eved that the situation
could be so easily cleared. Before the Revolution was well on its way
the delegates from Georgia to the Continental Congress had already
experienced certain fears as to the safety of Georgia and South Carolina.
They believed that if one thousand regular troops should land in Georgia
under a commander with adequate supplies and he should proclaim freedom
to all loyal Negroes, twenty thousand of them would join the British in a
fortnight. It was to them a matter of much concern that the Negroes of
these provinces had such a wonderful art of communicating intelligence
among themselves as to convey information several hundred miles in a week
or in a fortnight.[19] The colonists, too, could not ignore the bold
attempt of Lord Dunmore, the dethroned governor of Virginia, who issued
a proclamation of freedom to all slaves who would fight for the king,
endeavored to raise a black regiment among them, and actually used a
number of Negroes in the battle at Kemp's Landing, where they behaved like
well-seasoned soldiers, pursuing and capturing one of the attacking
companies.[20] Referring thereafter to Lord Dunmore as an arch-traitor who
should be instantly crushed, George Washington said: "But that which
renders the measure indispensably necessary is the Negroes, if he gets
formidable numbers of them, will be tempted to join" him.

Subsequent developments showed that these misgivings were justified. In
July, 1776, General Greene learned on Long Island that the British were
about to organize in that vicinity a regiment of Negroes aggregating
200.[22] Taking as a pretext the enrollment of Negroes in the Continental
Army, Sir Henry Clinton proclaimed from Philipsburgh in 1779 that all
Negroes taken in arms or upon any military duty should be purchased from
the captors for the public service, and that every Negro who would desert
the "Rebel Standard" should have full security to follow within the
British lines any occupation which he might think proper.[23] In 1781
General Greene reported to Washington from North Carolina that the British
there had undertaken to embody immediately two regiments of Negroes.[24]
They were operating just as aggressively farther South. "It has been
computed by good judges," says Ramsey, "that between the years 1775 and
1783 the State of South Carolina lost 25,000 Negroes,[25] that is, one
fifth of all the slaves, and a little more than half as many as its entire
white population. At