Our country’s history with chattel slavery and indentured servitude. Both during slave times and after, free labor was often provided to prominent citizens via a court-enforced indenture of impoverished children.
Such was the case for young Caleb Johnson.
In my research into the USCT soldiers of Carroll County, Maryland, the following history was found.
The first record we have of Caleb is his indenture. As a 14-year-old orphan, the courts in Anne Arundel county apprenticed him to Mr. David Feelemyer, a merchant in Ellicott City. A month later, Mr. Feelemyer passed along the indenture to Col James S. Piper. When Col Piper moved to Taneytown, young Mr. Johnson had no choice but to follow along. While ostensibly free, Caleb Johnson received no wages for his labor and had no agency in his life.
Finally, on September 13, 1858, Caleb Johnson reached the age of majority (21 years old). At this point he achieved his freedom. The next month, he married Mary Elizabeth Matthews, the daughter of James Matthews. James was no stranger to enslavement, having been enslaved from birth by Henry Swope and finally manumitted in 1845. Mary’s sister, Helen, had also been forced into indenture.
Maryland Law at the time required young Black children to be indentured to “some white person,” as long as the court deemed it appropriate.