John Enslow states that his slave John was convicted of "being engaged in a conspiracy and projected insurrection of the Negroes and Sentenced to be imprisoned in the Work House of Charleston untill his Master under the direction of the City Council of Charleston shall send him out of the limits of the United States into which he is not to return Under penalty of death;" said "sentence was in fact a commutation of the punishment of death" due to John's testimony against other slaves. The petitioner further reports that John was therefore duly imprisoned and "that during said confinement he died." Enslow argues that John’s dying in the Workhouse had the same consequence as if he had been executed in that "in either case the property of your Petitioner being taken from him by the public authority, and in the present sentence being dictated by a consideration of the public good." He cites that precedent can be found in the case of David Haig who sued for compensation when his slave Harry died in the Workhouse under the same court-sanctioned sentence. The petitioner therefore prays that his case be taken into consideration and that he be granted "the compensation allowed by Law in case of a Slave executed under the Sentence of a Court."
Result: Referred to claims committee.
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Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina
