Williams claims that his father, when a boy, accompanied Robert Bowie,
for whom he was working, to Mount Vernon, where he first met George
Washington. He said that General Washington once became very angry at
his father because he struck an unruly horse, exclaiming: "The brute has
more sense than some slaves. Cease striking the animal."
Robert Bowie, the third son of Capt. William and Margaret (Sprigg)
Bowie, was born at "Mattaponi", near Nottingham, March 1750. As a
captain of a company of militia organized at Nottingham, he accompanied
the Maryland forces when they joined Washington in his early campaign
near New York. He and Washington became friends. In 1791, when Captain
William Bowie died, his son Robert inherited "Mattaponi". He was the
first Democratic governor to be elected, one of the presidential
electors for Madison, and a director of the first bank established at
Annapolis.
Williams recalls hearing his father say that when Washington died,
December 14, 1799, many paid reverence by wearing mourning scarfs and
hatbands.
He recalls many interesting incidents during slavery days. He said that
slaves could not buy or sell anything except with the permission of
their master. If a slave was caught ten miles from his master's home,
and had no signed permit, he was arrested as a runaway and harshly
punished.
There was a standing reward for the capture of a runaway.
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