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 THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE BALEKA FAMILY IN AMERICA: A CASE STUDY

Excerpt from Balanta B’urassa, My Sons: Those Who Resist Remain Volume III

My son, we have now come to that pivotal moment where we begin to recount the actual events in the history of our family in America. The telling of the story begins with your great, great grand Uncle Eustace Blake, who, on August 9, 1974, stated,

"Our forefathers were George, Jack, Yancey. Yancey Blake married Melissa Page. Yancey begat nine children by Melissa. Two boys and seven girls. Boys: Yancey Jr and John Addison (grandfather of Eustace). During the civil war a group of Federal Soldiers came pass the house of my grandfather (Yancey Blake), Yancey Blake Jr. joined them and was never heard from anymore.”

The 1870 Census for Wake County, North Carolina, lists your great, great, great, great grandfather Yancey Blake age 51 years old and born in North Carolina in 1819. His mother, Lydia is listed as 70 years old. This places her birth in 1799-1800.

Estimating that Yancey’s father Jack was thirty years old when Yancey was born in 1819, that would make Jack’s birth sometime around 1788. Again, assuming that Jack’s father George was himself about 30 years of age at the time of Jack’s birth, that would put George’s date of birth sometime around 1758. Since Eustace listed no other ancestor, it is likely that George was the first of our family in America. Since the names “George” and “Jack” as well as the surname “Blake” are all English names, and since slaves were not permitted to use their actual names, and many took the surname of their masters, it is likely that George was bought and owned by an Englishman. In light of the fact that the English became very active in the slave trade at the ports in Cacheu and Bissau, and further, that the majority of Balanta captives that were taken were women and children, not only is it likely, but even more probable that George was captured as a boy between the age of 2 and 12 by either Bijago, Papel, or Mandinka of Kaabu and eventually sold to an English slave trader before the America Revolution, when English and American slave trading to the region ceased temporarily. Most likely George was brought to Barbados, Virginia, South Carolina or Georgia from where either he, his son Jack, or his grandson Yancey was brought to North Carolina.

Yancey Blake is not listed in the 1860 Census, but he is listed in the 1870 Census which suggests that he obtained “emancipation” as a result of the Civil War and after 1865 with the passage of the 13th and 14th amendments. However, family historian Ella Arrington Williams-Vinson writes in her book, Both Sides of the Tracks II: Recollections of Cary, North Carolina 1860 -2000: “ THE COLORED FAMILIES – All landowners before the 1860’s were the Bateses, Hawkinses, Blakes, Nicholases, Roths, and Joneses – the earliest Colored families in Cary….” I do not know the source for her information. Nevertheless, to discover the lost history of our family that begins with the capture of George and ends with the emancipation of Yancey – two and one half generations – I started the search for slave owners with the names George, Jack, Yancey and Blake in Wake County, North Carolina where Yancey is known to have lived. I found two listings.

1.       Randolph Blake living in Montgomery County (southwest of Wake County), listed in 1787 North Carolina State Census

2.       Dempsey Blake is listed in the 1790 Census for Wake County, North Carolinas owning 7 slaves.

Dempsey Blake (Massey)

By the time of the 1810 Census, Dempsey Blake is listed as owning just one slave.

Dempsey Blake was born in 1757 in Wake, North Carolina. His father was Joseph B. Blake and his mother was Elizabeth Hobgood. He had brothers named Asa Blake and Sessums Blake. Dempsey married Susannah Sorrell and fathered Anna Blake, Patsey Massey, Asa Blake, Betsy Blake, and Mary Page. According to Wake County Records, Dempsey Blake was granted 552 acres on both sides of Crabtree Creek in 1779. Which Crabtree Creek? The one north of Raleigh or the one west of Raleigh? Since my great, great, great Grandfather John Addison Blake built our family church in Cary, NC, my hunch is that Dempsey’s land grant was on the western Crabtree Creek. However, According to the book Southern Blakes by Kate Blake,

“Now note this grant of land, for it concerns the Blakes - April 27th, 1753, Earl Granville granted James McIlroy (McKelroy) 250 acres of land in Johnston County, N.C. Land on North Side of Nuese river in Johnston County, N.C. ‘begin at a White Oak below his (McKleroy’s) mill swamp, and running north 160 poles to a hicory, thence west 250 poles to the point of beginning.’ Said Grant being No. 734, Book 14, page 233, in Land Office, Raleigh, N.C.

Note: - This land was located on Walnut Creek, and fell into Wake County when that county was formed, 1771, and it is located about three or four miles south of Raleigh.

December 30, 1754, James McElroy sold the said tract of land to William Blake Sr. - he of Granville County. . . . By 1756, William Blake No.2 had moved to Johnston County, to the land he had purchased of James McKleroy. The proof that it was this William is in the following deed: William Blake, of County of Johsnton, province of North Carolina, Dec. 5th, 1756, for a consideration of 20 pounds sold John Coggan, of Granville County, 250 acres ‘Plantation said Coggan now lives on, being 1/2 of a tract of 500 acres granted to john Alston, on south side of Conway Greek in Granville County….’

Note: - The description of this land was the same as that wherein William Blake bought of Rollison, 1750 . . . Again, William Blake, of Johnston County, June 6th, 1758, deeded 150 acres of land on north side of Fishing Creek in Granville County, to James Thompson. ‘Said land belonging to William Blake and taken out of said William Blake’s tract.’ . . .

Then, there were a few deeds in the records of Johnston County,which threw a minor light on our subject:

James Simmons, March 20th, 1761, gave deed to William Blake, Sr., both of Johnston County, 300 acres by estimate, in St. Stephen’s Parish - \Beginning on south side of Crabtree Creek in Johnston County, at fir tree on line of William Hurst, east to Baker’s on Crabtree Creek in Johnston County — etc. . . .

In this deed there is mention in the corner of James MaKleroy - the party from whom William Blake made his original purchase in Johnston County, later Wake County. It may be said here that no part of Walnut Creek and Crabtree Creek is in the Johnston County of the present day - they are wholly in Wake since that county was formed. Crabtree Creek runs from west to east and passes Raleigh about three or four miles north; while Walnut Creek is about the same distance to the south, and runs from west to east, and both flow into the Nuese River, as can been seen from a good map.’

