Note 688 — Chapter XII · OBLIGATORY CIVIL MARRIAGE IN THE NEW ENGLAND COLONIES (continued 2)

Ibid., 22. The MSS. Records of the General Sessions of Suffolk (Jan. 30, 1709-10) contain the following evidence: "Upon reading the Petition of Jack Negroman Servant ... relating to his ... being Married to Esther a Negro Woman Servant [to another master] ... Ordered that [he] ... be not denyed marriage provided he attend the Directions of the law for the Regulation of Marriages." Compare "Flora's case" (1758) in MSS. Records of the Superior Court of Judicature (1757-59), 295, where the court held that the child of a female slave "never married according to any of the Forms prescribed by the Laws of this Land," by a person supposed also to be a slave, was not a bastard. From this decision it is argued that in Massachusetts all actual marriages were deemed good without any formal solemnization or the presence of priest or magistrate. Cf. Bishop, Mar., Div., and Sep., I, 179.