"mink" (n.) = 'a black, a Negro'?

[George Thompson]

> Nothing on my shelf either, at a glance. But there is/was the expression
> "black as a mink", which was used early enough (at G. Books from 1815)
> and which probably accounts for the "mink" allusion.

        New-York General Sessions, Nov. 8.  People vs. Beers. -- Beers, a mink-black little negro, and for years an approved waiter in a most respectable porter-house and tavern in Nassau-street, and lately a principal actor in the African corps dramatique, was yesterday tried and convicted of grand larceny.  It has been suggested that his passion for his new pursuit led him to the deed for the purpose of obtaining funds to purchase decorations for his theatre.
***
New-York American, November 10, 1821, p. 2, col. 5

> I see a few 19th-century instances of 'black' men named/nicknamed "Mink"
> (?relevance).

I think I recall a Faulkner character named "Mink" -- he would have been a white haracter.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
Date: Saturday, May 9, 2009 11:39 pm
Subject: Re: "mink" (n.) = 'a black, a Negro'?
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU

> Joel S. Berson wrote:
> > ...
> > "At 10Q.M. de moss spiceable brack folk ob stinkation gan show he
> > head from ebery treet and ally, like so many Mohe-choah Mink in a
> mud-bank ..."
> >
> > I presume "mink" here means 'a black/Negro person', from "mink
> > n.1  3.a.  ... thick glossy dark brown fur".  And "mohe-choah" is
> 'mocha' (?).
> >
> > Thus not in OED draft rev. Mar. 2009.  Nor in Chapman or
> > Wentworth/Flexner, the only two American slang dictionaries on my
> poor shelf.
> -
>
> Nothing on my shelf either, at a glance. But there is/was the expression
> "black as a mink", which was used early enough (at G. Books from 1815)
> and which probably accounts for the "mink" allusion. At G. Books I see
> a
> few 19th-century instances of 'black' men named/nicknamed "Mink"
> (?relevance).
>
> I reckon "moch[o]a" is probably right, but I'm not sure why it's used
> here, whether some mink were called "mocha" or whether it's just to say
> "black" again (but "mocha" is/was less dark than "black", right?). My
> OED shows a "mocha" referring to the color of a cat (?relevance).
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org