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Here's Kirk Higgins, courtesy of the Bill of Rights Institute, with the story. It was October 17th, 1781, and more than 8,000 British soldiers under the command of General Charles Cornwallis had been under siege for three long weeks by American and French forces at Yorktown, Virginia. The artillery fire from the Americans and French was relentless. Cornwallis had hoped for reinforcements, but a French fleet had created a naval blockade in the lower Chesapeake Bay. Reinforcements would not be able to reach Cornwallis, and now an escape by sea was impossible too. Realizing that all hope was lost, Cornwallis sent out a drummer and an officer with a white flag of surrender.
For the American forces, victory meant a new independent nation was now within grasp. For Cornwallis, it meant second-guessing in criticism about how he had led the British forces to defeat. But there was an important factor in his defeat at Yorktown that Cornwallis did not know at the time. One of Cornwallis' trusted servants, a man named James posing as a runaway slave, was a spy. James had been secretly working for the Continental Army, providing them intelligence about the British Army's strength, movement, and plans.
The penalty for portraying Cornwallis in the British Army, had he been caught, likely would have been death. James risked his life for the cause of America's freedom, but the battle for his own freedom would be long and difficult. Not much is known about James's early life.
We know he was born on a plantation in New Kent County, Virginia. He was an enslaved servant of William Armistead Jr. and while James has become known to many historians as James Armistead, he actually never took the surname of his slaveholder. Most simply knew him at the time as James. We know James learned to read and write and he likely spent time in Williamsburg, Virginia during the war, where William Armistead served the patriot cause by managing the commissary of military supplies. In fact, some researchers believe Williamsburg may have been where James first met the Marquis de Lafayette, the legendary French officer who had joined the American war effort under the command of General George Washington.
In 1781, William Armistead granted permission for James to enlist in the service of Lafayette. James was one of more than 5,000 enslaved blacks who served in the war as soldiers, sailors, and in a variety of support roles on both the American and British sides. For enslaved men like James, joining the Americans was not an easy decision and didn't come with many guarantees.
In 1775, Virginia's royal governor, Lord Dunmore, established a regiment of over 800 runaway slaves who were promised freedom if they fought for the British. Serving with the British meant the possibility of liberation for many who lived in bondage, but James embarked upon a different and uncertain path. For James, there was no assurance that joining the American cause would ever lead to his freedom. In fact, until 1771, James and the slaveholders in Virginia were not lawfully allowed to free their enslaved people.
Only the courts could do that, and only for meritorious service. But James decided to trust Lafayette and the Americans, and his help could not have come at a better time. By the time James joined the American side, the Revolutionary War had been dragging on for six years. For George Washington, defeating the British and securing American independence was always going to be a tall task. Washington was charged with turning a rag tag volunteer group of citizen soldiers into a force that could prevail against the highly trained professional British army. He recognized that putting spies behind British lines could give him the strategic advantage he needed.
Many spy rings were active on both sides during the Revolutionary War, despite the perils of the job. James joined the forces of the infamous traitor General Benedict Arnold in 1781, after Arnold had defected to the British side. James helped Arnold and his troops traverse the Virginia wilderness and soon earned the trust of the British high command and insight into British movements. By July 1781, James had infiltrated Cornwallis' camp, posing as a runaway slave and working as a waiter for officer's meals. James had now gained access to the British commander's inner circle and listened to their conversations about military strategy.
Officers assumed he was a simple servant and spoke freely in front of him. During the summer of 1781, James passed along intelligence that would help turn the tide of the Battle of Yorktown and the Revolutionary War for the American side. James informed Lafayette of Cornwallis' move from Portsmouth, Virginia to Yorktown and of the general's plan to remain in Yorktown to refit his army. Lafayette wrote to Washington in August 1781, quote, I have got some intelligences by the way of this servant I have once mentioned. I hear that they began fortifying at York.
They are now working by a windmill at which place I understand they will make a fort in a battery for the defense of the river. Cornwallis had been depending on the New York British fleet to bring fresh troops and supplies up the York River from the Chesapeake Bay, but utilizing the information James had relayed, Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau, commander of the French forces in America, deployed a French fleet under Admiral Francois Joseph Paul de Grasse to cut off the British Navy. Now the British could not supply or rescue Cornwallis' army. Washington and his French allies laid siege to Yorktown and forced Cornwallis to surrender on October 17, 1781. For Cornwallis, it was a bitter pill. After his surrender, Cornwallis reportedly saw James standing on Washington's and Lafayette's side and realized he had been had.
Ah, you rogue, he was reported to exclaim, then you have been playing me a trick all this time. James had done his part to secure American independence at great personal danger, but the fight to secure his own freedom of independence was just beginning. James recounted his pivotal role in helping the Continental Army in a petition to the Virginia legislature after the war. The petition read, quote, during the time of his serving, the marquee he often at the peril of his life found means to frequent the British camp, by which means he kept open a channel of the most useful communications to the army of the state. Despite his courage and contributions, James remained enslaved after the war.
In 1782, the Virginia legislature passed a law that allowed enslaved men who had fought as soldiers during the war to be freed, but it did not apply to spies. Lafayette, who personally detested slavery, did not forget the service James had rendered. In 1784, James encountered Lafayette in Richmond, and Lafayette found a way to show gratitude for his friend by providing a written testimonial in support of James' freedom. Lafayette wrote, this is to certify that the bearer by the name of James has done essential services to me while I had the honor to command in this state.
His intelligence from the enemy's camp were industriously collected and faithfully delivered. He perfectly acquitted himself with some important commissions I gave him and appears to me entitled to every reward his situation can admit of. James petitioned the legislature for his freedom in 1786 using Lafayette's letter in invoking America's founding principles. James wrote that he had been persuaded, quote, of the right in which all mankind have freedom. The Virginia assembly finally granted James his freedom in 1787.
William Armistead was compensated 250 pounds for the loss of James Labored. James adopted the surname Lafayette to honor the Marquis Lafayette and is commonly referred to as James Armistead Lafayette, but we know he often went simply by James Fayette. He eventually owned 40 acres of land in New Kent County, Virginia. This was a controversial and much debated period in James' life. Property tax records show both free and enslaved people living on James' property. It would not have been uncommon at the time for a freed black man to own slaves in the south, but some historians point to another possibility. Many of these individuals may have been James' family who he may have acquired with the intention of allowing them to live as free individuals. That also would have been common at the time.
We may never know the full story. There are aspects of James' final years that we do know more about. In 1818, James appealed to the Virginia legislature again, this time to request a pension based on his military service and age.
He stated that he was, quote, three score years and ten, making him 70 years old. The assembly granted him an annual pension and he traveled to Richmond once or twice a year to collect his payments. In 1824, the Marquis de Lafayette toured the United States. According to a Richmond newspaper at the time, Lafayette recognized James in a crowd, called out to him by name, and embraced his old friend.
It was the last time the two men would see each other. While James died in the early 1830s, his legacy certainly lives on today. He is remembered for being an integral part of the network of patriot spies that played an important role in securing the patriot's victory in the Revolutionary War. After the war ended, a British intelligence officer in America was quoted as saying, Washington did not really outfight the British.
He simply outspied us. And a terrific job on the production and editing by our own Monty Montgomery and a special thanks to Kirk Higgins of the Bill of Rights Institute. They do terrific work bringing American history to life. In their storytelling with school kids, with educators, and go to mybri.org to learn more.
That's mybri.org. What a story we just heard. The story of one of America's great spies who just happened to be an African American.
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