Art of the Deal (pages 9 thru 16)
The chapter title is a riff on Trump: The Art of the Deal by Donald J. Trump and Tony Schwartz (New York: Random House, 1987). The historical General David Forman, introduced in this chapter, fancied himself an important businessman whose wealth largely rested on real estate holdings, and was inordinately fond of his eldest daughter and her husband.
(page 9, par. 1, line 1) Late autumn air wafted and stung The Forman pioneer diary rarely mentions the weather, such as a drenching nighttime rain on the second or third night from departure. I mostly describe moon phases from historic calendars and weather conditions from contemporaneous descriptions from the same geography.
(page 9, par. 2, line 4) brother-in-law, John Burrough’s Freehold house “Major [John] Burrows, lived [there] after he left the army” Forman and Draper, Journey Down the Ohio and Mississippi 1888, p. 9 footnote. Editor Draper noticed John Burrows (sometimes” given as Burrowes or Burroughs): “Major John Burrows was first a captain in Colonel David Forman’s regiment. Forman had the nick-name of “Black David” to distinguish him from a relative of the same name, and he was always a terror to the Tories; and Captain Burrows, from his efficiency against these marauders, was called by those enemies of the country, “Black David’s Devil.” On January 1, 1777, Captain Burrows was made a captain in Spencer’s regiment on Continental establishment; and, January 21, 1779, he was promoted to the rank of major, serving in Sullivan’s campaign against the hostile Six Nations, and remaining in the army till the close of the war. Several years after, he went on a journey to the interior of Georgia, in an unhealthy season, when he probably sickened and died, for he was never heard of afterward.” Later sources, likely more complete than those available to Draper in the late 19th century, placed Burrows’ later career as a plantation owner in South Carolina. Samuel S. Forman’s sister Margaret married this John Burrows, cementing him by marriage and former military service to the extended New Jersey Forman clan. The sister died of consumption July 14, 1787.
(page 11, par. 2, line 3) a sickly child not expected to live Forman Papers, NYHS manuscript
(page 11, par. 2, line 8) his age remained a touchy subject Forman Autobiography, Historical Magazine Charles C. Dawson, an early editor of the Forman papers, believed that Samuel S. was younger than his stated age. Dawson judged that some of the anecdotes about his youth made chronological sense only if Samuel S. had been born about 1770. “The mention of his age and date of birth seems also to have been carefully avoided…but it is doubted if the Major’s [Samuel S. Forman’s] age was known to anyone except himself… If we suppose that he was born about 1770, instead of 1765, those statements [incidents from his earliest remembrance] will seem much more consistent.” I have judged Samuel S. Forman’s stated birth date to be accurate; the seeming anomalous anecdotes resulting from a sickly childhood, delayed start of schooling, and diminutive stature.
(page 11, par. 3) black servant Daddy French Forman Papers, NYHS Op. cit., Unpublished manuscript account of enslaved Daddy French’s holiday escapades with Samuel S. Forman as a child circa early 1770s. The recollected anecdote does not appear in either the Cantwell 1869 or Lyman Draper 1888 published versions of the Samuel S. Forman autobiographical travel account. “Daddy French” sounds to me to have been a nickname, perhaps reflecting a French Caribbean origin or accent. If it were not the jovial enslaved elderly man’s actual name, then his real name is lost to history.
We do not have Daddy French’s views of that annual ritual. It is likely that a mutual warmth and familiarity developed between young Samuel S. and the grandfatherly slave. We can only infer if Daddy French’s indulgent feelings for the youth were also tempered by feelings of obligation to ingratiate himself to his master’s pint-sized son. He could capitalize on a benign opportunity to legitimately bring home and share with his enslaved kin festive sweets that otherwise only the kitchen slaves tasted for themselves. And even then, kitchen help could anticipate the mistress’ wrath if caught… Sugar and alcoholic beverages were most often kept under lock and key by the mistress of the household and doled out sparingly. Otherwise, the kitchen was the domain of experienced and oft-times highly skilled enslaved domestics.