Now the Blakes, William Sr. and William Jr. – father and son – held the tract of land on Walnut Creek near Raleigh, for a period of nearly thirty years; 14 years while it was in old Johnston County, and the remainder of that period while it was in Wake County.’”

Erin Bradford, Reference Librarian at the Government and Heritage Library, North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, found the following additional information concerning Dempsey Blake’s ownership of slaves in the deed book abstracts for Wake County:

1.       1788 Aug 29 – Asa Blake of York County, VA to Dempsey (Asa’s brother) a man named Ned

2.       1788 Oct 26 – Jacob Wood sold several slaves to Dempsey.

·       Woman named Milly

·       Boy named Barry

·       Boy named David

·       Boy named Sam

·       Girl named Sarah

3.       1799 Jan 22 – Asa and Dempsey sold slaves to a man named John Nicholds (sic)

·       Woman Lucy age 33

·       Boy Abraham age 9

·       Boy Charles age 2 months

Bradford writes, “As far as the 7th slave goes and what happened to the 6 who were not there in 1810, I haven’t found. There are only deed book abstracts that go to 1800 for Wake County. Ideas for where the 7th slave came from is wills of family members – not just direct, but indirect relatives such as in-laws as slaves that were bequeathed to his wife, if he was married, would be included in the slave count for 1800 and 1810 census. I did find he purchased from several estates before 3 estates before 1800 and 1 estate in 1800, which is another possible source, but the abstract only listed the names of purchasers, not what they bought. In 1797 he bought from the estate of John Jones and William Brown. Asa also purchased from William Brown’s estate. In 1799, he purchased from the estate of Theophilus Hunter and in 1800 he purchased from the estate of James “Waldrope” (in another source, he is James Wardrope).

However, according to the North Carolina Wills and Probate Records, 1819 for “Demsey Blake”, he bequeathed to his son Asa Blake his “negro man Jack”.

Thus, there is now documented that, in the year 1819 (the year Yancey Blake was born) there was a Negro slave, of childrearing age, named Jack, in Wake County, North Carolina who was owned by Dempsey Blake and then his son, Asa Blake. This fits my calculations exactly, for Jack, father of Yancey, would have been about 30 years old in 1819.

Moreover, Yancey Blake is listed as residing in House Creek, Wake Co, North Carolina in the 1870 Census. In 1852, Yancey’s daughter Melissa Blake is listed as being born in House Creek, NC and in 1858, Yancey’s son John Addison, my great, great, great grandfather, is also listed as being born at House Creek, Wake Co., NC.

Dempsey Blake’s father, Joseph B. Blake, was born in 1727 in the Isle of Wight, Isle of Wight County, Virginia and died in Wake County, North Carolina on August 19, 1771 at the age of 44 (Wake Co., N.C. Will Book No. 1, page 8-9).

Southern Blake Ancestry

Joseph B. Blakes’s father, William Blake I, was born around 1680 in Nottoway Parish, Surry County, Virginia. According to the book Southern Blakes by Kate Blake,

“There is ample proof that Thomas Blake who settled in Isle of Wight County, Virginia, was a ship owner of considerable wealth. There is also proof that he was paid in land for the numerous indentured people he brought to Virginia Colony. He owned at least two ships, accumulated property in the new world and sometime around 1664, settled permanently in Isle of Wight.

Thomas Blake was the grandson of Sir Robert Blake and the son of one of the two sons of Sir Robert. The proof is not conclusive yet just which one was his father. However, this much we know: Sir Robert’s younger brother settled in what is now South Carolina and the records of the day refer frequently to him as ‘the brother of that illustrious Sir Robert.’ Sir Robert Blake was born in 1599 and died in 1657. He became famous in the War with Holland. When Civil War raged in England between Parliament and Charles the First, his naval forces destroyed the Squadron of Prince Rupert, the Royalist General. For this he was made Commander-in-Chief of the English Fleet. He won four victories over the Dutch Admiral, Martin Tromp, in 1652 and 1653, resulting in England becoming Mistress of the Seas.

Blake was sent by Cromwell to the Mediterranean Sea in 1654 to avenge British insults to the British Flag and near Tunis he attacked and destroyed a fortified harbor. Tunis and Algiers made terms at once, releasing all prisoners and paying an indemnity.

Blake also made a bold attack on the Spanish Fleet at Santa Cruz in the Canary Islands. He seized booty amounting to $14,000,000. He died of scurvy on his way home, while in sight of Plymouth (1657). Sir Robert was knighted for his services in 1654. The details are adequately told in any good encyclopedia.”

Concerning the ancestors of Sir Robert Blake, The website “The Blakes of Robison County, N.C.” states his genealogy thus:

“1.  THOMAS13 BLAKE (WILLIAM12, WILLIAM11, ROBERT10, HUMPHREY9, JOHN8 BLAQUE, ROBERT7 BLAKE, ROBERT6, HENRY5, WILLIAM4, HENRY3, RICHARD2 BLAQUE, ROBERT E.1 BLAKE)

When Lord Humphrey William Blake was born on October 13, 1500, in Andover, Hampshire, England, his father, William, was 35 and his mother, Mary, was 31. He married Agnes Littleton on June 2, 1519, in Rutland, England. They had 14 children in 32 years. He died on December 28, 1558, at the age of 58, and was buried in Over Stowey, Somerset, England.

When William BLAKE was born in 1465 in Calne, Wiltshire, England, his father, Robert, was 55 and his mother, Margaret, was 58. He married Mary Coles and they had one son together. He then married Mary Cole in 1493 in Andover, Hampshire, England. He died on June 20, 1547, in Andover, Hampshire, England, having lived a long life of 82 years.

When Robert de Calne Blake was born in 1410 in Calne, Wiltshire, England, his father, Henry, was 25 and his mother, Margaret, was 25. He married Alice Avice Wallop and they had 11 children together. He then married Margaret BELLETT and they had one son together. He died on October 29, 1474, at the age of 64.

When Henry Blake was born in 1385 in Calne, Wiltshire, England, his father, William, was 25 and his mother, Elizabeth, was 25. He married Margaret Bellett in 1410 in England. They had one child during their marriage. He died on October 29, 1467, in his hometown, having lived a long life of 82 years.

