You may never have come across John Laurens in your pantheon of Revolutionary War heroes in your history class. I didn’t, until the ‘Hamilton’ musical.
After you read his story, you’ll see why we need to celebrate this South Carolinian a little more on America’s 250th Birthday. He knew what liberty really meant.
Laurens grew up a child of wealth and privilege, because his father made his fortune in the slave labor. The son was sent to study in Switzerland and then learn the law in England. But John Laurens was more passionate about something else: The American Revolution. He fought bravely at the Battle of Brandywine (a site I took my family to visit, when I taught at the University of Delaware).
His fluency in French got him into George Washington’s inner circle.
But Laurens had grander ideas. According to the Mount Vernon digital library: “Despite his upbringing, Laurens believed that the republican principles the Americans were fighting for were hypocritical if they continued to utilize enslaved labor. Strongly influenced by the growing abolitionist literature that circulated in England while he was studying, Laurens encouraged those around him, including Washington, to consider freeing those they enslaved.”
The Marquis de Lafayette came around to his way of thinking. Washington did fear economic and social consequences. But Laurens was persistent. He came up with a plan where African American slaves could fight for the Continental Army and win their freedom. The Continental Congress balked in 1778, but on a second try a year later, Laurens won their approval. However, the state delegations of South Carolina and Georgia vetoed the idea. South Carolina reaped the repercussions of their shortsightedness, as Charleston was captured and Gates’ army was thrashed at the Battle of Camden (another battle site I took my family to… sense a trend?)
Laurens was captured at Charleston, but on parole, joined Benjamin Franklin in Paris, convincing King Louis XVI to dispatch his French Navy to Yorktown. So regardless of one’s views on race, we all owe a debt of gratitude to Laurens for helping win that battle.
Despite the win at Yorktown, the war wasn’t over. While negotiations dragged on, the British Army and Navy harassed the Americans. When a British foraging party threatened South Carolina, Laurens, who was wounded in every battle he fought, was finally killed at the Battle of Combahee River in 1782. Of Laurens, Washington wrote “he had not a fault that I ever could discover, unless intrepidity bordering upon rashness, could come under that denomination; & to this he was excited by the purest motives.”
From the bitter winter at Valley Forge, he wrote this to his father: “I would sollicit you to cede me a number of your able bodied men Slaves, instead of leaving me a fortune — I would bring about a twofold good, first I would advance those who are unjustly deprived of the Rights of Mankind to a State which would be a proper Gradation between abject Slavery and perfect Liberty — and besides I would reinforce the Defenders of Liberty with a number of gallant Soldiers…The Ridicule that may be thrown on the Colour I despise, because I am sure of rendering essential Service to my Country.”
How’s that for a prodigal son?
In recent debates, some seek to uphold the virtues of slavery, with “free room and board” and “the ability to learn a trade, like being a blacksmith,” while conveniently ignoring the whipping, lack of pay, racism and no freedom, and contrast that with the truths that Laurens sacrificed his fortune and life for. “He believed liberty and freedom, helped by slavery, did not deserve to be called either,” writes the National Museum of the United States Army.
John A. Tures is Professor of Political Science and Coordinator of the Political Science Program at LaGrange College, in LaGrange, Georgia. His first book, “Branded”, is available on Amazon. He can be reached at jtures@lagrange.edu.