common last names for slaves in the 1800s

You can use the links below to view more common surnames. Until recently, scholarly consensus was that early African American names did not differ significantly from those of white Americans. What are the most popular last names in the UK? LOTTIE had been the name of the nurse before me and so they just continued that same name. 30 January 2022, [PAST EVENT], Eastern Standard Time: Join special guest genealogist Taneya Y. Koonce and I as we present our joint Zoom webinar, Organize Your Genealogy! See flier for details; cost of this event is $25. Accueil > > Avr > 18 > Uncategorized > common last names for slaves in the 1800s. No, I dont know to whom she belonged before she was brought from Virginia to Kentucky. Brown: A common last name derived from an ancestor's complexion or the color of their hair. Who called you by that name and where was it done? that lists the slaves along with their surnames. In 1870, all of them were listed with the surnames of their last owner; however, each one of them named their sons for one of their brothers. Robyn. Ho Joanne, Q. > | Index main page>| Index by slave owner's name, Index to "Descriptive Recruitment Lists of Volunteers for the United States Colored Troops for the State of Missouri, 1863-1865"(NARA Microfilm Publication M1894 - 6 rolls). Augustin Meaning: a descendant of Augustine Origin: English 2. Evie (F) (English origin) means "life" or "lively". Abel, the name of Adam and Eve's unfortunate younger son, compensates with positive connotations: capable, competent, ready and willing. 3. I was called by that name all the time I was with the Morrows. An 's' at the end of a personal name also meant 'son of', for example Richards, Stevens, Williams and so on. Thanks for your comment, ", "The great gift of family life is to be intimately acquainted with people you might never ever introduce yourself to had life not done it for you. So I asked my mother and she told me my father John Barnett, a white man, and I took up the name of Barnett . Another interesting fact is that Creole surname use also evolved over time and varied from record to record with the same person. When slave owners married, they often received slaves as wedding gifts and inheritances from their wifes family. Newly emancipated slaves also frequently chose new first names, discarding those associated with slavery. One of my grandfathers in Africa was called Jeaceo, and so I decided to be Jackson. Bailey, Word Stories Surrounding African American Slavery. When Wessyngtons owner George A. Washington married Margaret Lewis in 1849 her father gave the couple twenty-nine slaves. I belonged to him until emancipation. - Jane Howard, "Friends are God's apologies for relations." He decided that he didnt want to be known as Cap Sherrod and that he would vote and marry under his choice of names. If the former slave had been befriended or assisted in getting established after the Civil War, they might have taken that persons name. . Surnames (not always those of former owners) would then be adopted as family names by former slaves and their descendants. A small number of creoles in Louisiana also acquired surnames derived from ethnic identities in Senegal. I dont know what became of his parents. 40. Is this the work of the evil spirits or from my bad karma? Is this my fate!To worsen matters, a given new European label applied only to one aspect of the nature (whereas his/her original name referred to a total identity) of the enslaved and this was an effective way to try to fragment a victims mindset. He identified father, mother and siblings in a Freedmans bank deposit in 1873, when he was already in New York City. In small communities when slaves were sold, they were often bought by someone in the area. I communicate with them on Facebook. The new surnames, usually not taken from a former slave owner, included: Williams, Jones, Johnson, Smith, Jackson, Thomas, Brown, Walker, Davis, Green, Robinson, Scott, Harris, Turner, and Anderson. The quote below, from a Southern Claims Commission file, is one of the most powerful and one of my favorites to use in lectures: I enlisted under Ross because that was my fathers name. The battle was long and hard-fought, with pro-slavery campaigners arguing that the slave trade was important for the British economy and claiming that enslaved Africans were happy and well-treated. Allard. Such resistance signified continual deep-rooted discontent with the condition of bondage and, in some places, such as the United States, resulted in ever-more-stringent mechanisms for social control and repression in slaveholding areas. I found in the Civil War registry, an enslaved man who enrolled in the infantry under the name of Wash Ellis. It was after emancipation on that I went back to work for Col. Morrow and where I got the name Lottie, as already explained. Delva Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. In French-speaking Louisiana, Slave names reflected the dominant language and thus were generally different from those in the English colonies. However, a small change to searching on C?lbert, which accounts for the variations in spelling expands that initial list to 877 enslaved people owned by people with those names. 