Jacob Van Wickle (1770-1854)

Guidance

This white person has 68 related events in the database, listed at the bottom of this page.

This person was connected with a notorious slave trading ring in New Jersey. To learn more about the slave trading ring and related documents, see our research guide Understanding Interstate Slave Trade & Kidnapping Documents.
Record Title
Jacob Van Wickle (1770-1854)
Identifier
NJS-PER-00068
Given Name
Jacob
Family Name
Van Wickle
Alternate Name
Van Wikle
Van Winkle
Birth Date
1770
Death Date
1854
Sex
Male
Occupation
Legal
Slave Trade
Biographical Description
Jacob Van Wickle was a corrupt Judge of Common Pleas in Middlesex County who took advantage of his position to establish a slave trading ring. Jacob Van Wickle's son Nicholas Van Wickle and brother-in-law Charles Morgan were also involved in his scheme to buy groups of enslaved people in New Jersey at cheap prices and send them to the Deep South to make huge profits. The Lost Souls Memorial Project, which seeks to memorialize the the individuals whose freedom was stolen by Van Wickle's slave trading ring, has documented over a hundred victims who were taken away from their communities in New Jersey.

New Jersey law stipulated that, before any enslaved person could be taken away (or "removed") from the state, the enslaved individual had to appear in court and give their consent to relocate with their enslaver. If the enslaved person consented, then the Judges of the Common Pleas would issue a removal certificate authorizing this relocation. In 1818, Jacob Van Wickle signed 77 removal certificates authorizing his own son, brother-in-law, and other associates who were part of the scheme to remove Black men, women, and children from New Jersey to Louisiana and Mississippi. But these Black people did not actually give their consent and were instead coerced to leave New Jersey with the slave traders or else left the state under false pretenses after being lied to about their destination.

Newspaper accounts of the Van Wickle operation note that Van Wickle assembled and imprisoned groups of Black people under armed guard at his house on the South River, which newspapers dubbed the "South River Establishment." Researchers affiliated with the Lost Souls Memorial Project identify present-day East Brunswick as the location of Van Wickle's "South River Establishment."
Keywords
white person
enslaver
government official
Van Wickle and associates
Place of Significance
South River
North Brunswick
South Amboy
East Brunswick
Parent of
Nicholas Van Wickle (1796-1865)
Stephen Van Wickle
Jacob Van Wickle Jr.
Spouse of
Sarah Morgan Van Wickle (1772-1835)
Related Person
Charles Morgan (1775-1848)
Lewis Compton
References

Gigantino, James J., II. "Trading in Jersey Souls: New Jersey and the Interstate Slave Trade." Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies 77, no. 3 (2010): 281–302. https://doi.org/10.5325/pennhistory.77.3.0281

Drake, Jarrett. "Off the Record: The Production of Evidence in 19th Century New Jersey." New Jersey Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal 1, no. 1 (2015): 104–25. https://doi.org/10.14713/njs.v1i1.16

Bailey, Anne C. "They Sold Human Beings Here." The 1619 Project, New York Times, February 12, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/02/12/magazine/1619-project-slave-auction-sites.html

Pingeon, Frances D. “An Abominable Business: The New Jersey Slave Trade, 1818.” New Jersey History 109, no. 3 (1991): 15–35.
Record Contributor
Jesse Bayker
Linked Sources
Mentioned in:
Linked Events
Additional Participant in:
Research Guide
Research Guide: Understanding Interstate Slave Trade & Kidnapping Documents
Resource class
Agent
Item sets
PERSONS
Enslavers

Part of Jacob Van Wickle (1770-1854)

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