Research Guides: HIST 712: US Civil War Era Research Seminar HIST 712 (Spring 2025): Narratives of the enslave / formerly enslaved

Worldcat & Primo

WorldCat This link opens in a new window
- This link opens in a new window
Materials held by thousands of libraries in the US and abroad. Books, websites, computer programs, films, slides, journals, magazines, papers, manuscripts, maps, musical scores, newspapers, sound recordings, videotapes, etc. Coverage: Before 1000BC-present.

Main Library Catalog
Direct link to the advanced search page of the main library catalog.

Use the subject search: "Personal narratives" AND (enslaved OR slave*) in Worldcat or the main library catalog.

The Library of Congress formally uses the subject "enslaved" but some older works are still cataloged under the discontinued term "slave" or "slaves."

Do NOT limit to publication date; most of these materials have been published on compiled volumes much later, and limiting the publication date to pre 1865 will miss important works.

Example: Subject search for "personal narratives" AND (enslaved OR slave*) in the main catalog
This Subject search will also work in Worldcat

Using (slave* OR enslaved) as a subject with other genre types (ex. Diaries, correspondences, personal memoirs") as subjects will also yield interesting results.

For freed individuals, the best search is a Subject search for "Personal Narratives" AND "African Americans"

There will be a number of false hits, but it's worth skimming to avoid missing something important. If you really don't want to skim, try added the keyword phrase (freed* OR reconstruction)

Databases

Highlights

African Americans and Reconstruction, 1865-1883 This link opens in a new window
African Americans and Reconstruction, 1865-1883 contains nearly 1,400 fully searchable printed works from the end of the Civil War to the beginning of Jim Crow. It includes documents related to African Americans and citizenship, voting rights, literacy, land rights, employment, and more, including the gaps between written law and practice.
Age of Emancipation This link opens in a new window
Age of Emancipation includes numerous rare documents related to emancipation in the United States, as well as Latin America and the Caribbean. This collection supports the study of many areas, including activities of the federal government in dealing with former slaves and the Freedmen's Bureau, views of political parties and post-war problems with the South, documents of the British and French government on the slave trade, reports from the West Indies and Africa, and other topics.
Black Abolitionist Papers This link opens in a new window
This collection searches a unique set of primary sources from African Americans actively involved in the movement to end slavery in the United States between 1830 and 1865.
Black Life in America This link opens in a new window
Comprehensive coverage of the African American experience from the early 18th century to the present. Sourced from more than 19,000 American and global news sources.
Institution of Slavery This link opens in a new window
The Institution of Slavery explores, in vivid detail, the inner workings of slavery from 1492 to 1888. Through legal documents, plantation records, first-person accounts, newspapers, government records, and other primary sources, this collection reveals how enslaved people struggled against the institution. These rare works explore slavery as a legal and labor system, the relationship between slavery and religion, freed slaves, the Shong Massacre, the Demerara insurrection, and many other aspects and events.
Slavery & Anti-Slavery: A Transnational Archive This link opens in a new window
Includes collections on the transatlantic slave trade, the global movement for the abolition of slavery, the legal, personal, and economic aspects of the slavery system, and the dynamics of emancipation in the U.S. as well as in Latin America, the Caribbean, and other regions. Part 1. Debates over slavery and abolition; Part 2. Slave trade in the Atlantic world; Part 3. The institution of slavery; Part 4. The age of emancipation. Includes legal documents, plantation records, first-person accounts, newspapers, government records, and other primary sources Covers: 1492 to 1888.
Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law This link opens in a new window
Brings together, for the first time, all known legal materials on slavery in the United States and the English-speaking world. This includes every statute passed by every colony and state on slavery, every federal statute dealing with slavery, and all reported state and federal cases on slavery. The library has hundreds of pamphlets and books written about slavery--defending it, attacking it or simply analyzing it. Covers 1450s to 1880s.
Slavery in Antebellum Southern Industries (History Vault) This link opens in a new window
Slavery in Antebellum Southern Industries presents some of the richest, most valuable, and most complete collections in the entire documentary record of American slavery, focusing on the industrial uses of slave labor. The materials selected include company records; business and personal correspondence; documents pertaining to the purchase, hire, medical care, and provisioning of slave laborers; descriptions of production processes; and journals recounting costs and income.
Southern Life and African American History, 1775-1915, Plantations Records (History Vault) This link opens in a new window
Primary source documents of records and correspondence of southern plantations during the Antebellum period of U.S. History. These documents reflect the business and operation of plantations, including slavery records. Part of ProQuest's History Vault.
Southern Life, Slavery, and the Civil War (History Vault) This link opens in a new window
This database consists of nine modules: Slavery and the Law; Slavery in Antebellum Southern Industries; records focused on the Slave trade and other legal issues pertaining to slavery; four modules of Southern Life and African American History, 1775-1915, Plantation Records; a module on the Civil War entitled "Confederate Military Manuscripts and Records of Union Generals and the Union Army"; and Reconstruction and Military Government after the Civil War.