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Anderson Independent-Mail
Anderson, SC
Oct 27, 4:16 AM EDT
Records of Freed Slaves to Go Online
By DIONNE WALKER
Associated Press Writer
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) -- Records the Freedmen's Bureau used to reconnect
families - from battered work contracts to bank forms - will be placed
online in part of a new project linking modern-day blacks with their
ancestors.
The Virginia Freedmen Project plans to digitize more than 200,000 images
collected by the Richmond bureau, one of dozens of offices established
throughout the South to help former slaves adjust to free life.
Gov. Timothy M. Kaine on Thursday unveiled the project and a state marker
near the site where the bureau once stood in downtown Richmond.
"This is the equivalent for African Americans of Ellis Island's records
being put up," said Kaine, who was joined by Mayor L. Douglas Wilder, the
nation's first elected black governor and a grandson of slaves.
Researchers will eventually transfer data from all of the southern states to
an online database, said Wayne Metcalfe, vice president of the Genealogical
Society of Utah, a partner in the project.
Records from Virginia should be ready to go online by the middle of next
year, Metcalfe said.
"It was one of the larger states and one of the most complete collections
available," he said. "It's a gold mine, as far as a genealogist is
concerned."
About a half-million slaves were left to establish a new life following
emancipation, Metcalfe said.
Established in 1865, the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands -
also called the Freedmen's Bureau - helped former slaves find clothes, food
and jobs.
Bureaus kept meticulous records, documenting marriages and work histories.
Those records will be scanned from microfilm and compiled into an electronic
index families will eventually be able to access, Metcalfe said.
Twenty-four years removed from slavery in rural Virginia, Hawkins Wilson had
established himself as a respected Texas minister. But there was something
missing from his life as a free man: the mother and sisters he left behind.
In a letter dated May 11, 1867, he offered bureau officials details of his
family's old home in Caroline County, and urged them to pass along a note to
his sister, Jane.
"Your little brother Hawkins is trying to find out where you are and where
his poor old mother is," reads the letter, which will be included in the
database. "Your advice to me to meet you in Heaven has never (lapsed) from
my mind."
Historians don't know if he ever found his family.
Debra
Great things have been affected by a few men well conducted.
George Rogers Clark to Patrick Henry, Gov. of VA 1779
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