Habeas Corpus Petition Concerning Elvira, An Enslaved Servant

In 1864, Calvin Ford, a resident of Petersburg, Virginia, filed a legal petition concerning an enslaved girl named Elvira. She had been convicted by a local Court of Oyer and Terminer, courts specifically empowered to try enslaved persons for capital crimes, for allegedly attempting to poison Ford and members of his household. Although she was found guilty by a majority of the five-judge panel, the decision was not unanimous. As a result, Ford challenged the legality of the court's decision, arguing that a unanimous ruling was required for conviction under the applicable legal standards.

At the time, Virginia law allowed enslaved individuals convicted of serious crimes to be sentenced to "sale and transportation" beyond the borders of the Confederate States. This practice, established in the 1840 revision of Virginia’s slave code, permitted courts to sentence convicted enslaved people to be sold and relocated to slave-holding regions outside the Confederacy, such as Cuba, Puerto Rico, or border states like Kentucky and Missouri. The sentence functioned as both punishment and a means of preserving the economic value of enslaved persons.

Ford’s petition requested that Elvira be released from the Petersburg jail and returned to his custody on the grounds of legal error. This legal maneuver likely reflected Ford’s desire to maintain his property rights and assert his own disciplinary authority over Elvira. The case illustrates how enslavers engaged with the judicial system to assert property claims and navigate legal procedures during the final year of the Civil War.