See quotation, 1861. The term was applied to the negroes in that year, when three of them made their way to the Union lines, by General B. F. Butler. “These men,” said he, “are contraband of war; set them at work.”—Vide Parton’s ‘Butler at New Orleans,’ and Wendell Phillips’s comment.
1861. The three negroes, being held contraband of war, were at once set to work to aid the masons in constructing a new bakehouse within the fort. Thenceforward the term “contraband” bore a new signification, with which it will pass in history, meaning the negroes who had been held as slaves, now adopted under the protection of the Government.—Atlantic Monthly, p. 626 (Nov.).
1862. On Feb. 15th President Lincoln wrote on a card: “I shall be obliged if the Secretary of the Treasury will in his discretion give Mr. Pierce such instructions in regard to Port Royal contrabands as may seem judicious.”—Id., p. 297 (Sept., 1863).
1862. The first information … came from a contraband, a negro boy.—W. H. Russell, The Times, March 27. (N.E.D.)
1862. “The general commanding wishes you to employ the contrabands in and about your camp in cutting down all the trees…. I have ordered … tents for the contrabands to be quartered in.”—Order of Gen. Butler, July 31: Parton, ‘General Butler in New Orleans,’ p. 506.
1863. Jerusha Matilda went down to Port Royal to teach the contrybands their primmers.—Seba Smith, ‘Letters of Major Jack Downing,’ March 28.
1863. Colonel Mallory, living on the York Peninsula, under a flag of truce, claimed three fugitive slaves (May 25th) who had sought refuge within the Federal lines to escape being sold “to go South.” The Colonel had met the General in several Conventions, had supper and drank with him; and, doubtless, presumed that he had but to ask and receive the “black rascals.” Butler heard the rebel demand with the formality of a commander. “You hold,” said the General, “that negroes are property.” “I do,” said Mallory. “You also hold that Virginia is no longer a part of the United States?” “I do.” “Now,” said Butler, “you are a lawyer, Colonel Mallory, and I want to know if you claim that the Fugitive Slave act of the United States is binding in a foreign nation; and if a foreign nation uses this kind of property to destroy the lives and property of citizens of the United States, if that species of property ought not to be regarded as contraband?” The Colonel retired without the negroes; and the country rejoiced over the construction that a negro was “contraband of war” when the slave of a rebel master.—O. J. Victor, ‘The History … of the Southern Rebellion,’ ii. 191.
1864. Having as a guard over him a coal-black, brutal-looking negro soldier, an escaped “contraband,” as Beast Butler styles the stolen and refugee slaves from the South.—‘Southern Hist. Soc. Papers,’ ii. 233 (Richmond, 1876).
1867. The garrison at Lynchburg were advised, doubtless by some “intelligent contraband,” that the brave cavalier was stopping with his father.—J. M. Crawford, ‘Mosby and his Men, p. 370.
1875. In the Atlantic Monthly for June, Mrs. Launt Thompson tells the ‘Story of a Contraband.’
1885. “Massa Capen,” said Moses, “the Unyum Gub’ment done make all de black folks contraban’; now, sar, what’s dat?”—Admiral D. D. Porter, ‘Incidents of the Civil War,’ p. 94.
1885. The Confederates soon finished all the contrabands that were swimming in the river, or clinging to the wreck.—Id., p. 243.
1908. [That boat] hails from Beaufort Island, in the heart of the black belt of South Carolina. Government had a depot of contrabands there in the wah, and their grandchildren are there yet.—N.Y. Ev. Post, Dec. 31.