When William Blake was born in 1360 in Calne, Wiltshire, England, his father, Henry, was 25 and his mother, Elizabeth, was 25. He had one son with Elizabeth Power in 1385. He died in his hometown.

Henry BLAKE was born in 1335 in Calne, Wiltshire, England, the son of Anne and Sir Robert. He had one son with Elizabeth DURANT in 1360. He died in his hometown.

Sir Robert BLAKE (de BLAKELAND) was born in 1300 in Calne, Wiltshire, England, the son of Robert. He had three children with Anne COLE. He died in his hometown.

Robert de BLAKELAND had one son in 1300. He died in 1347.”

Returning to Kate Blake’s Southern Blakes,

“The South Carolina Blakes, who have descended from sir Robert Blake’s brother, have already been dealt with in numerous papers, but the reader is referred to South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine under Blake of South Carolina, Vol. 1, No. 2 pages 153 to 166, Charleston, S.C. year 1900.

I mention this branch of the family first because much confusion about their lineage still exists. Some of the South Carolina Blakes did in fact migrate to Georgia at about the same time as our William Blake came to Georgia from North Carolina. Our Blakes, descendants of Thomas Blake of Isle of Wight, reached Georgia after settling for almost thirty years in North Carolina. They trekked through the Smokey Mountains in Cherokee Country (Tennessee) and arrived in Georgia (Wilkes County) shortly after the end of the Revolutionary War. William Blake and wife, Lucy, together with many other families, left Wake County at the end of 1783 and arrived in Wilkes County in 1785, along with a cavalcade of families and they were popularly known in those days as North Carolina Georgians, Governor Gilmer’s ‘Settlers of Northern Georgia’ gives a splendid account of these people. . . .

Thomas Blake made his Will 30 January 1707, Will Book 2, page 501 Isle of Wight, Va. Records. THOMAS BLAKE married Alice (last name unknown). He settled Isle of Wight Co. (Nottoway Parish) Virginia, about 1660. [His] son, William Blake No. 1 married Mary Sessoms about January 1704, daughter of Nicholas and Katherine Sessoms. William Blake made his Will Nov. 1, 1742 and it was probated March 12, 1746, Isle of Wight Records, Va.

CHILDREN OF WILLIAM BLAKE AND MARY SESSOMS

** William Blake No. 2, John d. 1774, Wm. Blake No. 3 was the executor of his uncle’s estate; Hannah; Mary; Thomas; Sessoms; Joseph (Deceased Aug 19, 1771) Wake Co., N.C. (Will Book No. 1, page 8-9); Benjamin. William Blake No. 2 married (wife’s name unknown). He moved to Edgecombe County, N.C., 1744 and was a member of the Granville County Militia 1755. ISSUE Sarah married William Cheek; ***William Blake No. 3 married Lucy (Allen) Mobley on May 23, 1780 in Wake County, N.C.”

According to Ancestors of Frank Pierce Davis and Mary Hinton Duke on the website, http://www.ncgenweb.us/ncwarren/fam-hist/families/davis-duke.htm

“Virginia has plenty of Blake families in various counties before 1700.  There are Blakes in York, Surry, Nansemond, and Isle of Wight counties, to name a few.  It is reported that one of the Nansemond Blakes was provoked by a series of events and ended up moving to the Shenandoah Valley in western Virginia.  He then changed his name to Black and later donated the land for the town of Blacksburg where VPI (Virginia Tech) is now located. . . .

William Blake (Sr.) was born about 1670 in Isle of Wight County, Virginia and married Mary Sessums of Surry County about 1703.  Both families lived next to the county line, a probably only a couple miles apart.  Possibly as a wedding gift, his father-in-law Nicholas Sessums gave him and his wife 200 acres of land to start off life with.  William wasted no time buying more land in both Surry and Isle of Wight Counties.  Some of his children are only mentioned in the will of his father-in-law. . . .

William Blake (Jr.) was born about 1706 in Isle of Wight County, Virginia and married Elizabeth ---, possibly a Coffield or a Tynes.  He bought and sold a piece of property in Isle of Wight County before migrating to North Carolina.

He . . . purchase[d] land in the Fishing Creek region when he bought 300 acres in 1745.  He assisted in building a new road into the Fishing Creek region in 1753.  There are conflicting records as to whether he was a mill operator.   He did not leave a will, but Granville County tax lists and his gift of land to his son-in-law William Cheek. . . . he moved from Fishing Creek region to Johnston County, North Carolina for a few years before returning back to the Fishing Creek region.  His sons ended up living in Johnston County on a permanent basis.  He was dead by 1780.  His daughter Sarah married William Cheek. . . .

The region in North Carolina where the Dukes, Clantons, Davises, Cheeks, Blakes, and others settled I am calling the “Fishing Creek” region . . . .  This Fishing Creek region was located in Edgecombe County, North Carolina until 1746.  When the county split at that time, Fishing Creek became part of Granville County.  This same region then became Bute County in 1764 and Warren County in 1779.”

Returning to Southern Blakes by Kate Blake,

“GENEALOGICAL NOTES AND MATTERS BY G.A. Hobbs

BLAKE –

The Blake ancestry had been traced from one William Blake of Edgecombe, Granville, Johnston and Wake Counties, North Carolina, on previous investigations and brought down to the present generation.  . . . Probably, however, it will be best to begin with the earliest Blake of this line – the immigrant ancestor, and this was: - THOMAS BLAKE.

Thomas came to Virginia Colony before 1664 and settled in Isle of Wight County. He was a man of affairs, owning considerable property and received numerous grants of land, some of which were for transporting emigrants to Virginian for colonization. . . . On April 10th, 1704, the above said Thomas, for love and natural affection as a consideration, deeded 100 acres to his son, William Blake, both then being of the Upper Parish of said County, Isle of Wight, Va. . . . For about the time Thomas gave William a deed for 100 acres, Nicholas Sessums gave a similar deed for a 100 acres to his daughter, Mary Blake, and his son-in-law William Blake; and I am of the opinion that these deeds were marriage gifts. . . . Nicholas Sessums was a man of much property, owned 1000 acres of land, numerous slaves . . . .

