NC Registrars to compile slave documents

Crouse came across the idea for the project one day as she was re-scanning images of old deeds that were not clear. She started reading some of the documents she was scanning and became intrigued by the information contained there. She realized that the names of slaves contained in those hundreds of documents were not indexed, making it nearly impossible for people to find information about specific slaves unless they looked through all of those pages.

So Crouse started jotting down information about the slaves listed. There were a lot of slaves whose names were not listed, Crouse said, and only about half a dozen of those named had a last name listed.

Crouse said people have come to the register of deeds office over the years trying to do genealogy research including slaves. She said, “But if they don’t know who owned them, they might never find them.

http://mtairynews.com/bookmark/15397248-Register-of-Deeds-employee-compiles-slave-index

he Buncombe County Register of Deeds office has kept property records since the late 1700’s. In our records one can find a wealth of information about the history of our community. On this page, we have compiled a list of the documents that record the trade of people as slaves in Buncombe County. These people were considered “property” prior to end of the Civil War; therefore these transfers were recorded in the Register of Deeds office. The list below shows the book and page number where the deed is located in our record books as well as the seller (grantor) and buyer (grantee) of the “property.” For your convenience, you can view each original document by clicking on the book and page hyperlink.

The Register of Deeds Office presents these records in an effort to help remember our past so we will never again repeat it.

http://buncombecounty.org/Governing/Depts/RegisterDeeds/Genealogy_SlaveDeeds.aspx?redirect=slavedeeds

A painful, but yet fascinating project, rarely spoken of but well worth compiling as long as it helps rather then hurts.

As an aside, went to a mutual friends house way out in the boonies, and he took me to this small square of land with river rocks with names carved into them. Overgrown with small trees etc, it was a fmr Slave Graveyard long forgotten to time or concern.