a lawyer and planter from the Northern Neck of Virginia, in what became the United States. For two decades he sat on the Colonial Virginia Governor's Council. After the American Revolutionary War, and influenced by his Baptist faith, Carter began what became the largest manumission and release of enslaved African Americans in North America in the 74 years prior to the American Civil War. By a deed of gift filed with Northumberland County on September 5, 1791, and related documents filed in Westmoreland County in subsequent years, Carter began manumitting 500 slaves from his plantations in his lifetime. He also settled many of them on land he gave them.