Now the Blakes, William Sr. and William Jr. – father and son – held the tract of land on Walnut Creek near Raleigh, for a period of nearly thirty years; 14 years while it was in old Johnston County, and the remainder of that period while it was in Wake County.

Finally, according to the Southampton County, Virginia Deed Book 1 - 1749 to 1753:

“Pages 253-256: JOSEPH BLAKE and wife ELIZABETH of Edgecombe County to THOMAS BLAKE (note: brother) dated 13 Sep 1751

112 acres on the south side of Purcels Branch, sd. BLAKE (sic), and Short Branch, S: JOSEPH (signed) BLAKE and ELIZABETH ("X") BLAKE, W: NATHANIEL (signed) RIDLEY and EDWARD (signed) RIDLEY

Pages 256-257: JOSEPH BLAKE and wife ELIZABETH to RICHARD WIGGINS dated 10 Sep 1751

170 acres on the south side of the Nottoway River, north side of Angelica Swamp adj. Purcels Branch (patent to WILLIAM BLAKE), S: JOSEPH (signed) BLAKE and ELIZABETH ("X") BLAKE, W: NATHANIEL (signed) RIDLEY and EDWARD (signed) PATE”

Thus, my sons, our first lead in discovering the details of your great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather called George, his son called Jack, and his son called Yancey, lies with Dempsey Blake, son of Joseph Blake, son of William Blake, son of Thomas Blake, the grandson of Sir Robert Blake, Commander-in-Chief of the English Fleet under Cromwell, who made a bold attack on the Spanish Fleet at Santa Cruz in the Canary Islands. He seized booty amounting to $14,000,000. . . .

Thomas Blake owned two ships on which he carried English emigrants to Virginia for which he received extensive land grants. Of these, he gave 100 acres to his son William, who married Mary Sessums, daughter of Nicholas Sessums who himself owned 1000 acres, numerous slaves, and gave to Mary an additional 100 acres as a wedding present. William Blake’s will was probated in 1746 and gave lands to four of his children, including Joseph Blake, who died in 1771 in Wake County. In 1779, Dempsey Blake was granted 552 acres on both sides of Crabtree Creek. Also, in 1797 Dempsey Blake bought from the estate of John Jones and William Brown. Asa Blake (Dempsey’s brother) also purchased from William Brown’s estate. In 1799, Dempsey purchased from the estate of Theophilus Hunter and in 1800 he purchased from the estate of James “Waldrope” (in another source, he is James Wardrope). Our ancestors George, Jack and Yancey could have come through the above-mentioned connections. Concerning the estate of Theophilus Hunter, Kate Blake writes,

“One thing is certain. William Jr. received a grant of land 1730; and in 1735 he sold it to Joshua Claude; and he went to North Carolina and received a grant of land in Edgecombe County, 1744 – which land was actually located in what is now Warren County. . . . When William Sr. made his Will in 1742, he provided that his wife, Mary, son, Joshua Claude, and Thomas Blake to be executors of his Will. You will note that he called Joshua Claude, son, but he was certainly not a blood son; son-in-law perhaps. . . . This William received a grant of land in old Edgecombe County, N.C., 1744, . . . Moreover, Edgecombe County, as of that date, was a small empire- 19 counties having been created from it in later days. Thus, it would be hard to determine just where this 1744 grant was actually located – but as a guess, I would say that it was in what later became Bute, County, and still later Warren County, N.C., land located on North Side of Fishing Creek. Our next record of the said William No. 2, was found in Granville County, which county was set off from Edgecombe, 1746. He purchased a tract of 250 acres from one George Rollison, both parties of Granville County, April 17th, 1750, and paid for it with Virginia money; said tract of land being half of a grant of 500 acres to John Alston, North Side of Fishing Creek. . . . John Pullen, the party to whom William (No. 3) and Lucy Blake sold, just before they set out for Georgia, sold both the William Blake (no.2) tract and John Blake tract, to Co. Theophilus Hunter – one of the great early characters of both Johnston County and Wake County. In the deeds to said Hunter, the language of the deeds was the same as that of Blake to Pullen. Said Hunter added the land to his great manor estate, called Hunter lodge, which place with its owner was celebrated during colonial days, during the Revolutionary period, and after the Revolution.”

This genealogy, however, is contested by an alternative genealogy for Dempsey Blake. According to this genealogy,

“Dempsey Blake Massey was born in 1797 or 1798, at Buckhorn, Wake, North Carolina, to Richard, Jr. Massey and Patsy (2nd wife) Massey (born Blake). Richard was born in 1770, in Wake, North Carolina. Patsy was born in 1770, in North Carolina. Dempsey had 8 siblings: Samuel Massey, Richard Andrew Massey and 6 other siblings. Dempsey married Fanny Massey (born Spears) in 1821, at age 24 in, North Carolina. Fanny was born in 1805. They had one son: Dennis G Massey. Dempsey passed away in 1840, at age 43.”

Dempsey, of course, had other children. The 1840 census states that he had 6 sons and 4 daughters. Dempsey’s father is listed as Richard Massey, and not Joseph Blake. Penelope Blake was born ca. 1770/1773 and died ca. 1797 in Wake County, NC.  On March 20, 1787 in Wake County she married Richard Massey, Jr, the son of Richard Massey and Judith Brasfield.   She was Richard's first wife.  After her death he married her cousin, Patsy Blake. Penelope was the daughter of Benjamin Blake, brother of Joseph Blake. Patsy was the daughter of William Blake No.3 (grandson of William Blake Sr.), and Lucy Allen Blake. Thus, in this genealogy, Dempsey Blake is descended from William Blake Sr. through the marriage of his great granddaughter to Richard Massey.

Besides, Dempsey Blake, other possibilities in the Virginia and North Carolina area for finding our ancestors George, Jack and Yancey include:

1.       1840 Wake County census:

Bennet T Blake who owned 54 slaves, he was in the age group 40-49

Alexander Blake owned 2 slaves, in the same age group

Susanna Blake owned 15 slaves, There was 1 woman age 40-49, and 2 age 70-79

Asa Blake with 14 slaves and in the 40-49 age group.

In 1850, the only one I can find is Bennet, age 50, no slaves, and a Methodist minister. 

