some of these had received prior training from the British, but opted to seek freedom on their own rather than be reenslaved on the American mainland or the Caribbean.

In one such instance, in Georgia, a large group of men and women erected twenty-one houses and planted rice fields in a clearing near the Savannah River. The site was estimated to measure 700 yards long and 120 yards wide, and was protected by a four-foot high log-and-cane barrier. From this base in the swamps two escaped slaves dubbed "Captain Cudjoe" and "Captain Lewis" led an armed group of 100 men who called themselves "the King of England's Soldiers" in punishing guerilla attacks on plantations and state troops. They posed such a threat that in 1785 a joint Georgia and South Carolina military expedition was sent after them. Lewis was captured, tried and hanged - his head placed on a pole and displayed as a warning.

But this didn't stop numerous other escaped slave communities, created during the upheaval of Revolution, often called maroons as were their brethren in the Caribbean, from continuing their semi-independent status well into the early 1800s.

References & Further Reading:

George F. Jones. “The Black Hessians: Negroes Recruited by the Hessians in South Carolina and other Colonies,” South Carolina Historical Magazine, 83 (October 1982): 287-302.

Sylvia R. Frey. Water from the Rock: Black Resistance in the Revolutionary Age. (1993)

Woody Holton. Forced Founders: Indians, Debtors, Slaves and the Making of the American Revolution in Virginia. (1999)

Benjamin Quarles. The Negro in the American Revolution. (1961)

Africans in America- PBS- American Revolution

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part2/2narr4.html