In Their Own Words – Life on Ante-Bellum Plantations as Recorded by the Owners

Curious about what planation life was like prior to the Civil War?  Want to try to trace your southern roots?  Gain a unique perspective on everyday life from the collected familial documents of plantation owners from the Revolution through the Civil War, as seen in their own words.  The collection includes are such things as slave registers, diaries, photographs, wills, business and personal letters and correspondence, etc.  Things that a family might hold on to, and because of this these documents escaped being destroyed during the Civil War when many of the official records were.

The general editor – Kenneth M. Stump created this series to aid researchers in answering questions surrounding planation life and slavery from the Revolution to the Civil War.  Family papers donated to various Southern mostly academic libraries and the Library of Congress are the source of this collection.  Records of Ante-Bellum Southern Plantations can also be of interest to genealogists.  Of this 1213-reel microfilm collection, OSU Libraries owns the following units:

Records of Ante-Bellum Southern Plantations from the Revolution Through the Civil War. Series J, Selections from the Southern Historical Collection, Manuscripts Department, Library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Part 4, Georgia and Florida (F213.R44 1990 Microfilm, 47 Reels)


Records of Ante-Bellum Southern Plantations from the Revolution Through the Civil War. Series I, Selections from the Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collection, Louisiana State University Libraries (F213. R43 Microfilm, 18 Reels) [Only have Part 3 – Natchez Area]

Records of Ante-Bellum Southern Plantations from the Revolution Through the Civil War. Series F, Selections from the Manuscript Department, Duke University Library, Part 1-3 (F213 .R39 1986 Microfilm, 16 Reels) [Only have Part 2 – South Carolina and Georgia]

Records of Ante-Bellum Southern Plantations from the Revolution Through the Civil War. Series B, Selections from the South Carolina Historical Society (E 445 .S7 R43 Microfilm, 10 Reels)

Records of Ante-Bellum Southern Plantations from the Revolution Through the Civil War : Series C, Selections from the Holdings of the Library of Congress Part 2 (HD1471.U5 R45 Microfilm, 5 Reels)

Besides the overarching series records in the catalog, broken out are records relating to a specific plantation and/or family with associated reel and call number information.

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