(page 11, par. 4, line 2) “He and his friends play-acted at war” Forman Papers, NYHS, Op. cit., This youth militia drilling may have occurred in early 1778 as depredations in Monmouth County by and against Loyalist neighbors continued to grow more vitriolic and destructive, and New Jersey militia leaders like then-colonel David Forman could anticipate that the entire British army might traverse central New Jersey if they were to quit their occupation of Philadelphia and march overland to New York City.
The school boys could point to the dark brown stain on the church’s pine floor, where mortally wounded British General Monckton was said to have bled and breathed his last. Many British wounded had been left behind by the British Army, on their way to marching on to New York City from Monmouth battlefields, and cared for within the Old Tennent Church.
Samuel S. and his grammar school friends did more than simply observe deceased soldiers’ burial places and the still observable damage inflicted on buildings. Their curiosity led them to dig up the General Monckton’s grave. Or it might have been one of the British grenadiers who had died in hand-to-hand combat at the height of the battle, or expired on the unvarnished pine board floor of the make-shift field hospital. As Forman recalled the incident, “We opened the grave; a few pieces only of blanket, which encompassed the corpse, remained.” The thigh bone, the largest in anyone’s skeleton, was unusually long. School mate Barnes Smock, who was a remarkably tall student and a coadjutor to the desecration, found that “the thigh bones of this unfortunate officer far out-measured his.”
Boys being boys, they may have chased one another brandishing the moldering bones. Would diminutive Samuel S. have imagined himself the son of a far earlier Sam, plucked from Reverend Woodhull’s didactic tales? It would have been an empowering thought to transform his role in the graveyard frolic into the Biblical Samson. Then he would scatter his Philistine playmates. He would demote Barnes Smock’s precociously tall presence to its proper place in the schoolyard pecking order, by wielding nothing more than a mantle of righteousness and the osseous jaw of an ass. For Samuel S.’s recollections of this macabre frolic, see Forman Travels Down the Ohio…, Op. cit., p. 12.
(page 11, par. 5, lines 4-5) ugly, prolonged guerrilla conflict between Patriot and Loyalist neighbors that had developed in Monmouth County Monmouth County and Northern New Jersey claim the dubious distinction of the most prolonged civil conflict between Loyalists and rebellious Americans of any region in the future United States. Armed hostilities in one form or another extended from 1776 into 1783. Though Americans claimed the ground, and a large battle was fought at Monmouth in June of 1778, the region was the scene of frequent raids by displaced Loyalists and former slaves in the British service. British sympathizers and some criminals maintained refuges on Sandy Hook and in the Pine Barrens. Other Loyalist raiders ventured forth from British-occupied New York City. The American and French victory at Yorktown in October 1781 had the paradoxical impact of exacerbating the ferocity and depredations inflicted by both sides on one another in 1782 throughout the Northern New Jersey and Monmouth County region, ceasing only with Peace of Paris.
David Forman organized New Jersey militiamen early in the Revolutionary War. By the time the fighting moved south from New England following the Siege of Boston, he had participated in the American defeats in the New York campaign. At the Battle of Germantown, as the Americans lost their grip on Philadelphia in October 1777, then-colonel David Forman led the New Jersey militia in one of three prongs of George Washington’s unsuccessful attempt to dislodge the British Army from settling into the captured American capital. See: Gigantino, James J. II, ed. The American Revolution in New Jersey: Where the Battlefront Meets the Home Front, and Adelberg, Michael The American Revolution in Monmouth County.
(page 12, par. 1, line 4) employing their fathers’ first names as their middle names The middle names, differing from their names at birth or baptism, were adopted by the individuals themselves. The practice confounds historians and genealogists. There were so many identically named 18th century Formans, interrelated and hailing from the New Jersey, Eastern Pennsylvania, and Maryland areas, that individual identities may have been blurred in family genealogies. I am suspicious that Ezekiel Forman, General David’s older brother and the person placed in charge of the pioneer venture to Natchez, is sometimes in family histories described as being a Loyalist. I have found that Ezekiel was a lawyer in good standing living in Philadelphia during the 1780s. If he had been at one time accused of Loyalism, he had been exonerated by then. I suspect, but have been unable to document. that if there had been another Ezekiel Forman, who may well have been a Tory or Loyalist.