The fact that Bennet Blake, a Methodist minister, had 54 slaves in 1840 and no slaves in 1850, would make sense, since, as already noted, between 1782 and 1790 the number of Methodists in North Carolina grew to more than 8,000 whites and nearly 1,800 blacks. In 1785 Tar Heel Methodists considered forcing slaveholders to manumit their slaves as a condition of membership. This became a reality in 1846, as John Spencer Bassett notes in Slaver in the State of North Carolina:

“The first edition of its Discipline, 1846, said in the words of the older Discipline: ‘We delcare that we are as much as ever convinced of the great evil of slavery. Therefore, no slaveholder shall be eligible to any official position in our Church hereafter . . . When any traveling preacher becomes an owner of a slave or slaves, by any means, he shall forfeit his ministerial character in out Church, unless he execute, if it be practicable, a legal emancipation of such slaves . . .”

This would explain why Bennet manumit all of his slaves – a considerable divestment of “capital”. This might explain the early leadership of the Blake/Baleka family,and thus Balanta people, in the African Methodist Episcopal Church Movement.

We also know already that according to the North Carolina Wills and Probate Records, 1819 for “Demsey Blake”, he bequeathed to his son Asa Blake his “negro man Jack”.

About a “Negro Named Jack”

Meanwhile, a bill of sale (1811/1824) for a slave named Jack is found in the register of deeds for Buncombe County. Chisolm and John Griffith sold to Solomon Brigman “a negro boy named Jack”.

On August 26, 1853, another bill of sale for a slave named Jack “about 58 years of age” was filed in Buncombe County by Alex Henry to Alexander Robertson. This would put the birth of this Jack around 1795which is not far from my estimate for the birth of your great, great, great, great, great grandfather Jack at 1788. Alex Henry received Jack from his mother Mary in 1848. In her deed to her son, Mary claims that she bought Jack.

Another bill of sale registered in Buncombe County on August 8, 1835 states that Jonathan Merrill sold to Ephraim Henry a “negro named Jack”, while yet another bill from April 3, 1832 mentions the sale of a negro named Jack from Blake Piercey to Ephraim Piercy. Here there is the association of both the names “Jack” who was sold by “Blake”.

1.       Charles Yancey (1732-1805)

1800, Tax Record - Culpeper Co., VA 
Taxes based on 10 slaves
1805, Will - Culpeper Co., VA
Gives negro man named Jack to wife Elizabeth Yancey
Gives negro man named Bristol to wife Elizabeth Yancey
Gives negro man named George to wife Elizabeth Yancey

2.       Absalom Yancey (1794-1835)
        1828 - Granville Co., NC (adjacent county just north of Wake) Negro man named Jack deeded to Henry Miller

In 1805, George and Jack could very well have been alive. If they were slaves of Charles Yancey or Absalom Yancey, this would also explain the name of your great, great, great, great grandfather Yancey. . . .

A final consideration is that there is a county called Yancey that is 245 miles west from House Creek where Yancey’s son, John Addison, was born in 1858. The 1860 Slave Schedule for Yancey County lists 319 slaves and shows that Milton Penland owned the most with 31 slaves, . Perhaps this is where Yancey could have received his name.

However, the best evidence, the “smoking gun”, if you will, is found in the North Carolina, Wills and Probate Records of 1850 which states, “I, Asa Blake of the County of Wake and State of North Carolina . . . I leave to my well beloved wife Siddy (or Ciddy or Liddy) Blake . . . the following negroes (to wit) a negro man Jack, +Yancy, and also a negro woman [S]ealy and Matilda . . .” Here, my sons, we see that the negro named “Jack” that Dempsey gave to his son Asa in 1819, has now been given to Asa’s wife “Liddy” in 1850. Jack would be in his 60’s by this time. Meanwhile, Jack is now accompanied by a male named “+Yancey”. This, I believe, proves our that our family was owned by Dempsey Blake. Further consideration must be given to the fact that a standard Certificate of Death for a “Jack Blake”, age 55, filed on 11-6-1930 lists “Matilda Blake” as his mother. That means that Matilda had a son named Jack in 1875. It is likely, therefore, that the Matilda given to Siddy (or Liddy, maiden name Hatsfield) Blake by her husband Asa Blake (Dempsey’s son), was the daughter of Jack, father of Yancey. Thus, Matilda, the daughter of Jack (and heretofore unknown sister of Yancey), named her first son after her father (Jack), the son’s grandfather. In addition, a standard Certificate of Death from April 24, 1932 in Wake County, North Carolina, for Nona Blake Webster, age 35, lists Jack Blake and Nona Blake as parents. This Nona Blake Webster would have been born in 1897, thus she would be the daughter of Jack Blake (and wife Nona), son of Matilda, daughter of Jack given to Asa Blake from his father Dempsey Blake. Meanwhile, Yancey’s mother, named “Lydia” could have been named after Asa Blake’s wife “Cidy/Liddy”.

Meanwhile, an emancipated slave named Jack living in Wake County, North Carolina, married Cherry Blake on October 10, 1853. The 1880 Census for Cherry Blake list a son named “Jack”, aged 22 (thus born in 1858) in Wake County. This could explain Ella Arrington Williams-Vinson reference that the Blakes owned land in Cary, North Carolina prior to the Civil War in her book, Both Sides of the Tracks II: Recollections of Cary, North Carolina 1860 -2000: “ THE COLORED FAMILIES – All landowners before the 1860’s were the Bateses, Hawkinses, Blakes, Nicholases, Roths, and Joneses – the earliest Colored families in Cary….”

In addition, North Carolina marriage records show that in 1879, twenty-year-old Jack Blake, son of “Henderson” Blake and Matilda Blake, married Amelia Evans in Wake County, North Carolina.

Was Yancey a runaway slave?

It is very difficult to find any trace of Yancey prior to the 1870 Census. However, the Milton Chronicle newspaper, on March 10, 1859, announced a $100 reward for a negro slave, about 30 to 35 years of age, named YANCY. My great, great, great grandfather Yancey would have been about 39 years old. If he ran away and sought refuge with Methodist Minister Bennet Blake, who was well known for his work with the Free Negroes in the area, then this could be the link explaining “Yancey Blake”.

Is “Henderson Blake” Your Great, Great, Great, Granduncle Yancey Blake Jr.?

