Contested Freedom: Free Persons of Color in Savannah, GA, 1823-1842

The “Contested Freedom” dataset is compiled entirely of information for free persons of color who resided in the city of Savannah, Georgia, registered between 1823 and 1842. The dataset contains 1,321 named individuals residing in Chatham County. Savannah’s free Black population was made up of previously enslaved people who were manumitted by their owners, Black children born to free mothers, and emigrés from St. Domingue who fled to Savannah directly after the Haitian Revolution. This dataset, extracted from the “Savannah, Georgia, Registers of Free People of Color, 1817-1864,” includes the years 1823-1829 and 1833, 1835, and 1842. This register was collected by the city of Savannah throughout the antebellum era and right before the close of the Civil War. The information includes: names, age, current residence, occupation(s), and guardian(s), and, in some instances, property (or lack thereof), number of slaves owned, and parentage.