(page 12, par. 2, line 5) “I love my family more than myself…” Fenelon’s book, translated from the French, was a mainstay didactic text used by 18th century American schools and tutors. A copy was listed in Ezekiel Forman’s 1795 estate inventory listing books studied by his children at Wilderness Plantation’s little school. My linkage of Fenelon’s writings with Samuel S. Forman is circumstantial and conjectural. Fénelon, François de La Mothe, Leslie Chilton, and O. Jr. Brack, eds. The Adventures of Telemachus, the Son of Ulysses.
Samuel later resonated with another legendary figure from Greece’s Golden Age, a figure encountered during his studies. Anacharsus was a Stoic philosopher, traveling extensively, observing foreign ways, and writing about them for the benefit of people back in his native Scythia. See Forman, Autobiography, Historical Magazine, Op. cit. The 1869 published version of Samuel S. Forman’s autobiographical travelogue consistently casts himself in the third person as the semi-legendary Anacharsus. Other versions identify himself more conventionally in the first person. Fenelon’s book, translated from the French, was a mainstay didactic text used by 18th century American schools and tutors. A copy was listed in Ezekiel Forman’s 1795 estate inventory listing books studied by his children, at Wilderness Plantation’s little school. My linkage of Fenelon’s writings with Samuel S. Forman is circumstantial and conjectural.
(page 13, par. 2, line 19) inspiration for his nicknames: “Black David” and sometimes “Devil David” Forman, William P. Records of the Descendants of John Foreman, who settled in Monmouth County, New Jersey, p. 22. Fairchild in: Three Revolutionary Soldiers: David Forman, Jonathan Forman, and Jonathan Marsh Forman provides the more benign explanation that “Black David” Forman had thick dark hair, with black facial stubble that accumulated rapidly and noticeably between shaves. This facial appearance distinguished the general from and identically named Sheriff David Forman, who was approximately the same age, resident in Monmouth County, but had held a civil rather than military post.
(page 13, par. 4, lines 2-4) “an arrangement with the Spanish Minister” The Forman land grant was an instance of Spain implementing its policy, initiated by Governor Miro by 1787 and ready for application by minister Gardoqui in New York by early 1789, to encourage American settlers to Luisiana and Spanish West Florida. Spanish authorities favored David Forman’s proposal as it involved a relatively large number of immigrants who would bring be self-sufficient for labor and capital. The Forman immigrants comprised the largest single group of Americans taking advantage of the Spanish offer while the policy was in place. For the Spanish origins, rationale, and expectations for the policy, see: Din, Gilbert C. 1969. “Immigration Policy of Governor Estavan Miro in Spanish Louisiana” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 73 (2 Oct):155-175; Whitaker, Preston. The Spanish-American Frontier. Boston, 1927, pp. 97-107; Hatcher, Matti A. “The Louisiana Background to the Colonization of Texas, 1763-180.” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 1921, Vol. 24 (January): pp. 169-194; and Nasatir, Abraham P. Borderland in Retreat – From Spanish Louisiana to the Far Southwest.
(page 14, par. 1, line 5) business agent or supercargo Supercargo was the contemporary term used for the role. Supercargoes were essential on long distance trading ventures, where they served as a knowledgeable merchant’s representative. They were delegated by the owner the authority of selling a cargo on the best possible terms. At the distant destination port, they decided on the spot whether to sell for cash, barter for hopefully saleable merchandise for the return trip, and to supervise warehouses or trading establishments at the ultimate or intermediate destinations.
They ranked just below the captain while aboard sea-going merchant ships in transit. Governed by Admiralty law and practice, the supercargo was a staff role having no line authority over seamen or stevedores. In contrast, Samuel S. Forman assumed line authority over his flatboat travelling from Louisville to Natchez. In comparison to “factors,” the supercargo travelled along with the cargo in long distance trade, while the factor was geographically settled at the destination port. Supercargoes realized their apex of importance and influence in the China Trade of the late 18th and early nineteenth centuries. The emergence of telegraph and telephone during the nineteenth century rendered this merchant’s role extinct.
