On Monday, October 27, 2008, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in St. Louis added a new feature to their website entitled “African-American Life in St. Louis, 1804-1865.” The website includes information gathered by National Park Service historians and interns after over a decade of research into St. Louis court documents and newspapers. The comprehensive exhibit contains databases culled from original documents in the archives of the St. Louis Circuit Court, the City of St. Louis, the National Archives, the Missouri Historical Society, and Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. In addition to including such well-known historical figures as Dred Scott, the exhibit also has lists of the names of long-forgotten African Americans who purchased their freedom, obtained a license to remain in the State of Missouri as a free person of color, or were auctioned on the steps of the Old Courthouse. The incredible surviving collections of court documents, combined with the ongoing work of preservation by the State of Missouri, and the time and talents of National Park Service, State of Missouri, and other dedicated researchers made this project possible. A special program of Cultural Diversity Internships administered by the National Park Service and the Student Conservation Association allowed two interns, Miel Wilson and Ebony Jenkins, to create crucial databases in this collection. The information available here will be of great interest to historians and genealogists nationwide, and provides a unique insight into urban slavery.
The information can be found at the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial website. The site is organized into "Freedom Suits," "Emancipations," "Slave Sales," and "Freedom Licenses," and there is also a section on “Running Away” which is linked to the National Park Service’s Underground Railroad Network to Freedom project.
The Freedom Suits section of the site consists of a list of each of the over 300 court cases generated by slaves, like Dred and Harriet Scott, who sued for their freedom in St. Louis. The Emancipations list enumerates the nearly 1,000 slaves who were freed in St. Louis prior to the Civil War, a remarkably large number for a city whose slave population never exceeded 2,600. Most of these slaves probably purchased their own freedom from their enslavers. The slave sales database is taken from the records of the St. Louis Probate Court, and enumerates the over 533 slaves that were sold on the steps of the St. Louis Courthouse between 1828 and 1865. The Freedom Licenses database is a tally of all the free persons of color in the city who applied for a license to remain in the state between 1835 and 1865. By the terms of an 1835 law, a "free man or woman of color" had to have a license with them at all times as proof that they were free. A total of 1,492 people were issued freedom licenses, 45 people were denied licenses, and another 573 persons who could not produce licenses were rounded up by sheriffs or deputies. These statistics are made more interesting by the personal information included about each applicant, including height, distinguishing characteristics, and profession. A separate list of the professions of free persons of color in St. Louis is also included, with some very surprising entries.
The site includes several links to other related sites, particularly the one maintained by Washington University in St. Louis, which provides many scans of the original documents on line. For more information contact Bob Moore, Historian, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, bob_moore@nps.gov.
