As a P.S., I should add that I have also seen the phrase "to give 
[someone] his time" used in other American historical contexts to 
indicate the action of a master in ending an apprentice's period of 
servitude, or when a young person is released from the obligation to 
work for an employer while conveying his wages to his father.  I can't 
say whether this usage was ever current in Virginia, however.

Clearly, though, the term had similar applications in various types of 
servitude other than slavery; and I wonder if perhaps its use in the 
context of slavery derived from those situations when a slave was 
permitted to hire him- or herself out and keep the wages rather than 
remitting them to his/her legal owner--a situation that would have been 
more or less equivalent to informal emancipation.

--Jurretta Heckscher

On Feb 27, 2007, at 6:34 PM, Jurretta Heckscher wrote:

> Yes, I have come across the term "to give a slave his/her time," and 
> it means, as you have surmised, an unofficial emancipation:  the 
> person was allowed to live as a free person, but legally they were not 
> free--and thus subject to having their "freedom" revoked at any time 
> by their legal owner or his/her heirs.
>
> The reasons for this practice were probably numerous.  In Virginia, 
> the law (of 1806, if memory serves?) stating that those who were 
> officially freed either had to leave the state within a year, or have 
> their residence in the state approved by a petition to the 
> legislature, probably led some slaveholders to "give time" in this 
> fashion rather than go to the trouble, and publicity, of turning to 
> the legislature.
>
> I don't know, but can imagine, that it might therefore have been an 
> especially useful mechanism among two grooups:  those who had 
> themselves been manumitted and were subsequently able to purchase 
> enslaved family members, but who (even if they were literate and could 
> craft a formal petition) might reasonably have supposed that their 
> wishes would carry little weight with the legislature; and those--such 
> as Martha Jefferson Randolph--whose social position was such that 
> whatever informal arrangements they might make for their human chattel 
> would likely have been treated with respect, discretion, and 
> understanding by the white community, thus affording the slaves so 
> treated some measure of local protection.
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> --Jurretta Heckscher
>
> On Feb 27, 2007, at 5:53 PM, Heritage Society wrote:
>
>> Martha Jefferson Randolph, by an unsigned note, expressed a wish for 
>> her children
>> "to give their time" to three slaves ("Betsy Hemmings, Sally and 
>> Wormely").
>> Other references in the note make it clear that the slaves are not 
>> being liberated. This note has been referred to as a "codicil," but 
>> it is unsigned and unrecorded , and why it has been referred to as a 
>> "codicil" is unclear. Has anyone run across this term "to give their 
>> time"? The procedure for manumission was specific in the Virginia 
>> statutes at this time , so this term suggests a euphemism for a 
>> practice where slaves were permitted to go on their own , but were 
>> not required to leave Virginia , since they were not legally freed 
>> from slavery . Does this term appear anywhere else in the literature? 
>> . Any comments would be appreciated and it may be off list if 
>> preferred.
>>

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