William Henry Clopton of Virginia

William Henry Clopton was born November 28, 1810 in Virginia. He was the son of (Elder) James Clopton and Martha Winfree Clopton. He is a direct descendant of the first William Clopton, Gentleman, and his wife, Ann (Booth) Dennett Clopton. He married his first wife, Elizabeth Brumly, daughter of William Brumley of New Kent County, Virginia on November 28, 1833. They had two children, Mary Foote Clopton Wilcox and William Henry Clopton, Jr..

In 1849 he married as his second wife, Lucretia Roberts of Hampton, Virginia. She was the daughter of Zerubabel Roberts and Margaret Trower Roberts. No record of any children by this marriage nor death dates, has been found.

An April 1990 article in Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, by Dr. Stephen V. Ash entitled "White Virginians Under Occupation," states:

Surely the ultimate degradation befell slave owner William H. Clopton of the Peninsula. Clopton, a secessionist, was sarcastically described as a 'high minded Virgnia Gentleman' by the Union officer (General Edward Wild) who arrested him in 1864. 'He has acquired a notoriety as the most cruel Slave Master in this region, but in my presence he put on the character of a Snivelling Saint. I found half a dozen women among our (slave) refugees, whom he had often whipped unmercifully - I laid him bare and placed a whip into the hands of the Women, three of Whom took turns in settling some old scores on their master's back. A black man, whom he had abused, finished the administration of Poetical justice. I wish that his back had been as deeply scarred as those of the women, but I abstained and left it to them'

Wild was a Massachusetts abolitionist, who recruited an "African Brigade" from among North Carolina and Virginia Contrabands. After the incident involving William H. Clopton, it was reported that General Wild's troops behaved in an unmilitary manner and inflicted much suffering on the inhabitants of Charles City. They looted Sherwood Forest, home of President Tyler, who was a neighbor and intimate friend of William Henry Clopton, and several other plantations. Wild was court martialed after his troops shot and killed Lamb Wilcox, an unarmed planter, as he stood in his front doorway and another summary execution. Although the court decided against General Wild, General Butler eventually reversed the decision.

Although accounts of this incident involving William H. Clopton, do not clearly identify him as William Henry Clopton, no other William H. Clopton was living in the area at that time. Additional references to the whipping may be found in Ira Berlin's, A Documentary History of Emancipation, "The Destruction of Slavery," Series I, Volume I, and "The Black Military Experience," Series II. Also, Plantation of the James, privately printed in 1977, by Ransom Badger True, also recounts the story.

[#800]

Based on Information Supplied by :

Captain Franklin G. Babbitt
Appearing in the Clopton Newsletter April 1991 Issue