1754 Excerpts from the Courant for June 22 to 29, 1754 at Jamaican Family Search Genealogy Research Library - contain the names of some "runaway slaves" or indentured servants, and information about them. Although it is not widely known, some African Americans used surnames before they were emancipated. You should give a TED talk! how the surnames former slaves had were connected to their experiences in slavery. Elijah is derived from the Hebrew name Eliyahu, composed of the elements. . Robyn N. Smith, [insert post title], Reclaiming Kin (https://reclaimingkin.com: accessed [insert date you read the post]), [insert the date the post was written]. Ive taken back reclaimed some of that lost memory, especially that of my enslaved ancestors. Samuel had only two slaves: the man that could be Wilson and a 42-year-old woman. My Vimeo ON Demand video page lists six videos you can choose from to watch for 3 months ($15 each): -Finding the Last Slaveowner: Guidance and Case Studies, -Cluster Research: Using Groups of People to Find Your People, -Using Deed Records to Uncover Your Family, -Putting it All Together: Making Sense of All the Research You've Done and, -More Than Just a Name: Incorporating Social and Community History Into Your Research. Students examine how freed people in the United States sought to define freedom after Emancipation. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. ", "If you look deeply into the palm of your hand, you will see your parents and all the generations of your ancestors. One given name the childs family selected and kept secret and one the child was known by given by the slave owner. By country & year of birth. 26 September 2021 [PAST EVENT]: Acclaimed genealogist Melvin Collier and I will be presenting an all-new 2-hour lecture titled More Than Just Names: Incorporating Social and Community History Into Your Research from 1:00-3:30 EST (please note it is Eastern Standard Time). John Lewis was born in 1831; in 1844 he and several family members were given to George A. Washington of Wessyngton. It was after emancipation on that I went back to work for Col. Morrow and where I got the name Lottie, as already explained. Throughout the colonial period, as many as one-fifth of the enslaved people in North Carolina retained African names; Quash, Cuffee, Mingo, Sambo, Mustapha, and Sukey were among the most common recorded. Edited by Gabriele vom Bruck and Barbara Bodenhorn, 178199. As a result, many slaves used the surnames of their owners wifes family. By the late 19th century, England was home to about 300 surnames with traceable genealogy. Q. After Emancipation, many former slaves adopted new names and surnames. I first wrote about this in this 2009 post: http://justthinking130.blogspot.com/2009/09/calvin-r-yarborough-where-it-all-began.html, And,then, more recently in 2013, here: http://justthinking130.blogspot.com/2013/11/many-rivers-to-cross-my-priscilla.html. Also included here are common names among slaves, many of which were classical and had ties to the Bible or mythology, such as Keziah and Venus. Rodriguez (Rodriguez is Spanish for the son of Rodrigo. I hope you dont mind my sharing those posts. Wide-ranging survey of naming practices in the (mainly Anglophone) Atlantic world both during and after slavery. -William Faulkner, "Call it a clan, call it a network, all it a tribe, call it a family. They called me OCK. . Kaplan, Justin, and Anne Bernays. Former slaves also interchanged surnames on census records. Students examine the factors that led many northerners to turn against federal policies passed during the Reconstruction era that protected freedpeople. Daniel Odgen, Magic, Witchcraft, and Ghosts In The Greek and Roman Worlds, p. 119, Laurence Vidal, Los Amantes de Granada, Ed. The highest percentage of African names was found among male slaves in the eighteenth century, when . . It had always been passed down in the family that Thomas has been owned by the Blacks. Garcia (The Spanish form of Gerald, Garcia would be the son of Gerald. Thanks for adding your very experienced voice to the conversation. After I had returned to Louisville from Danville, My sister, Lizzie White, got to calling me Mollie, and it was with her that the name started. Where did you get the maiden name of Smith from? But once freed most immediately chose surnames, with or without keeping their accustomed name. I would appreciate any constructive comments on this question, which can be posted to me via my website address above. Free black slave holders could be found at one time or . You can read about this in the following two posts on my blog. They called me OCK. James: (M) (Latin origin) means "heel" or "supplanter". At your request I have finally made available for viewing past popular webinars! 