Dunmore Offers Freedom: Slaves Join British Forces
He wasn't an abolitionist. John Murray, Lord Dunmore, didn't care about freedom — he needed soldiers. Desperate after fleeing his own governor's mansion, he promised liberty to any enslaved person who could reach British lines and fight. Hundreds ran. Some estimates say 800 men joined his Ethiopian Regiment within weeks. But the offer only applied to rebels' slaves, not loyalists'. And when the British lost? Most were abandoned, sold, or dead from smallpox. The first mass emancipation in North American history was a military recruitment ad.
November 7, 1775
251 years ago
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