How can I find out if my early American ancestors owned slaves?

Dear Ms. Mason,

Thank you for posting your request on History Hub!

We searched the National Archives Catalog and located the Population Schedules for the 1840 Census, the Population Schedules for the 1850 Census, and the Population Schedules for the 1860 Census, in the Records of the Bureau of the Census (Record Group 29) that contain information about slave owners in the state where they resided. For more information about the non-digitized schedules, please contact the National Archives at Washington, DC - Textual Reference (RDT1) via email at archives1reference@nara.gov, and include the full names of those persons who were listed as the heads of households. During the data collection for the 1850 and 1860 census, two questionnaires were compiled - one for free inhabitants and one for enslaved people. For more information, please see the Questionnaire & Instructions for the 1850 and 1860 census.

You may experience a delay in receiving an initial acknowledgment as well as a substantive response to your reference request from RDT1. We apologize for this inconvenience and appreciate your understanding and patience as we balance mission-critical work and the safety of our staff during the pandemic.  Please check NARA’s web page about COVID-19 updates for the latest information.

You may wish to search Ancestry or FamilySearch for the U.S. Census. There may be a fee for using Ancestry. Instead, please check for access at your local library as many library systems subscribe to these sites, making them free for their patrons.

We suggest that you review the National Archives document Federal Records that Help Identify Former Slaves and Slave Owners and search the Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers for possible information, since during the slavery period owners often advertised in newspapers about their runaway and fugitive slaves in hopes that citizens, or bounty hunters would would find and return their "property" usually for a reward.

We also suggest that you contact the State Archives for any genealogical records in their holdings about slave owners in any pertinent states. The FamilySearch wiki African Americans, Identifying the Final Slave Owner (National Institute) may be useful.

We hope this is helpful. Best of luck with your family research!

Sorry, when I said early American, I meant from the 1600's and forward.

Sorry, when I said early American, I meant from the 1600's and forward.