20 August 2022, 1-3:30 pm [PAST EVENT], Eastern Standard Time: Join me for a two-hour lecture and workshop on Using Deed Records. Nat Turner's Rebellion One of the most famous slave revolts in American history came in 1831 when Nat Turner led a bloody uprising in Southampton County, Virginia. A. I was first called by that name in the family of Col. Morrow in whose service I was in Louisville, Ky., just after the war. On all subsequent census records, he is listed as John Lewis. In 1836, William Turbeville died leaving an estate with several slaves who were brothers: Turner, Nelson, Simon, Jordan, and Jacob. In the context of The Bahamas, the surname appears to originate with Denys Rolle, an American Loyalist who re-settled on Exuma, one of the so-called Out Islands of The Bahamas, sometime in the mid-1780s. African Americans tended to use surnames associated with their own families instead of the last slave owner. In 2001, I began a process of transcribing names of some of the largest slaveholders and matching the surnames with numbers of African Americans on the 1870 . Who called you by that name and where was it done? Please subscribe or login. Former slaves often made up surnames based on their occupations. Born in Union County, South Carolina, he was sold to his last enslaver in 1858 and then brought to Mississippi. There are certainly methods you can used to try to verify some of the storyyou can look for Carrington and Williams slaveholders in the area in which your ancestor lived in the 1870 census. Here, our list of notable early African American names. Robyn. I love to hear from my readers. I was bornthe child of Phillis Houston, slave of Sol Smith. Dorothy, Doris or Dora: Meaning 'gift of God', this Victorian girl's name was popular in the 19th century. The first published African-American poet & author Phillis Wheatley was born in West Africa. The, For descendants, I would add the substantial emotional impact of seeing an ancestor's name attached to a dollar value, or being valued in a list with silverware and cattle. I want.to.know.where we (who are.descendants.of.freed.people.who.got sent.back.to Sierra Leone.from.maybe Nova Scotia.) My mothers name was Octavia Smith and it was from her that I got it but where the name came from to her I never knew. 2019 (cited under the Anglophone Caribbean) includes a good general introduction to slave naming. Thomas: Thomas is a common surname of biblical origin meaning twin. E. Togo Salmon Conference, E. Togo Salmon Conference 1993 Mcmaster University: Goodyear III, Frank H. "Photography changes the way we record and respond to social issues". Love you, I have done quite a bit of genealogy for my own family, and it was difficult enough, but what you are doing, is incredible work. Women tended to have two names, and slaves often just had one. Were there any famous slaves? Copeland This last name comes from Old Norse origin. Middle Tennessee, where tobacco, cattle, and grain became the favored crops, held the . this page. Slavery was coexistent with the founding in 1670 of the first permanent colony in South Carolina, and early official records occasionally contain the names of slaves.3 An inventory of the estate of Francis Jones in 1693 lists 'a negro man Jack' and 'a negro Woman name Jugg.'4 An inventory of the Slavery existed in the United States from its founding in 1776 and became the main . This old French surname has Germanic origin, and means 'noble'. 3. Some of them developed a long-term relationship with one of the female slaves. The following is a list of historical people who were enslaved at some point during their lives, in alphabetical order by first name. This was the case with several others from Wessyngton. You can read the introductory maps for a high-level guided explanation, view the timeline and chronology of . Phillis Wheatley (May 8, 1753 - December 5, 1784) Source = Wikimedia. However the frequent rebellions by . Some of these individuals probably lived through the Civil War to become named citizens in Ashley County, Arkansas and may have taken the last name of Hollaway/Holaway or Terry/Tery. Cheryll Cody, "'There Was No Absalom on the Ball Plantation': Slave-Naming Practices in the South Carolina Low Country, 1720-1865," American Historical Review 92 (June 1987). So just a few things to be aware of when researching any African-American ancestors. A krio from.Freetown Sierra Leone. Join me as I present this NEW webinar that covers why we miss our ancestors in these records and presents numerous strategies to assist in finding every clue in census records. Surnames. Please submit permission requests for other use directly to the publisher. -Unknown, "Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city;)" It means 'raven'. Smith.). All rights reserved. ", "No matter what you've done for yourself or for humanity, if you can't look back on having given love and attention to your own family, what have you really accomplished? Leo (M) (Russian origin) means "lion". In fact, it's not even past. Tell me the name you were called before you met Phillip Fry? While Smith remains the most common U.S. surname, for the first time, two Hispanic namesGarcia and Rodriguezmade the top 10. In 1800, Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman were able to escape their terrible life of enslavement and were able to help other slaves trapped in a world of forced labour and grant them freedom once again due to the Underground Railroads that helped him, his partner Anna Murray Douglas and many other fugitives sneak away from the horrible As enslavement continued through the 1800s, African American culture included naming practices that were national in scope by the time of emancipation, and intimately related to the slave trade. The names they gave their children provide a valuable, if limited, index of that process over time. Most Popular Names. Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made (1974). The link was not copied. This is common. The most common of 603 names of female Slaves were Bet, Mary, Jane, Hanna, Betty, Sarah, Phillis, Nan, Peg, and Sary. The table below shows the most common last names with statistics on the heritage and ancestry of those with the surname. Practices undoubtedly varied, and different archival sources may yield different conclusions. Or, the Slaves were given numbers or classical Greek names. Archambeau. Even many given names of ancestors eventually became a surname, such as Todd or William. I'll illustrate transcribing deeds, show you how to find your county deed records on FamilySearch, and you will receive my PDF Beginner's Guide to Using Deed Records, a $12 value! This unique-sounding French last name means 'bold' or 'daring'. My full name is Dick Lewis Barnett. Hi Jim, Best of luck to you, I was called mostly Lewis Smith till after the war, although I was named Dick Lewis SmithDick was the brother of John Barnett whom I learned was my father . Login Forgot . Im very familiar with the work of Gwendolyn Hall and Elizabeth Shown Mills. See flier for more details. Many took the surname of famous or celebrated people; such as 'Lincoln', 'Grant', and 'Washington' was very popular. Ref. For more details, see the flier here, and you can purchase them here. Manifests - Alphabetical by Slave Names Return to Slave Manifests main page Click on each Slave name to view information on that voyage. One of the largest sources are the Civil War pension records of the almost 200,000 black men who served in the US Army and Navy. USA.gov, The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. Index by slave owner's name | Surname unknown or illegible. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here. 782 Lists of Slave owners with names of slaves Tamme, 766 Tom, 766 West, 766 Will, 766 Barker, Nathaniel Harry, 591, 700, 746, 767 Barkley, Barbary Grace, 651 A. Lottie Smith was my name and what they called me before I met Phillip and was married to him. Slave Names Below are some best cute and catchy slave names: Infirm Mite Lunn Amanda Walter Garner Hannah Delia Bastard Inferior Weevil George O'Hanlon Jordan John Owen Rachel Fetid Spider Betty Nathan York John Wright Wicked Whelp Thornton Dick Field Robert Dick William Hunter William Sam Kiner Augustus Dick a/k/a Richard Ferguson Foul Beast Enslaved people often transferred such names to later generations in modified form or relied on African naming traditions, such as "day names" or names reflecting the order of birth among siblings. According to the latest search data available, Italian last names and their meanings are searched for nearly, 40,500 times per month. Drawing on extensive archival records, this digital memorial allows analysis of the ships, traders, and captives in the Atlantic slave trade. There are also a few problems with the original dataset in name transcription such that a small number of first names were transposed with last names. Surnames like Chantimel have disappeared, while names like Horsford and Ackie, coming from Antigua (where they are common), or Quarless, Dowden, Chandler, and Dottin from Barbados, have enriched Grenada's family history and cultural identity. Slaves were generally listed with just one name and thus with little to none of the genealogical information recorded for free whites. Like most of the architecture and towns in Italy, they can also tell a story. Nonetheless, this is a situation where two brothers selected different surnames. On Anglican (Church of England) baptisms records the child legally and officially is documented with the surname of the mother if she and the father were not married. ", "Families are like fudge; mostly sweet with a few nuts. Dick Lewis Barnett and Phillip Fry were African American veterans of the Union Army during the Civil War. Testimony of Dick Lewis Barnett, May 17, 1911: I am 65 years of age; my post office address is Okmulgee Okla. You are the continuation of each of these people." Enslaved people suffered constant sale, where children were frequently torn away from parents at young ages and spouses were often separated. slave rebellions, in the history of the Americas, periodic acts of violent resistance by Black slaves during nearly three centuries of chattel slavery. The difficulties include using records that provide no surnames, the constant sale and breakup of families, and the lack of identification of fathers. Jackson: This name is a patronymic of Jack. Maria Aparecida Schumaher, Erico teixeira Vital Brazil. Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. The resources Im getting from my colleagues through Facing History have been just invaluable. This article is from the Encyclopedia of North Carolina edited by William S. Powell. Who called you by that name and where was it done? Ones occupation also set the naming method, such as Sheperd, Cooper, or Smith. In my research so far, I have found very little evidence of white Culbert slaveholders only three cases so far. 3. Start your year off with tips and strategies that can help you in the new year & beyond. Users without a subscription are not able to see the full content on Although it is not widely known, some African Americans used surnames before they were emancipated. Anouilh. Robyn. Names and Naming, African Africans arriving in the American colonies and later the United States continued to give their children African names well into the nineteenth century. I am the applicant for pension on account of having served in Co. B. Anthropologist Meyer Fortes's observation that the naming practices of any society "epitomize personal experiences, historical happenings, attitudes to life, and cultural ideas and values" holds particularly true for African American enslaved people. Some scholars of slavery have come to view the names and naming of enslaved people as agauge of many aspects oflife and culture during enslavement and of howcustoms changed over time. This is such a well-written and informative post one that I know will open many eyes to the complexity of slave surnames, as well as many other aspects of the lives of the enslaved. Jonah, the name of the Old Testament prophet who was swallowed by the whale, only to emerge unharmed three days later, is increasingly appreciated by parents looking for a biblical name less common than Jacob or Joshua, yet not too obscure. Cook Cook has an Old English origin, and it means 'one who cooks' or 'one who sold cooked meat'. "More than half of the surnames are derived from the Christian or fore-name of the father," [1] and based on a total of 3,253,800 people, nearly 18 in every 100 persons was known by one of these fifty surnames. Alfred "Teen" Blackburn (1842-1951), one of the last living survivors of slavery in the United States who had a clear recollection of it. Well, I got to thinking about all us slaves that was going to take the name Fitzpatrick. Hello Thank you for your comment, Some of these examples come from the wonderful book, Voices of Emancipation: I served [in the War] as Henry Lock, the Lock being my old Massas name but since the War I have taken name of Rollie., [Edward] was owned by Drury Stovall and went by the name of Edward Stovall. I am the identical person who served in the said companies under the name of Lewis Smith. Robyn. Picked by several celebrities (a couple of times even for a girl), adding up to an enthusiastically recommended choice. I have been a researcher, writer, lecturer and teacher for over twenty years. Where did you get the maiden name of Smith from? College Advanced AA Gen. Class, November 2012, Robyn, Aaron, Karen, Katherine and Michael, October 2014, African-American Family History Conference, February 2015, African-American Genealogy Group Conference, October 2016, Central Maryland AAHGS, with Alice Harris, September 2015, Howard Comm. .When I got home after the war, I was wearing the name of Lewis Smith, but I found that the negroes after freedom, were taking the names of their father like the white folks. Florence, Fiorella, Fleur, and Flower are translations, but we like Flora best of all. 6. However, many African Americans faced a problem when they applied for their pensions. I have gotten so many requests over the years from those who couldn't make the live webinars so I hope you enjoy this new feature. Kindest regards, Also, the government seemed to be in a almighty hurry to have us get names. Expand or collapse the "in this article" section, Slave Names and Naming in the Anglophone Atlantic, Slave Names on Emancipation and after Slavery, Expand or collapse the "related articles" section, Expand or collapse the "forthcoming articles" section, African Retailers and Small Artisans in the Atlantic World, Alexander von Humboldt and Transatlantic Studies, Atlantic New Orleans: 18th and 19th Centuries, Black Atlantic in the Age of Revolutions, The, Chinese Indentured Servitude in the Atlantic World, Cities and Urbanization in Portuguese America, Colonial Governance in the Atlantic World, Comparative Indigenous History of the Americas, Criminal Transportation in the Atlantic World, Domestic Production and Consumption in the Atlantic World, Economy and Consumption in the Atlantic World. The Genealogy Source Table Collection includes 10 blank, editable source tables for death certificates, city directories, obituaries and funeral programs. i did a simple search of the 1860 slave schedule using the name Culbert and came up with slaveholders in MS,VA,NC,AL,GA and SC holding 17 enslaved people. Louis (M) (English origin) means "famous warrior". Students explore the legacies of the Reconstruction era today, reflect on the idea of democracy as a continuous process, and consider how they can best participate in the ongoing work of strengthening our democracy. Of course my mother wasnt a Bradley fore she married.

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