SPECIAL TOPICS CONTRIBUTIONS BY JOHN G. SHARP
Confederate Pensacola Navy Yard Payroll January 1862
with list of Enslaved Laborers
On 12 January Commodore James Armstrong USN surrendered the Pensacola Navy Yard to the Confederate forces of William H. Chase. Commander Thomas Wilson Brent, Confederate States Navy, assumed command.1 Thomas W. Brent 1808-1875 was appointed a midshipman on 1 March 1825 and was promoted to Commander USN. In 1855 Brent resigned his commission on 19 January 1861 and was appointed a Commander in the Confederate States Navy in March 1861. Following the Confederate withdraw from Pensacola on 9 May 1862, Brent was later stationed in Savannah, Georgia, and subsequently became part of the defense of Red River. In 1863 he commanded the CSS Savannah with the Savannah Squadron. At war's end Brent was made prisoner and paroled May 22, 1865, at Mobile, Ala. After the war Commodore Brent worked for a fire insurance company.2
1 Pearce, George F. The U.S. Navy in Pensacola: From Sailing Ships to Naval Aviation (1825 -1930) (University of West Florida: University Presses of Florida 1980), 68, 77
2 Smith, Myron J. Civil War Biographies from the Western Waters Confederate and Union Naval and Military and Personnel Contractors, Politicians Officials, Steamboat Pilots and Others (McFarland: North Carolina 2015) 30
Enslaved laborers figure prominently on this and other Pensacola payrolls. In early Florida a shortage of labor quickly made the use of enslaved labor dominant, which was extremely profitable for local slaveholders.3 From the 1820s to the 1860s, enslaved laborers was extensively used by the federal government to build, repair and maintain the many buildings and structures that comprised the Navy Yard and forts lining Pensacola Bay.4 The Secretary of the Navy, Mahlon Dickerson, on 2 June 1838 went so far as to confirm the long standing practice “I have to state that it is not deemed expedient to change the practice which prevails at the Navy Yard Pensacola…” Slavery from the start remained central to the Confederate States and enslaved labor figured prominently on the CSA Corps of Engineers payrolls. The sums listed beside each name on the payroll would go to their owner and not the slave who performed the labor. These documents provide a rare record of enslaved persons. On March 21, 1861, the vice president of the new Confederate government, Alexander H. Stephens, gave his famous "Cornerstone Speech" in Savannah, Georgia, in which he declared that "slavery was the natural condition of blacks and the foundation of the new Confederacy." Enslaved labor figured prominently on many Confederacy payrolls throughout its existence.5 He declared that, relative to the U.S. Constitution, "Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition."6 In areas occupied by Union forces enslaved labor was continued to be utilized from the outbreak of the Civil War, the records of the U.S. Army Corps engineers reflect no significant changes regarding reliance on enslaved labor until the Emancipation Proclamation.7
3 Sharp, John G.M. Early Pensacola Navy Yard in Letters and Documents
to the Secretary of the Navy and Board of Navy Commissioners 1826-1840, 14 May 2019 http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/portsmouth/shipyard/pensacola-sharp.html Accessed 12 August 2019.4 Sharp, John G. M. Payroll for Persons Employed in the Navy Yard Pensacola May and June 1827 Genealogy Trails http://genealogytrails.com/fla/escambia/1827payroll.html
5 Sharp, John G. M. Confederate Slave Payrolls 1861 – 1865 Federal Records that Help Identify Former Slaves and Slaveholders 25 July 2020 http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/portsmouth/shipyard/csp.html accessed 12 August 2020
6 Dew, Charles B. Apostles of Disunion Southern Secession and the Causes of the Civil War (University Press of Virginia: Charlottesville 2001), 14
7 Hulse, Thomas “Military Slave Rentals, the Construction of Army Fortifications, and the Navy Yard in Pensacola, Florida, 1824–1863,” Florida Historical Quarterly, 88 (Spring 2010), 526
Transcription: This muster was transcribed from NARA, RG - 45, microfilm roll 158, pages 23-27. Roll 158 is particularly difficult to read, as the film is old and parts of the original documents appear to have suffered considerable damage, prior to filming. I have striven to adhere as closely as possible to the original in spelling, capitalization, punctuation and abbreviation (e.g. Do" or "do" for ditto or same as above) including the retention of dashes, ampersands and overstrikes. The two departures from the original text is the highlighting of the top line information and the trade or occupational titles. Where it was not possible to determine what was written, I have so noted in brackets. Where possible, I have attempted to arrange the transcribed material in a similar manner to that found in the text.
John G M Sharp, 12, August 2020Pay Roll for the Officers of the Navy and Others Employed in the Navy Yard at Pensacola and Warrant & Petty Officers, Sea O Sea and Engineers Deployed on Board the Gun Boat Bradford January 1862
1 Thos W. Brent 2 John Peterson 3 Joseph D. Grafton 4 Saml Z. Gonzales 5 Donald Davidson 6 G.G. Patterson 7 George P. Brown 8 Coleman Gonzales 9 John Abram 10 David Taylor 11 Willis Hadley 12 William Bond 13 John Penns 14 John O’Brian 15 Michael Burnt 16 George Wilson 17 Daniel Hessner 18 Augustus Dahlman 20 George Washington 21 William Essex 22 Abner Lee Page 2
23 Alwin Gonzales 24 Stephen Chapman 25 David Tripp 26 William Sands 27 Simon Blant 28 Carter Gonzales 29 Isaac Gonzales 30 Alfred Kelly 31 William T. Morill 32 John Bright 33 Charles Antonio 34 Webb Merill 35 Samuel Jones 36 John Taylor 37 John Hanafy 1st Class Fireman 38 Peter McGinn 39 Michael Davis 40 Joseph Verdine 41 C. H. Snell 42 William Rainbow 43 James Ward 44 Charles Wells 45 James Carey 46 George Williams 47 Marius Dorning 48 Jacob Keeling 49 William Moore 50 Bryan W.Wynn
Approved Thomas W. Brant Commandant
[Note] White & Slave Laborers employed repairing public property and the Navy Yard
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John G. “Jack” Sharp resides in Concord, California. He worked for the United States Navy for thirty years as a civilian personnel officer. Among his many assignments were positions in Berlin, Germany, where in 1989 he was in East Berlin, the day the infamous wall was opened. He later served as Human Resources Officer, South West Asia (Bahrain). He returned to the United States in 2001 and was on duty at the Naval District of Washington on 9/11. He has a lifelong interest in history and has written extensively on the Washington, Norfolk, and Pensacola Navy Yards, labor history and the history of African Americans. His previous books include African Americans in Slavery and Freedom on the Washington Navy Yard 1799 -1865, Morgan Hannah Press 2011. History of the Washington Navy Yard Civilian Workforce 1799-1962, 2004.
https://www.history.navy.mil/content/dam/nhhc/browse-by-topic/heritage/washington-navy-yard/pdfs/WNY_History.pdf
and the first complete transcription of the Diary of Michael Shiner Relating to the History of the Washington Navy Yard 1813-1869, 2007/2015 online:
https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/d/diary-of-michael-shiner.html
His most recent work includes Register of Patients at Naval Hospital Washington DC 1814 With The Names of American Wounded From The Battle of Bladensburg 2018,
https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/r/register-patients-naval-hospital-washington-dc-1814.html
The last three works were all published by the Naval History and Heritage Command. John served on active duty in the United States Navy, including Viet Nam service. He received his BA and MA in History from San Francisco State University. He can be reached at sharpjg@yahoo.com