Finally, there is one more possibility in the North Carolina area. According to Eustace Blake, “During the civil war a group of Federal Soldiers came past the house of my grandfather (Yancey Blake), Yancey Blake Jr. joined them and was never heard from anymore.”

The U.S., Colored Troops Military Service Records, 1863-1865 list "Henderson Blake", age 18, estimated birth year 1847 in Henderson, North Carolina, enlisted in the 40th U.S. Colored Infantry in Tennessee.

"Henderson Blake" could be the identifying clue stating that he came from the Blake plantation in Henderson County..... Why?

The website Plantation-owners Biographies states, “In 1850, Walter Blake and his family are still in Henderson, NC, with real estate valued at $8,000, and 30 slaves from ages 57 to 0, and 120 slaves in St Peters Parish, Beaufort, SC.” Henderson was located in western North Carolina, not far from the border with Tennessee.

William Kauffman Scarborough writes in Masters of the Big House: Elite Slaveholders of the Mid-Nineteenth Century South,

“As a consequence of the deadly, miasmic atmosphere that pervaded the rice swamps from mid-April to mid-October, it was imperative that Low Country planters leave their plantation residences for more extended periods than was common elsewhere in the South. Some, like the Heywards and Pringles, sojourned in the Northeast; others established summer homes at nearby Pawley’s Island or interior pineland sites such as Society Hill and Plantersville. But perhaps the most popular summer refuge for Charleston-area rice barons was Flat Rock, North Carolina, situated in the mountains of Henderson County. Established in the later 1820’s by Charles Baring, nephew of the founders of the celebrated banking house of that name and husband of one of the Heywards, it soon became the summer colony for a host of prominent South Carolinians. Among its early residents were the Middletons, who established a summer home there as early as 1828, and Judge Mitchell King of Charleston, who constructed a summer place called Argyl and eventually acquired 4,000 acres in the vicinity. As the years passed, other wealthy Low Country and a few Up Country aristocrats, among them the Hamptons and Singletons, built lavish summer residences in Flat Rock. Three of the largest Low Country slaveholders - William Aiken, Walter Blake, and Joshua Ward - maintained summer homes in this mountain paradise.”

In the book, Mountain Masters: Slavery and the Sectional Crisis in Western North Carolina, John C. Inscoe quotes William Malet from the book An Errand to the South in the Summer of 1862, saying, “A visitor to Walter Blake’s Henderson County plantation marveled at the ‘baronial style’ in which he lived. ‘He has his own mills and tanyards, curriers and shoemakers,’ all of which claimed a good portion of his thirty-six slaves’ time and energy.’” Malet himself writes,

“On the 24th I drove fourteen miles through to a beautiful place called "The Meadows," the property of Mr. Blake. The road crossed several streams. He has 7000 acres of forest, and 700 acres of rich meadow, alluvial soil; all now drained, and most productive in all kinds of grain and grass; sixteen cows were in milk: he had about sixteen horses in his stable. He has several teams of mules, splendid animals, about sixteen hands high. Justly are the sable drivers proud of their teams of six mules each. Mr. Blake's entire donkey is valued at 200?. On the 25th we dined at Mr. Robertson's, about two miles from The Meadows. He gave us Smyrna mutton and excellent old Madeira. Mr. Blake lives in baronial style. He has built a very pretty church, and entertains the clergyman. His immense tracts of mountain forests abound in red deer and pheasants; he has his own mills and tan-yards, curries and shoemakers. I was introduced to my room by my kind friend the British Consul, Mr. Bunch, whose wife is sister to Mrs. Blake, who is the first Unionist lady I met in the South, she having come from Philadelphia. Mr. Blake is the very beau-idial of an English country gentleman; hearty, hospitable, full of information, straightforward, and patriotic. His eldest son, a fine young man, was aide-de-camp in several battles at Richmond. He complained of the maraudings of the Yankees, who had taken away about 300 of his brother's Negroes, and robbed and destroyed his plantation, his brother all the while being in England, and taking no part whatever in the war.”

My sons, if 18-year old “Henderson Blake” is, indeed, “Yancey Blake Jr.”, then Yancey Blake Sr., your great, great, great, great grandfather, born in 1819, would have been about 28 years old at the time of Yancey Jr.’s birth, and about 46 years old when Yancey Jr. ran off and enlisted in the 40th U.S. Colored Infantry in Tennessee. Remember my sons, the moment Yancey Jr. ran off with the troops, he became a runaway slave, a fugitive. To protect himself it is likely that he wanted to conceal his true identity. Yet, in order to leave a clue as to his family, he enlisted as “Henderson”, indicating that he was a member of the Blake family from Henderson, NC. If true, he and his father Yancey Blake, were one of the 65 slaves owned by Walter Blake or Daniel Blake who lived in Henderson at the time.

Plantation-owners Biographies also states,

“Despite there being three Blake entries on the list of 19 top slaveholders in 1860, there is very little to be found on the internet about this family. These Blakes all are related -- the Blake family was one of the oldest and wealthiest early families of South Carolina, tracing back to Joseph Blake who was Governor of the Carolina Province 1696-1700, who owned a plantation called "Plainsfield" on the Stono River. Note that both Walter and Daniel were born in England, and the Blake family owned slaves and property in both England and America. Apparently more information may be found in the Encyclopedia of American Wealth, which has entries for the following: Joseph Blake - Joseph Blake II - Daniel Blake I of Newington - William Blake - Joseph Blake III - Daniel Blake II - Daniel Blake III - Walter Blake - Arthur Middleton Blake - Francis Blake (jr) - S. Preston Blake - Curtis L. Blake. 

