Virginia African American Genealogy

African American genealogical research often presents additional difficulties because record keeping for Black individuals was limited before the Civil War. For this reason, a separate section devoted to African American resources is appropriate, similar to the approach taken for Native American research, which faces comparable challenges. The resources linked from this page provide the principal sources currently available for researching Black genealogy in Virginia.

Although progress has been made in recent years, African American genealogy still requires careful, methodical work. New publications, bibliographies, and guides issued by genealogical societies and interest groups have improved access to relevant information, but the first step remains the same: organizing personal materials and applying standard research practices.

Researching African American families involves two broad periods, divided by the Civil War. Methods used for tracing enslaved individuals differ significantly from those used for white families or free African Americans before emancipation. After the war, African Americans appear in most of the same record types as white families, and research techniques largely converge.

• National Archives
  • United State National Archives
    • Digital Classroom
    • Genealogy Research at the National Archives
• Archives
  • The State Library of Virginia
    • Published Materials for Genealogists (pdf)
  • Virginia African American Griots
• Societies
  • Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society
  • Virginia Historical Society
    • African American Manuscripts
• Biography
  • Black Loyalists
    Black Loyalist is a repository of historical data about the African American loyalist refugees who left New York between April and November 1783 and whose names are recorded in the Book of Negroes. In this first stage, the site concentrates on providing biographical and demographic information for the largest cohort, about 1000 people from Norfolk Virginia and surrounding counties.
• Virginia African American Cemeteries
  • Eastern Shore Cemeteries
  • Hosted at Ancestry.com
    • The First African Baptist Church of North America $$
  • Access Genealogy’s Cemetery Records
    The most complete coverage of Cemetery records available on the web.  They are broken down by county.  We do know know if there are African Americans in these cemeteries, so you should browse them for ancestors also.
• African American Census Records
  • Hosted at Ancestry.com
    • 1870 US Fed Census $$
  • Access Genealogy’s Census Records
    Providing the most complete coverage of census records available on the web. We’ve broken the list down by county, and take a careful look at the index page where we explain which records are missing from the census data and may never be recovered.
• Church Records
  • Hosted at Ancestry.com
    • The First African Baptist Church of North America $$
  • Hosted at VCU Libraries
  • Sixth Mount Zion Baptist Church Collection
  • Search Augusta Church Records
• Court Records
  • Hosted at Ancestry.com
    • Slavery petitions and papers $$
  • Hosted at Carter G. Woodson Institute
    • Albemarle County Marriage License
    • Albemarle County Last Will and Testaments
    • Albemarle County Land Deeds
  • Hosted at Virginia US African American Griots
    • Will of Frances Hicks
    • Will of Harwood Clary
    • Brunswick County Deeds
      • Deed Books 1-5, (Misc. Abstracts)
      • Deed Book 3, (1744-1749)
      • Deed Book 4, (1750-1764)
      • Deed Book 5, (1752-1755)
      • Deed Book 6, (1755-1762)
      • Deed Book 7, (1761-1764)
      • Deed Book 8
      • Deed Book 14, (1780-1790)
      • Deed Book 15 [part 1]
      • Deed Book 15 [part 2]
  • Westmoreland County Court Orders 1705-1790
