Joseph Martin (general)
Joseph Martin, Jr. (1740–1808) was a brigadier general in the Virginia militia during the American Revolutionary War, in which Martin's frontier diplomacy with the Cherokee people is credited with not only averting Indian attacks on the Scotch-Irish American and English American settlers who helped win the battles of Kings Mountain and Cowpens, but with also helping to keep the Indians' position neutral and from siding with the British troops during those crucial battles. Historians agree that the settlers' success at these two battles signaled the turning of the tide of the Revolutionary War—in favor of the Americans.
For other people named Joseph Martin, see Joseph Martin (disambiguation).
Martin was born in Caroline County, Virginia, and later lived at Albemarle County and then at Henry County, Virginia, at his plantation, Belmont, on Leatherwood Creek in Martinsville, not far from the plantation of his friend Governor Patrick Henry, Leatherwood Plantation.
General Martin held many positions during his public life. As a very young man he first tried his hand at farming, next he worked for three years as an overseer on the huge plantation of his local Virginia kin, next he was a longhunter, and an explorer on the frontier for friend Patrick Henry, then an early pioneer and builder of Martin's Station in the "wild west," a surveyor of the KY/NC and TN/VA borders, an Indian agent/Indian fighter for Patrick Henry, a member at peace treaties with the Indians, and along with Dr. Thomas Walker, Joseph Martin named the Cumberland region and the Cumberland River, he served as a member of the legislatures of Virginia, Georgia, and North Carolina, he was lifelong friends with Gen. Thomas Sumter, he was also friends and brothers-in-law with Col. Benjamin Cleveland (both married Graves sisters), he was unsuccessfully nominated by Patrick Henry to the position of the first governor of the Southwest Territory, was the holder of some 80,000 acres across the Southeastern U.S. at one point. The city of Martinsville, Virginia, was named in his honor during his lifetime.
Legislative service[edit]
In his peripatetic life on the frontier, Martin was called upon to serve in the legislatures of several states. He served as a member of the North Carolina Convention called to approve the United States Constitution, and served several times in the North Carolina General Assembly. Martin was subsequently elected to the Virginia House of Delegates, until he finally chose to retire because of advanced age.[58] (In 1787 the North Carolina assembly chose Martin as Brigadier General of the Washington District.) During his time in the Virginia legislature, Martin was one of the primary supporters of James Madison's Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions.[59] During his military service in Georgia, Martin was elected to the Georgia legislature in 1783.
Martin was also initially a member of the Watauga Association, which supported the founding of the State of Franklin. Martin subsequently resigned his membership when he saw that it might compromise his role as Indian agent.
In 1799, Martin and his old friend Major John Redd of Henry County served as the two county representatives on the Virginia commission relating to the Alien and Sedition Acts.[60]
Toby's freedom[edit]
General Joseph Martin, Jr. owned a slave named 'Toby' from the time Toby was about 25 years old, and in his letters to historian Lyman Draper, Martin's son Col. William Martin told Draper that Toby, "a bright mulatto, a little under middle stature, of great physical powers, as well as mental" had served his father for many years and had distinguished himself in several battles. It was General Martin's intention, noted his son, that Toby be freed at Joseph Martin's death, but the General died intestate. Taking note of the General's affection for his longtime servant, as well as the Martin's family members' sentiments toward Martin's constant companion, the family elected "by mutual consent" to leave Toby out of the inventory of General Martin's estate, and Toby "has ever since been free, and has made himself a good estate."[77] In his letter to Draper, Col. William Martin calls the freed slave "my fine old brother Toby."