On the 1860 census, Joseph Blake had 610 slaves on a rice plantation in Beaufort (Prince William's parish); Joseph and his son Walter -- it is known that Joseph had two plantations, one in Prince William's parish and one in St. Peter's parish, with 545 rice slaves on the former and 74 on the latter. The former one was called Bonnie/Bonny Hall, on the Combahee River, south of the town of Yemasse, with 330 acres in 1860 and 1700 in 1897. Walter Blake is listed in the History of Beaufort County as an absentee owner, not visiting for years at a time and living in Charleston, however, Joseph is not found on the census, and Walter is found with his family (wife Ann born SC; children Louisa, Walter, Anna, Godfrey, Reginald, Sydney) in Prince William's Parish in Beaufort. It was also stated that "Blake managed his father's huge estate of 610 slaves on Bonny Hall Plantation in Prince William Parish but lived in Charleston and at Hayfield Plantation near Flat Rock, NC" which was considered a resort village in the mountains -- which is where William Aiken's summer home was, in addition to the Heywards, Elliotts, Hamiltons and Rutledges. It is assumed that Walter's wife Ann was the daughter of one of these plantation owners; perhaps as a total guess she was a Heyward as William Heyward is listed on the same page as the Blakes on the 1860 census, and Nathaniel Heyward was the original largest plantation owner in Yemasse. Bonny Hall was apparently first owned by Governor Blake in the mid-1700s, passed down to son William, and eventually to Joseph and his son Walter -- which incontrovertibly confirms a relationship between Joseph, Walter and Daniel; Arthur's relation is uncertain.”

Joseph and Walter Blake: The Great Rice Plantation Owners of the Carolinas

According to SLAVEHOLDERS FROM 1860 SLAVE CENSUS SCHEDULES transcribed by Tom Blake, the following held slaves:

JOSEPH BLAKE, at SC, Beaufort, roll 1231, page 89 of Prince William Parish, holding 575 slaves

ARTHUR BLAKE, at SC, Charleston, roll 1232, page 307B, holding 538 slaves.

DANIEL BLAKE, at SC, Colleton, roll 1234 page 103 of St. Bartholomew, holding 527 slaves.

BLAKE Beaufort Co., SC

BLAKE, Colleton Co., SC

BLAKE, Holmes Co., MS

BLAKE, King William Co., VA

BLAKE, Leon Co., FL

BLAKE, Warren Co., MS

The South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine Vol. 1, No. 2 (April, 1900), pp. 153-166 states,

“This distinguished Carolina family is descended, as Oldmixon tells us, from a brother of Admiral Blake. In his History of the British Empire in America, Oldmixon writes, ‘I say more of Mr. Blake because his family is one of the most considerable in this Province; where he arrived in the year 1683, with several other Families the followers of his fortune.’

[Footnotes 1 and 2 state] ‘T’was about this time, that the Persecution raise’d by the Popish Faction, and their adherents, in England, against the Protestant Dissenters, was at its height; and no Part of this Kingdom suffer’d more by it than Somersetshire.  The Author of this History liv’d at that time with Mr. Blake, brother to the famous General of that name being educated by his Son-in-law, who taught School in Bridgewater: and remembers, tho’ then very young, the reasons old Mr. Blake us’d to give for leaving England: One of which was, That the miseries they endur’d, meaning the Dissenters then, were nothing to what he foresaw would attend the Reign of a Popish successor; wherefore he resolv’d to remove to Carolina: and he had so great an Interest among Persons of his principles, I mean Dissenters, that many honest substantial Persons engaged to go over with him. [Oldmixon, Car. Col: 2 p. 407]. 

Warrant to Maj: Maurice Matthews: To lay out to Capt: Benjamin Blake 1090 acres of land in some place not yet laid out &c the said land being due to the said Benjamin Blake by and for the transportation into this province of himself and 21 persons whose names are recorded in the Secretarys Office in the said province &c 10 May 1682 &c Dated 18 March 1683. Joseph Morton &c Sec: Office Bk 1682-92 p 243. This was probably Pawlets; The grant to Plainsfield, 1000 acres was 5 July 1683.’

What estate he sold in England he sold to carry the effects along with him . . . .

Benjamin Blake of Plainsfield and Pawlets, Esq: J.P, Lords Proprietors Deputy and Member of the Grand Council of Carolina, Gov: Archdale in his Descriptions of Carolina says: ‘In Gov: Moretons time General Blake’s Brother with many Dissenters, came to Carolina, which Blake being a wise and prudent person of an heroic temper of spirit, strengthened the hands of sober inclin’d people and kept under the first loose and extravagant spirit, &c. The Governor, as we are told marry’d Mrs. Elizabeth Blake his daughter, and by this alliance the strength of their party was so increas’d that we hear little of the other till Mr. Colleton’s government.’ Capt. Blake received considerable grants of land in the province and settled the large plantations of Plainsfield and Pawlets in Colleton County. About the year 1685 he was appointed Lords Proprietors deputy and in October of that year signed the new constitutions and oath of allegiance to King James.

He served in the Council during the administration of Gov Moreton and Colleton: the Lords Proprietors recommended him ‘as a confidential man’ and appointed him Clerk of the Crown and Peace for S. Carolina. In 1686 he was commissioner under the act for public defence and in 1687 one of the committees to revise the constitutions which drew up a new form of government for the province. Capt. Blake died about the year 1689 and was succeeded by his son:

Right Hon Colonel Joseph Blake of Plainsfield and Pawlets, Esp: S.P., Landgrave of Carolina, one of the true and absolute Lords and Proprietors of Carolina and twice Governor of South Carolina. Was born and educated in England. He probably followed his father to Carolina and on his death was appointed Lords Proprietors deputy in his stead but was removed by Gov. Sothell, Oct. 1690. The Proprietors remonstrated and reappointed Blake to Gov. Ludwells council, Nov 1691. He served in Gov Ludwells and Smiths councils and on Gov: Smith’s resignation, Oct. 1694, succeeded him as Governor of the province and was created a Landgrave. Col. Blake provided for defence of the province ‘in these times of War with the French King’ and served as governor until Gov. Archdale’s arrival in 1695 and then as deputy in his new council. . . . Gov: Blake inherited a good estate, received large grants of land himself and acquired a considerable property. . . . Gov: Blake died 7th September 1700 and was succeeded by his only son: Hon Colonel Joseph Blake.

He was born in 1700 and educated probably partly in England. . . . Col. Blake inherited his father’s Proprietorship and landed estates, besides a good estate from his mother’s family including the Newington, Mt Boone and Cypress lands, some 6000 acres, and the fine Newington mansion, where he chiefly resided. His Proprietorship was surrendered to the King under Act of Parliament 1729. . . .

