Rewriting history

UC Davis distinguished history professor Alan Taylor has received not one, but two Pulitzer Prizes in arts and letters for his books on early American history. Last month, Taylor won his second for The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832. Taylor, who previously won in 1996 for William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic, taught history at UC Davis for two decades, focusing primarily on the settlement of the United States-Canadian borderlands frontier, until some unexpected research findings put him on the trail of his latest book, which examines 3,000 slaves from Chesapeake Bay Region who escaped and helped the British in the War of 1812. As Taylor recovered, once again, from the shock of winning, he spoke with SN&R about turning this particular chapter in U.S. history into a movie (hint, hint: calling Ken Burns).

How did you get started?

I was doing research on another book about Canada and [the United States] in the archives in Nova Scotia. I found material on these refugees—escaped slaves who settled in Nova Scotia after the War of 1812. I was fascinated, I wanted to know their story of where they came from and what happened to them.

Is this an overlooked story?

As I got deeper into it, I realized that nobody had written a book about this before. There were a few older articles, but nothing too substantial.

How did you start your research?

In 2010, I found some extraordinary documents in Virginia about slaves escaping their masters. There were records from the state of Virginia's militia documenting their suppression of escape attempts. The documents revealed a lot about how African-American slaves lived, and numerous attempts to steal boats and canoes from shore to join British warships in the Atlantic. Then I went to the United States National Archives in College Park, Maryland, where I found 11 boxes of documents from a claims commission that handled compensation for slave masters that owned the escaped African-Americans. There were pages and pages of depositions where I learned about how and when the slaves made their escape attempts. There were also several letters written after the war by the escaped slaves to their masters telling them why they had to leave.

Coolest character you encountered?

I was drawn to Bartlet Shanklyn, who leads one of the most difficult and resourceful escapes of the war. Bartlet Shanklyn stole not just a canoe or a rowboat, but an entire ferryboat. He helped 17 men, women and children escape. Then, after the war, he writes this amazing letter to his former master to set him straight. Shanklyn was very proud of his blacksmith abilities and proud that he outsmarted his overseer.

Did the British always want to free the slaves?

No. When they started, until about 1813, their goal was not to free the slaves. They wanted to inflict damage on the American economy. The naval captains had orders from London not to take in more than just a handful of African-American men who could help as pilots and guides. The British government didn't want to take on the financial responsibility of caring for these African-Americans. Eventually, the naval commanders took on hundreds of liberated slaves. It posed a real challenge to feed and shelter them. The naval captains came around very quickly, and recruited them as sailors, marines, nurses and laundresses. They also helped tremendously with providing intelligence on the local geography and people.

Where did they resettle?

Most of them went to Nova Scotia, and a large number of them also went to Trinidad and New Brunswick.

Any War of 1812 myths to bust?

The popular misconception is that the War of 1812 was a draw, a war with no consequence. The reality is a paradox: The standstill is what changes the thinking in the U.S. and Canada about our relationship as neighbors. Before the war, the U.S. and British thought they were incompatible, either one or the other would have to prevail over the other. The British Empire would have to shatter the United States, or the U.S. would have to conquer Canada and purge the British from the continent. In the wake, there was a burst of nationalism on both sides, which came with new recognition about how we could become better neighbors.

Biggest challenge with this book?

It was a little scary at first, because I previously wrote largely about frontier topics in Canada and the U.S., and I had never written about slavery in this way. There was a steep learning curve in catching up on the great historical scholarship out there. It was a challenge to get in there and do something that people would pay attention to.

Any other fun episodes?

There was one time when Virginia militia men were trying to trap British sailors, so they painted themselves in blackface. The British started to row ashore when the naval captain noticed these supposed slaves had white ankles, and they turned around.

Sounds like it would make a great movie or Ken Burns documentary?

You know, a lot of people have said that so far. I would be delighted if someone in Hollywood or PBS wanted to make a movie out of this, but I wouldn't know much about that. Ken Burns would have a hard time with this subject, because it's all pre-photography. It might require some reenactment.