  • King George County Register of Free Persons 1785-1799
  • 1795 – 1853 Powhatan County Marriage Records, Free Blacks and Mulattoes (hosted at Powhatan County Virginia VAGenWeb Archives)
• Genealogy
  • African American Families of Virginia’s Eastern Shore
  • Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware
    The history of the free African American community as told through the family history of most African Americans who were free in the Southeast during the colonial period
• History – Slave Records
  • The Geography of Slavery in Virginia
    The Geography of Slavery in Virginia is a digital collection of advertisements for runaway and captured slaves and servants in 18th- and 19th-century Virginia newspapers. Building on the rich descriptions of individual slaves and servants in the ads, the project offers a personal, geographical and documentary context for the study of slavery in Virginia, from colonial times to the Civil War.
  • Ancestry.com Slave Narratives  $$
    Perhaps no other resource approaches the range of human experience found in Ancestry.com’s Slave Narratives. This collection of interviews stands in contrast to other slave narratives that appear in most literature anthologies which were written by the rare few who, against staggering odds, had become literate. This database provides a more poignant picture of what it was to live as a slave in the American South. Taken from The American Slave: A Composite Autobiography, this collection is the most complete available picture of the African-American slavery experience. There is simply no other historical document quite like it. The collection contains over 20,000 pages of type-scripted interviews with more than 3,500 former slaves collected over a ten year period. (Requires Ancestry.com Membership) Get 14 Days Free Access!!!
  • Hosted at Ancestry.com
    • Slave life in Georgia $$
    • Freedman’s Bank Records, 1865-1874 $$
  • Slave Importation Certificates in Alexandria County Records, 1790-1845
    These records are from deed books, first appearing in 1792 (but dating as early as 1790) and concluding in 1845. These records include the slaveowners’ names (and often a spouse, parent or guardian reporting for the actual owner); the slaves’ names (and usually approximate ages, often surnames, and sometimes occupations), often the state of origin, and occasionally with the exact date of arrival.
  • Hannah Valentine and Lethe Jackson Slave Letters, 1837-1838
  • American Brig Creole’s Slave Revolt 1841
  • Richmond Slave Traders
  • Richmond & Henrico Tax Lists – Slaves – 1782- 1784 – 1784
  • 1839 – 1845 Buckingham County Property Tax List   Free Blacks and Mulattoes (hosted at Buckingham County Virginia VAGenWeb Archives)
  • 1803-1865 Augusta County Register of Free Blacks
  • 1803-1865 Staunton County Register of Free Blacks
  • Freedmen’s Bureau Records
  • Inventory of William Cook’s property 1820
  • Runaway Slaves of the Eastern Shore
• Military Records
  • Military Records (hosted at AccessGenealogy)
    • World War I Records
      • Hosted at Ancestry.com
        • WWI Draft Registration Cards $$
    • World War II Records
      • Virginia World War II Army – Air Corps Casualty List
      • Virginia World War II Navy – Marines Casualty List
  • African-American Civil War Soldiers & Sailors
  • Hosted at Ancestry.com
    • Civil War Service Records $$
  • Albemarle County African American Veterans of World War I
  • James Harris A Free Man of Color, Revolutionary War Veteran
  • Names in Index to Surry County Virginia Register of Free Negroes
• Miscellaneous
  • Free African Americans of North Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina from the Colonial period to about 1820, vol 1 and 2, Heinegg, Paul, 2001.
• Surnames
  • African-American Surnames Database
• Vital Records
  •  Virginia Vital Records

