Enslaved in Old New York: A Digital History and Data Project
Creators: name: Barnes, Christopher A
Publisher: name: Adelphi University
Year: 2024
Subjects: Brooklyn
Slavery
Manumission of enslaved people
New York City
Kings County
Old Town Records
New York City Municipal Archives
Long Island
African Americans

description: In “The Genealogical Possibilities of Manumissions in the Old Town Records,” Steven Meyer describes the grant-funded project at the New York Municipal Archives to digitize the record books from the “old towns” in Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx incorporated by the City of New York in 1898. Some of those town record books contain information which can help the descendents of enslaved African Americans trace their ancestry back to the time and place of their ancestor’s emancipation. As Meyer explains,
description: "Many African Americans today are exploring their genealogy but can only go so far because of the legacy of slavery in America and a past obscured by the lack of records. However, there are records in the Municipal Archives that might help fill this knowledge gap. One collection is the Old Town Records, which includes documentation of manumissions and slave births in New York City."
description: Thanks to the Old Town Records digitization project, the public will have online, full-text access to these documents for the first time. This is an amazing new resource, but it is important to note that these digital editions are composed of page images and are not searchable. So while these digitized versions may be readable for us, they are not readable by machines, which means you can’t run a search for a particular last name.
description: In this presentation for the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society’s 45th national conference, I describe my efforts to realize the full potential of the Old Town Records by having the relevant information added to the Enslaved.org database. This open access database makes it possible for anyone to search by keyword, location, date, and more. All information in the database is submitted as a dataset conforming to the principles of linked open data, meaning other databases and search engines can work with the data and it can be enhanced over time so later researchers benefit from the addition of missing or new information. All datasets are first submitted with an explanatory article to the Journal of Slavery and Data Preservation for review before being added to Enslaved.org.
description: In order to demonstrate the value of these records for African-American ancestry, I tried to find the first person manumitted in Brooklyn in his post-emancipation life as a free man. Cesar Foster, about 23 years of age and a butcher by trade, was manumitted on March 4th, 1797. Through free search engines as well as subscription databases like Ancestry.com, I was able to discover another Cesar Foster operating a butcher shop in Albany in 1815. Is this the same person? I ran a search in the subscription database at Ancestry.com and discovered another Cesar Foster listed on the Albany census for 1820. Based on the age range reported, this could indeed be the same man. Furthermore, the 1820 census shows him living with a free woman of color of the same age and free boy of color. Did Cesar Foster move to Albany some time after manumission, set up his own business, and start a family? Ultimately his ancestors are the ones who are best placed to make the final determination, and my work will hopefully make it easier for them to find him and recover his story.