Rutgers Manuscript Sources Relating to the African-American Community in New Jersey

Abstract

Special Collections and University Archives at the Rutgers University Libraries holds several manuscript collections relating to the AfricanAmerican exper ience in N e w Jersey. O n e of the earliest holdings is a volume of minutes of the African Association of N e w Brunswick. T h e minute book dates from 1817 to 1824. T h e Association was founded to provide funds for a school in Parsippany, N. J . , organized by the Presbyterian Synod of N e w York and N e w Jersey. T h e goal of the school was to educate "Young M e n of Colour to be Teacher s and Preachers to People of Colour within theses States and elsewhere." Included in the volume are the Association's constitution, a list of subscribers, receipts, certificates of permission to join, and texts of addresses delivered before the Association by Jeremiah Gloucester of Philadelphia (January 1, 1820) and Augustavus Cesar (January 1, 1821). Rutgers also holds the records of the N e w Brunswick Colonization Society which include its minutes , memberships lists, and constitutions. T h e Society was active in 1838-1839 and revived in 1853-1854. T h e r e are collections that relate directly to slavery in N e w Jersey as well as to the lives of free African-Americans during the pre-Civil War period. T h e records of M i d d l e s e x County , N. J . , include a vo lume of slave manumiss ion records, 1800-1825, and a vo lume recording the births of Black children in the county, 1804-1844. T h e manumission register's entries include the name (and somet imes age) of the freed slave, the date of manumission, and the name and residence of the person registering the manumission. T h e volume is indexed by the name of person freed. Entries in the birth register include the name and sex of the child, the mother's given name, the name of the person reporting the birth, and the dates that the birth was reported and recorded. T h e Peter Still Papers (Burlington County, N . J . ) include correspondence, 1850-1875, relating to the purchase of his wife and family held as slaves in Alabama and to the publication of his biography. T h e collection also includes a Still family genealogy, 1798-1821.