Accomack County Virginia African American Genealogy

• Accomac Roots African American families of Chincoteague Island
• African American Indentures
• Free Negro Heads of Families 1830
• Free Black Census 1800-1930
• Map of African American families on Chincoteague Island in the 1800’s
• Map of Christ Union Baptist Church Cemetery on Chincoteague Island – as of Jan. 2007.
• Map of Odd Fellows Cemetery on Chincoteague Island – as of Jan. 2007
• African American Churches of Chincoteague
  Chincoteague/Accomac Black History in Pictures
• African American Genealogical Resources (Accomack & Northampton)

Arlington County Virginia African American Genealogy

• Records of the Rock Spring Congregational United Church of Christ
  • The Background of Integration by Dudley P. Babcock
  • Residence of Arlington County Employees
  • Sample of Census Tracts
  • Distribution of Employees Pay Grades 1-6 By Residence (March 1962)
  • Report on Housing in Arlington County with Particular Attention Toward Discrimination Toward Negroes by Arlington Council on Human Relations (April 1962)
  • A Report to the Arlington Churches on Racial Discrimination in Bowling Alleys and Motels
  • Broadside: The Negro Citizen in Arlington published by American Council on Human Relations
• Nauck / Green Valley Heritage Project
  The Nauck/Green Valley Heritage Project is a digital repository for images, memories, and documents related to the history of Arlington’s Nauck neighborhood. It began as a cooperative effort by people from Arlington Public Library, Arlington County, the Drew School, and the Nauck Civic Association.
  • Dr. Alfred Taylor Jr. and Delores Taylor Collection
    Images and documents primarily related to the history of Macedonia Baptist Church.
  • Charles R. Drew Collection
    Photos related to the life of Charles R. Drew, prominent African-American doctor and “Father of the Blood Bank.” Collection is primarily drawn from the Charles R. Drew papers at the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center at Howard University.
  • Ernest E. Johnson Collection (1948-1962)
    Consists of images of the Parks and Recreation Department’s Negro Recreation Section. The photographs show children and adult activities such as sports teams, dance recitals, plays, parades and award ceremonies. Ernest E. Johnson was the head of the Negro Recreation Section and then head of all county recreation centers after desegregation in 1962. He continued to serve Arlington until the 1980s.
• Arlingtonians for a Better County (ABC) Organizational Records
• Records of Church Women United of Arlington (1944-2001)
  The national Church Women United describes itself as “a national volunteer Christian ecumenical women’s movement.” From its beginning in 1941 it has been an interdenominational and interracial group. The national CWU has been a significant leader in developing the churches’ role within the Civil Rights movement, the peace movement, and the equal rights movement.
• George Melvin Richardson Collection
  Papers donated by George Melvin Richardson, former principal of Hoffman-Boston Junior-Senior High School.
• Arlington County Public Schools
  The incomplete and unofficial records of the Arlington County, Virginia, public school system. The entire collection measures 20.85 linear feet, and ranges in date between 1909 and 2004. The bulk of the material is from the period 1946-1988
• Records of the Citizen’s Committee for School Improvement
  The scattered records of the Citizen’s Committee for School Improvement for the period from 1946-1954 and 1956-1969. The Committee, a nonpartisan association, was formed in Arlington, Virginia in 1946, with the immediate purpose of influencing the selection of Arlington School Board candidates. The Constitution of the committee adopted in 1947 states that the organization’s goals “are to advance the nature of the population, the needs of the time, and the resources of the community.”
• Arlington County Public Schools: Desegregation Materials
  Information related to the integration of Arlington County Public Schools including the history, redistricting, pupil distribution, and boundary maps. The collection was donated by Lisa Farberstein, Director of Community Service and Public Information for the Arlington County Public Schools
• Personal Papers of Elizabeth Pfohl Campbell
  This collection consists of the personal papers of Elizabeth Pfohl Campbell, and covers the period from 1945 through 1991, with the bulk of the material falling between 1947 and 1959. The materials in this collection were generated or collected as a result of Mrs. Campbell’s involvement in the Arlington County School Board, as well as her interests and activities in education and local politics.
• Arlington Public Library Oral History Program
  The Arlington Oral History Program preserves the memories of Arlingtonians who witnessed and made history in a growing collection of over 375 interviews. This sample features interviews with people who were involved in the desegregation of Arlington Public Schools in various ways. You can listen to the audio recording of the interview and read through the typed transcript by clicking any of the files.
• Daniel Ellis Byrd papers, 1940-1984; at the Amistad Research Center
  This collection is held at the Amistad Research Center at Tulane University. It consists of the papers of civil rights attorney Daniel Ellis Byrd, who worked for the NAACP as a field secretary for forty years.
• Personal Papers of Barnard D. Joy
• Personal Papers of Barbara Marx
• Personal Papers of Henry Gardner
• Eastman-Fenwick Family Papers
• Records of the Arlington County League of Women Voters
• Desegregation of Arlington Public Schools

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