McKay was a "sickly, slothful and stupid sort of fellow," too much disposed to brutality in the treatment of the slaves in his charge; Butler seemed to have "no more authority over the negroes ... than an old woman would have"; and Green, the overseer of the carpenters, was too much on a level with the slaves for the exertion of control.

Donald McKay was chief of scouts, and the exploits of Drehan existed only in his own imagination.