Researching Slave Ancestors
Tracing the family history of people held as slaves can be difficult
May 2, 2007 Darlene Vaillancourt
As I mentioned in an earlier blog, there are new slave registry databases being made available online. That piqued my interest in the unique struggle of researching ancestors who may have been slaves.
Researching African American ancestors who were slaves may be one of the toughest tasks a genealogist can face. But if you have hit a brick wall, don't give up just yet. While records may be sparse or difficult to find, you may still be able to trace your family line back beyond those years of slave ownership.
Census records from the 1850s and 1860s will not offer much assistance, because even though slaves were usually enumerated before the Civil War, they were simply counted and not always recorded by name. The 1870 census is the first one after emancipation and will contain the names of all freed slaves.
Another pitfall in the study of slave ancestors, is that they didn't usually maintain their family surnames when they were emancipated. This can create quite a problem when trying to trace family. One often used assumption (that is not always correct, but does offer a place to start) is that freed slaves usually took the surnames of their last owners.
So if your family name at this point in history was Smith, it could very well not have been your family name any farther back. It could be the name of the slave owners instead. That can still be helpful though. You will likely find more information about your relations through the names of the owners anyway.
Most of the issues and events from this point in history are American in origin, and as a Canadian I admit that my own knowledge of this era is not as complete as it could be. Here are several websites that will be very helpful to you as you research your African American ancestors:
Freedmen's Bureau Online - The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands (usually just called the Freedmen's Bureau) was created in 1865 in manage the affairs of refugees and newly freed slaves. Much of their documentation is now available online (in transcribed form). On their website, you can find banking records, marriage records, legal documents and more. Many of the records are arranged by state, and you can also search by surname.
Afrigeneas - A site dedicated to African American genealogical research, though not specifically to the slave era. They have a good collection of general genealogy articles as well as those pertaining to African heritage. There is also a great database of contributed slave information that you should check out in your research. You should remember that many of these records are contributed by other genealogist and may not be properly sourced.
Most slave documents are organized at the state-level and not available online in one central location. You can visit Cyndi's List for a good collection of links to all the various state collections of slave records.
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