"Fifty Years in Chains" is an autobiography of a fugitive slave,Charles Ball, where he describes his life as a slave under various masters and his service in the Chesapeake Bay Flotilla of the U.S. Navy under the command of Commodore Joshua Barney in the War of 1812.Charles Ball (1780 - unknown) was an enslaved African-American from Maryland who worked as a cook and sailor.According to his Autobiography his grandfather was a man from a noble African family who was enslaved and brought to Calvert County, Maryland around 1730.