(page 14, par. 2, lines 8-9) the prestigious Society of the Cincinnati The organization thrives today on a mission of promoting knowledge and appreciation for American ideals emerging from the Revolutionary Era. The national society headquartered at Anderson House in Washington, DC, houses a museum and extensive research library dedicated to eighteenth century militaria. The Society is genealogically-based fraternal organization, with components organized by the thirteen original states. The criterion for eligibility is based on original member propositi, officers who had served during the Revolutionary War for at least three years, or had been killed in action, as Continental Army or allied French officers. Membership passes by patrilineal primogeniture in the state component of the propositus.
In its early years, figures like John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Elbridge Gerry criticized the organization as promoting an undesirable American hereditary militarized caste. Such concerns dissipated as the Society emerged as a voice advocating for the humane treatment of all veterans. According to Society sources, 5500 people qualified for membership, of whom some 2150 had joined within a year of its founding in 1783.
The organization implicitly encouraged a national point of view, as service in the more numerous state militias did not meet membership criteria. So many characters in Ill-Fated Frontier were original members of the Society of the Cincinnati, that I will mention the affiliation in the text only if it is relevant to the saga. Anthony Wayne, David Forman, Benajah Osman, Jonathan Forman, Ezekiel Forman’s eldest son Thomas Marsh Forman, James Wilkinson, Josiah Harmar, Arthur St. Claire, George Washington, and Ohio Land Company leaders Rufus Putnam, Winthrop Sargent, and Benjamin Tupper, were all original members of the Society of the Cincinnati. Henry Knox and Alexander Hamilton are acknowledged as organizers of the group in 1783. Not coincidentally, George Washington was the most important founding member.
(page 15, par. 2, line 2) “proceed with Capt. Benajah Osman &…David’s tenants or slaves to Fort Pitt” Samuel and Samuel S. Forman papers, New York: NYHS. Agreement between David Forman and Samuel S. Forman, dated November 21, 1789.
(page 15, par. 4, line 6) “four horse team and guided by trusted black coachman” Forman Travels, NYPL manuscript c. 1850, pp. 41-42. The coachman in this anecdote is variously named as Old Moses or Phillip in different unpublished manuscripts, written at different times from Samuel S. Forman’s recollections during the 19th century. The incident of David Forman assigning his coachman so Samuel S. could impress a Conover neighbor girl on an impromptu date, does not appear in the 1that 888 published book version edited by Lyman C. Draper.
(page 15, par. 5, line 2) Ginnie, forty-five years old, David’s chief house servant. My identification of Ginnie as the principal house servant is based on equivocal references in primary sources. Further details in my book are circumstantial and conjectural. An anecdote related by Samuel S. Forman, occurring when the emigrant party crossed Pennsylvania, suggests that Ginnie was an enslaved house servant better known, trusted, and held a position of responsibility and trust among the masters. Her age and family connections are more certain, as they are based on the detailed 1795 Ezekiel Forman estate inventory. This “mammy” role, a much maligned by modern observers, was in this sense a job title rather than a name. One of the variants of the Samuel S. Forman travel chronicles identifies this woman as “Mammy Jenny.”
This interaction, which I equivocate as “probable,” is suggested by the circumstance that General Forman’s house – whose size, appearance, and internal layout have been documented in an abortive late 20th century effort to save the derelict structure – was relatively small by modern standards. Enslaved domestics would always be in proximity and probably eves-dropping distance of the master and his family. Human nature suggests the enslaved would have had a keen interest in David Forman’s evolving plan to permanently relocate Ginnie and five dozen of her enslaved associates to far-off Spanish West Florida during a time of Indian war.
The kitchen was most often the base and domain of enslaved domestics. See Christopher Farrish’s account of Virginia slave-based plantation ga,rden and kitchen management, in: Jennifer Jensen, ed. Dethroning the Deceitful Pork Chop: Rethinking African American Foodways from Slavery to Obama. I am presuming that Monmouth County slave-based plantations were similar to their North Carolina and Virginia counterparts with respect to domestic food preparation by enslaved domestics. This may not have been the case. Southern plantations were typically larger, employed more slaves, and therefore may have enabled more specialization and autonomy carrying out assigned food preparation tasks. I could find no sources specifically addressing this aspect of slavery in the Mid-Atlantic states.