Primary Source Analysis: 'Black Samuel' and the Doucet Family's Farm, 1796
- Colby Gaudet
- 4 days ago
- 3 min read
Updated: 3 days ago
I’ve studied the papers of the eighteenth-century Acadian merchant captain, Pierre Doucet, for over five years, and every time I revisit and review the archival collection, I turn up new evidence that I overlooked previously. The documents left by Captain Doucet and his son, Colonel Anselm (or Samuel) Doucet, constitute the Fonds Famille Dousett (or Doucet) at the Centre Acadien, Université Sainte-Anne. While a microfilm of this fonds is held at the Nova Scotia Archives in Halifax, the microfilm does not contain all the items held in the physical collection at the Centre Acadien. I recently revisited the collection in Church Point, to compare the fonds to the contents of the Halifax microfilm.
In the journal Acadiensis and elsewhere on this blog, I’ve written about Captain Doucet as a merchant and slave-trader.[1] Yet, it’s my personal connection to Pierre Doucet (I’m a 6x great-nephew) that commits me to revisiting his archives. In the 1780s and 1790s, Captain Doucet (a resident of Clare Township, NS) transported enslaved people on several occasions between Jamaica, Georgia, and Cuba. In late 1787, commissioned by Phineas Lovett of Annapolis Royal, Doucet transported four enslaved persons from Nova Scotia to Barbados, where two of these persons – James and Scipio – were sold. Doucet also employed free Black labourers to clean and repair his vessels in Jamaican ports and in Halifax.
My revisitation of the Doucet family papers earlier this week turned up another document showing evidence of Captain Doucet’s use of Black labour.[2]

TRANSCRIPT:
This Certifieth that Black Saml. [Samuel] has work’d on Major Dousett’s Farm at picking Stones, for which we think he is entitled to Eleven Shillings ––
J. Phips
Saml. x his mark Melanson
St Mary’s 20th Apl 1796.
Recd Payment
Jacob Chryst
The item is a note by Jedediah Phips, a resident of Digby Township, originally from Massachusetts.[3] Phips must have worked for Captain Doucet as numerous notes in the fonds bear Phips’ handwriting and signature. Samuel Melanson (as I’ve discussed in my Acadiensis article), was, at this time, a son-in-law to Captain Doucet. Samuel (or Anselm) Melanson had married Pierre’s daughter, Monique Doucet, in October 1794. In 1807, Samuel Melanson signed an Annapolis County slaveowner’s petition where he reported owning two enslaved persons: an adult woman and a child (each of whom was unidentified by name on the document).
‘Black Samuel’s identity is unknown based on the information available from the note. He likely lived nearby or else lodged on the Doucet farm for a time. Jacob Chryst, who witnessed the payment for Sam’s labour, was a ‘Hessian’ Loyalist (or German settler) who owned a lot of land next to the “Heirs of Peter Doucett” in Gilbert’s Cove.[4] Considering this, the Doucet farm referred to by Phips was not the Doucets' primary residence at Pointe-à-Major, where the captain lived. The farm in question was part of the Doucet estate north of the Sissiboo River, near Plympton, where the captain’s heirs owned land. Considering Samuel Melanson signed the note, as Doucet’s son-in-law, Melanson was one of the heirs who occupied the farm at Gilbert’s Cove where 'Black Sam' worked picking stones from the family’s fields.
While in my Acadiensis article, I discussed evidence of Captain Doucet’s use of Black labour in Atlantic ports from Kingston, Jamaica, to Halifax, Nova Scotia, this note is the first evidence of a Black labourer on the Doucet family’s land in rural Clare in the 1790s – a decade before the 1807 petition. Having earned wages from Doucet, ‘Black Sam’ was ostensibly a free man of African origin or descent who worked for the Doucets for a time. What is certain from this instance is that Sam was paid for his work in the fields. Still, over a decade later, Pierre Doucet’s heirs would hold five enslaved people in bondage as private property. From this 1796 note alone, Sam’s identity will remain unclear, including any possible connection between him and the enslaved people whose unpaid labour the Doucet-Melanson family exploited in late 1807.
[1] Colby Gaudet, “Slavery and Black Labour in a St. Mary’s Bay Acadian Family, 1786–1840,” Acadiensis 52, no. 1 (Spring 2023): 9–35.
[2] Centre Acadien, Université Sainte-Anne, MG-3, Fonds Famille Dousett (Doucet), Série A, Capitaine Pierre Doucet, boîte 2, dossier 6.
[3] Isaiah Wilson, A Geography and History of the County of Digby, Nova Scotia (Halifax: Holloway Brothers, 1900), 361.
[4] Nova Scotia Crown Land index sheets, no. 13; also, Marion Gilroy and D.C. Harvey, Loyalists and Land Settlement in Nova Scotia (Halifax: Public Archives of Nova Scotia, 1937), 10.
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