History / United States / State & Local / Middle Atlantic (DC, DE, MD, NJ, NY, PA)Reference / Genealogy & HeraldrySocial Science / Emigration & ImmigrationSocial Science / Cultural & Ethnic Studies / American / European American Studies
Description
Thework at hand is an alphabetical listing of all free African-American heads of household listed in the five U.S. censuses for the State of New York taken between 1790 and 1830. Since it was during this 40-year period that the New York legislature passed a series of statutes resulting in the gradual emancipation of the state's slave population, the scope of this work documents the emergence of a completely free black population by 1830. In all, there are 15,000 references to freedmen, many of whom appear in more than one census.