Browse Items (201 total)

This 1835 entry from the Maryland Province Cashbook records the payment of the balance due to the Jesuits for the sale of four enslaved women at St. Thomas Manor. The Procurator of the Province received the payment from Fr. McSherry on November 15,…

Baptismal record for Noble, the son of Moses Taylor and Eliza Dorsey, dated November 2, 1832. Moses Taylor was owned by Joseph Evans, and Eliza Dorsey was owned by the Jesuits at White Marsh.

Baptismal record for Sylvester, the son of Joe and Easter, slaves of Newtown, dated June 4, 1819. Joe and Easter (or Esther) Greenleaf and their children, including Sylvester, were sold to Henry Johnson in 1838. Their names appear on the list of…

Transcription of a record of baptisms in St. Mary's County, Md., performed by Fr.. James Walton SJ, from 1766 to 1794. The record includes many names of children born into slavery and free people of color.

The transcription was prepared by Thomas…

In this bill of sale, dated September 4, 1843, Jane E. Smith sells an enslaved man named Len to Rev. Woodley for 400 dollars. Rev. Woodley was the agent for Newtown.

This page from the Newtown daybook records the birth of 28 slaves at Newtown from 1782 to 1796. Eight children died during the first years of their life. The daybook also mentions the sale of two slaves to Edmund Plowden in 1784.

In this letter from 1816, Bishop Neale explains the rules governing Catholic marriages between enslaved persons. Priests had to get permission from the slaves' owners and the owners had to promise not to separate husbands and wives.

Fr. Lucas…

In 1745, Fr. Thomas Poulton, SJ began a preparatory school at Bohemia plantation in Cecil County, Maryland. This account entry from 1746 shows Mr. Wyatt, the schoolmaster, paying Jack and Ben, two enslaved men on the plantation.

John Carroll,…

An account book from Newtown includes this transaction between Jesuit plantations in 1816. Br. Joseph Mobberly purchased from Newtown a pair of shoes for James, an enslaved man who was the groom of the stud horse kept at St. Inigoes.

In a diary entry from 1820, Br. Joseph Mobberly offers an account of the whipping of Sucky, an enslaved woman who was punished as a child because she witnessed the self-flagellation of an unnamed priest from St. Inigo's Mission. For another…