The brig Roleson sailed from Pensacola, Florida and arrrived in Hyannis, Massachusetts on May 8. During the voyage, stowaway fugitive slave Columbus Jones had been discovered and kept in chains. At Hyannis, the captain and first mate of the Roleson negotiated with the captain of the schooner Elizabeth B., to transport Jones to Norfolk, Virginia for a fee and hand him over the authorities there. When this became known locally, they were arrested for kidnapping, indicted by a grand jury in Barnstable, and tried the following November. They were acquited. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Samuel May, The Fugitive Slave Law and Its Victims (New York: American Anti-Slavery Society, 1861), 118-119.
Record Data
Date Certainty
Exact
Type
Slavery/Abolition