1. "Vital Records" : Births, Deaths and Marriages
Image of a page from the Louisa County Birth Records
The 1870 Federal Census is the first public record in which freedmen and their families are recorded in a systematic way. There are, however, some public sources which include at least one family relationship or more to help reconstruct family units before this important Federal Census.
We usually think of Birth and Death Records, and Marriage registers, so called "Vital Records," as important sources of family information. They are equally valuable for finding relationships before 1865 but they require close examination and following their clues to break through the "brick wall of slavery."
Virginia required counties to keep birth and death records starting in 1853.   They contain the name of each infant, the mother’s name and the name of the slave owner.  Â
Pay particular attention to who the owner is. The record may read: child named Winston, slave, male, mother named Betsy, Owner, R. Meredith. If the year of Winston's birth makes him the right age to be the Winston you found in 1870 or 1880 (perhaps living with a mother named Betsy, or near R. Meredith.) then you have an idea of the white person whose estate records may contain the names of the family you are researching.Â
Image of a page from Louisa County Birth Records 1865-1870
Birth records after 1865 give the child’s last name as well as the full name of mother and father. An important clue as to former owners can be found in the 'Informant" column. From 1865 until about 1870, it was common for a white person to reported the birth of a child for black parents. The informant will describe his relationship to the family as "friend" or "Employer". This is a clue of a relationship between this family and what could be a former owner. Â
A note: Many enslaved persons were known in the community with a last name before 1865 although rarely were those last names recorded in public documents. After 1865, new last names (and sometimes first names) were self-selected by freedmen and it is not uncommon to find some of those names changing in the years following the end of the Civil War.
Access Louisa County Births 1865-1870Â Â
Â
A Louisa County grave site marked with a shaped stone.
Death Records, Louisa County 1853-1896
Death Records are a valuable resource for finding family information for a formerly enslaved person who died after the Civil War. They contain the person's age at death, cause of death, parent's names and the name of the person informing officials of the death.Â
The informant's relationship to the person is indicated, spouse, sibling, etc. As in the case of birth records, it is common in the years right after the war for a former owner to report deaths and list themselves as friend, neighbor, or employer. This proximity is a clue that the informant might be part of the white family who enslaved the person you are researching.Â
No images of these records are available in this archive but they are available at the Library of Virginia. Our thanks to the Library of Virginia who complied and shared their transcription of these records. The library has death records when they resumed again in 1912 until 1939.
Louisa County African-American Marriages Â
The marriage records are an important source of information: the parents of both bride and groom are recorded. For those couples who married before the 1870 census, this is the primary source for discovering parents' names.
Other information to look for includes: the age of the couple at marriage, if they had been married before, where they lived at the time of marriage and where they were born. If a person is not born or living in Louisa County, it is important to note which county you might need to explore for information about their family roots.Â
The transcriptions in the downloadable Excel Sheets contain just the couples names and ages. If you follow the link to the images you will be able to see three sizes of the image of the actual page on which the record exists and read the additional information listed above.