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Tom Briggs (c. 1824/25-1854) learned to play the banjo from one of the first blackface minstrel musicians, Bill Whitlock. He played with Wood's Minstrels and performed in England in 1849.

He traveled to California with E.P. Christy's Minstrels in the mid-1850's, via the Gulf of Mexico and the Isthmus of Panama, to tour the gold camps and to perform in San Francisco. However, soon after opening night in that city he succumbed to typhoid fever or tuberculosis contracted in Panama. His banjo tutor, Briggs' Banjo Instructor (Oliver Ditson, Boston 1855) was completed by his friend, minstrel James Buckley.

Tom Briggs, according to Edward Le Roy Rices’ Monarchs of Minstrelsy (New York, 1911) was:

...one of the earliest and greatest banjo performers in minstrelsy; when he first went on the stage, in the early 40’s, he travelled under the name of Fluter. He invented the banjo thimble in 1848 [used for rapid tremolo picking], and it came into general use three years later. He was the first to do the bell chimes [i.e. harmonics] , and gave imitations of a horserace on the banjo. He played successful engagements in the 40’s and 50’s with Wood’s Minstrels, likewise Buckley’s Serenaders. September 20 1854, he left New York with E.P. Christy’s Minstrels to play an engagement in San Francisco; he contracted an illness on the way, and was unable to play. Tom Briggs died in San Francisco October 23, 1854; aged 30 years. (p. 46)

...more at: Tom Briggs' Jig - full Score(s) and Annotations

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