Antigua and Barbuda—Slave Returns, 1742–1863 [M3V5-V2V]

Lisa Mazor

For slave returns, if the person making the return is the attorney for a deceased proprietor or the guardian of an underaged / unwell proprietor, should the deceased/underaged/unwell proprietor be listed as the proprietor or should the person making the return be listed as the proprietor?

In addition, where several returns are contained on the same record extract, how do you ensure that, following indexing, the enslaved persons are connected with the correct proprietor?

Melissa S Himes

You are going to be indexing each unique name on these registers, some will be Proprietors and some will be Enslaved Persons.

Each example has the following: Please Note: Entries will need to be added for all proprietors and enslaved persons listed on this register.

On the Triennial Return it expands to say:  Entries will need to be added for all proprietors and enslaved persons listed on this register. Names listed under the "Increase" and "Decrease" columns were proprietors.

The project instructions:

• Index each unique name. Some names may be duplicated. When names are exact duplicates, meaning that all required fields are the same, index only the first instance of the name listed. Skip the other exact duplicates and then index the next unique name. Unique names include names with different middle initials and different name spellings or where the other required fields are different.
• Be careful to examine the full document and index all names recorded on the document. Proprietors were recorded in multiple columns, including the leftmost column titled "Name and Description of Person Making Return," as well as the rightmost columns titled "Increase" and "Decrease."

So, you would index all the names, attorneys, deceased, guardians, living persons whether underage or unwell as proprietors. But, only each unique name once. For example, in your batch, Margaret Johnson only gets one record created (delete entry 6), but, all of her wards should be entered as proprietors. George Butt should have a record,

The goal of indexing is to get the researcher to the image to see all the names and make their own assessments.

Lisa Mazor

Thank you so much - that was extremely helpful.