William Blake (2nd son of Hon: Joseph Blake) of Plainsfield and Pawlets . . . . was born at Newington in 1739 and educated in England. He received a large fortune from his father and acquired considerable estates in England and Carolina. . . . He was in England in 1774 and joined in the petition to the King against the Boston Port bill; but he was conservative in his views and remaining in England was amerced by the act of 1782 as a Royalist. Mr. Blake m. 11 Feb: 1759 Anne dr. of Walter Izard Esq;. . . .He left issue Joseph Blake, b 1769 , his successor and Daniel Blake, b. 1775 . . . . Mr. Blake died July 1803 and was succeeded by his eldest son: Joseph Blake of Hamells Park in the County of Herts Esq; was born in 1769 and educated at Eton and Cambridge. He resided chiefly in London.  m. Miss Hough dr. of Colonel Hough of the English army and had issue: William Blake, his successor; Joseph Blake; Walter Blake (named after his grandfather Walter Izard); Francis Blake . . . .

Walter Blake jr: esq: b. Aug 1841 m. Aug: 1870 Henrietta Lousia dr. of Daniel Blake esq: . . .

And there you have, my sons, the other important lead besides Dempsey Blake, for reclaiming the lost history of your ancestors George, Jack and Yancey. Both Dempsey and Walter Blake are descendants of Sir Robert Blake, who was a pirate given status as Commander of the English Fleet, who raided Spanish ships in the Canary Islands off the coast northwest of our Balanta homeland in Guinea. The Blake family thus established their fortune at this time and used it to establish an English colony as Lords Proprietors. Concerning this, Hope Samuel Chamberlain writes in History of Wake County, North Carolina, the place where Dempsey Blake was living, where the Blake family owned substantial property and where your great, great, great, great grandfather was born,

“The first settlement of the Carolinas was begun under the charter of a company of English noblemen, the Lords Proprietors. If these owners received their quit-rents as specified, they did not take much further interest in their plantations, nor molest the settlers; hence, the northern colony, being so neglected and more isolated, was ever the freest of all the Old Thirteen; one might even say the freest and easiest of them. Having no good harbor and hidden behind the sand-bars from the storms of Hatteras, it enjoyed its immunity. Not being easily reached from outside, it did as its people chose with governors and edicts, dodged its taxes, harbored fugitives, and governed its own affairs quite comfortably.

The Lords Proprietors employed John Locke, the great English Philosopher, to draw up a form of government for their two infant colonies, and when he did so a more unsuitable set of constitutional provisions for a thinly settled state would be hard to find.

This ‘Fundamental Constitution’ was a confused and complicated plan full of strange titles and orders of nobility, with its ’Landgraves’ and its “Caciques,’ a plan which it would have been hard enough to follow in a populous society, with no will of its own; and which it was quite impossible to carry out in a sparsely peopled edge of the wilderness where the principal aim in life of the inhabitants was to escape all outside coercion, and to delight in space and liberty.

The confusion brought about by this famous Locke Constitution was also a cause of this glorious opportunity, eagerly grasped by the colonists, to avoid outside interference, as well as dispense with all the inconveniences of home rule and superfluous government.

Still another cause of freedom was the rapid succession of Governors, sent by the Lords Proprietors, some grossly incompetent, some most tyrannical, and all objectionable to the temper of the colony even when of average diligence, or because of that diligence.

The later Royal governors were on the whole better men, but the custom had gone on too long for them to subdue those who had defied so long and so successfully any other government save their own.

Again, the liberty of North Carolina was favored simply by the shape of the coast as mentioned above, indented as it is by sounds and wide tide-water rivers, intersected by great swamps, and the whole shut in form the highway of nations by shallows and sand-bars. Even neighborhoods were secluded from each other by sounds and estuaries, while the whole was protected from outside interference. The individual planter scarcely saw a dozen folk outside of his own family in a year.

This freedom of the free in North Carolina was well known, and many came to her borders to enjoy it. The adventurous, then as now, longed for a wilderness in which to wander; the hunter wanted game, and found abundance there. Religious sects, persecuted elsewhere, were unmolested in North Carolina; . . .  Those also who wanted to rub out their reckoning and begin life over again, could do so unquestioned, and those who simply wanted to make a living, could make it almost too easily for their own welfare, by half cultivating the rich bottom-lands. . . .

Colonists were coming in great numbers by the middle of the eighteenth century. Great Indian wars were fought to a conclusion, and the west was opened up more and more, as people pushed up the great rivers. . . .

For many years after Col. William Byrd and Edward Mosely had surveyed the dividing line, Wake County was but an undistinguished part of the middle western woods, with here and there a settler; but by 1765 it had become adjoining parts of the counties of Johnston and Orange. It was in this same year that William Tryon came to be the new Royal Governor of North Carolina, and the colony became daily more prosperous, the west having filled up as stated, while the eastern precincts grew rich and became refined in their ideas of comfort and even luxury. Those eastern folk enjoyed agricultural abundance from the fertile soil, they plied a coastwise trade, and owned large ships trading to Bermuda and even to English seaports. Their sons were sent to be educated in England or in the northern colleges . . . .

As to the look of the country, we know that the forest and the old field bore such a great proportion to the cultivated cleared land that farms were far apart. Only here and there did a home stand out against a wooded slope, here and there a slim spiral of smoke betray a human habitation behind the trees, or a cleared field show the work of the settler. Roads wound for miles through unbroken woodland, and the cultivated fields seemed but patches.

This life was not a poor one, although it was extremely simple. It was independent, it was self-respecting. It was full of rude plenty and wholesome work, of hope and expectation. A poor man could make a start and be sure of getting a living while paying for his land. He would raise a little stock and a pair of colts. His log-cabin cost him little beside the time he took to build it, and he need never go without his simple food and clothing and his necessities provided that he was a good shot, and the he and his wife were industrious. Slavery lightened the tasks of those who could get far enough ahead of the world to afford the purchase of a servant or two. . . .”

The slave population of North Carolina rose rapidly during the eighteenth century. Natural reproduction accounted for much of the increase, which was augmented further by the immigration of slaveholding whites and the burgeoning slave trade. Some Africans were brought overland from neighboring Virginia and South Carolina. Others entered North Carolina as part of the colony’s seaborne trade with mainland English colonies, particularly Virginia and South Carolina, and the West Indies. Still others were imported directly from the Guinea Coast of Africa, which extended from present-day Guinea-Bissau to Nigeria.