that he had emancipated a mulatto boy and girl belonging to him, children of one of his female slaves. The boy at the time of Nicholls’ death was serving an apprenticeship to a blacksmith in Nansemond County. To the girl, he devised two hundred acres of land in fee simple, and to the boy three hundred and ten acres. To the latter, he also bequeathed a pair of millstones, and all the ironwork necessary for the equipment of a water-mill. He gave both children the cattle which at the time of his death would be running on the lands he had left to them by will, and they were to share alike in the division. To the girl, he bequeathed a feather-bed and bolster, a rug and two blankets, four ewes and one ram, a sow and pig, one woollen and one linen wheel, a pair of wool, a pair of tow, and a pair of cotton cards. To the boy, he bequeathed a feather-bed and bolster, two blankets and a rug, four ewes and a ram, a sow and pig, and a musket. In case either died before he or she came of age, the survivor was to be the heir of the deceased.[1]
The records of the seventeenth century disclose the fact that numerous suits were entered by slaves for the recovery of their freedom, and that the courts showed them the amplest justice. In an action brought in 1695 in Elizabeth City County by a negro against the executors of Colonel John Lear, in which it was alleged that he was entitled to his liberty, the executors failed to make their appearance. An order was adopted that unless Lewis Burwell and Thomas Goddin, who were the representatives of Colonel Lear, attended the next court, the plaintiff should be set free.[2] A similar order was entered in York in the case of Henry Tyler, the administrator of Mr. Martin
