1729

Freedom seekers establish a mountain refuge in Virginia

Upper James River and neighboring mountains, Virginia

Lieutenant Governor William Gooch reported that about fifteen enslaved people escaped with provisions, tools, bedding and weapons and began clearing land in a mountain refuge. An armed party pursued them, wounded one person and forced the group to return.

Dates preserve the source’s precision. This entry is part of a selected historical record; its qualifications and sources are retained below.

Context / qualification

The account survives here through a published excerpt of Gooch’s letter. It shows an attempted independent settlement and its suppression; it does not establish the participants’ names, a precise site or the duration of the refuge.

Sources

• Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States, chapter 2, p. 33; supplied print pages, edition/year unidentified
• William Gooch to the Board of Trade (1729), excerpt reproduced in Who Built America?, “Suppression of a Community of Freedom Seekers,” citing Sally Hadden, Slave Patrols, p. 30 ↗

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