Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938
WPA Slave Narratives (Complete Digital Version)
The full text for the WPA Slave Narratives is available for free online. One of the better online resources for searching and accessing this collection is found via this link. Besides the online full text, it provides indexes, allowing you to browse, search and access the full text by state and people's names.
Step by Step Tutorial
Download a PDF of all people interviewed in the WPA Slave Narratives by name, with state, volume, part, and Project Gutenberg®* file number: People Interviewed in WPA Slave Narrative Volumes
The distinguishing state name in a full WPA Slave Narrative title occurs about 51 words from the start, causing the shorter Project Gutenberg® entries to look alike. For convenience, here (http://johnsepich.com/wpa-slave-narratives/people-and-files ) are the Project Gutenberg® file numbers for the state names and their parts, linked to the Project Gutenberg® files.
Search example:
1. Choose the state "Texas" to search. Find Texas on the list > Click Texas-1 30576
2. Click the title “Slave Narratives: …”
3. For this example, find “Read this book online: HTML” and click to access the online full text.
4. Find the interviewee’s name “Allen, Sarah” and click on the hyperlinked page number 12 to access the online full text of the interview.
WPA Slave Narrative Digital Resources
There are several additional resources for accessing the WPA Slave Narratives. The resources at the Library of Congress are particularly useful and easily accessible. Please see below for a list of these resources.
The Library of Congress Collection
"Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936 to 1938"
Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938 contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives were collected in the 1930s as part of the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) of the Works Progress Administration, later renamed Work Projects Administration (WPA). At the conclusion of the Slave Narrative project, a set of edited transcripts was assembled and microfilmed in 1941 as the seventeen-volume Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves. In 2000-2001, with major support from the Citigroup Foundation, the Library digitized the narratives from the microfilm edition and scanned from the originals 500 photographs, including more than 200 that had never been microfilmed or made publicly available. This online collection is a joint presentation of the Manuscript and Prints and Photographs divisions of the Library of Congress.
- An Introduction to the WPA Slave Narratives
- The WPA and the Slave Narrative Collection
- The Limitations of the Slave Narrative Collection
- The Importance of the Slave Narrative Collection
- Appendix I: Narratives in the Slave Narrative Collection by State
- Appendix II: Race of Interviewers
- Articles and Essays
- Voices and Faces from the Collection
- A Note on the Language of the Narratives
- Guide to Using the Collection
- Collection Items
Omar Ibn Said Collection in the Library of Congress
The Omar Ibn Said Collection consists of 42 digitized documents in both English and Arabic, including an 1831 manuscript in Arabic on "The Life of Omar Ibn Said," a West African slave in America, which is the centerpiece of this unique collection of texts. Some of the manuscripts in this collection include texts in Arabic by another West African slave in Panama, and others from individuals located in West Africa.
AmericanAncestors
Ancestry.com
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U.S., Interviews with Formerly Enslaved People, 1936-1938
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Requires creating a free account
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Harry S. Truman Library & Museum
Louisiana History and Heritage Education Programs
Mississippi History Now
National Archives Voices of Emancipation
NEH EDSITEment!
- The SlaveVoyages website is a collaborative digital initiative that compiles and makes publicly accessible records of the largest slave trades in history. Search these records to learn about the broad origins and forced relocations of more than 12 million African people who were sent across the Atlantic in slave ships, and hundreds of thousands more who were trafficked within the Americas. Explore where they were taken, the numerous rebellions that occurred, the horrific loss of life during the voyages, the identities and nationalities of the perpetrators, and much more.
State Library of North Carolina
University of Arkansas
- WPA Early Settlers' Personal Histories of African Americans in Arkansas
- These personal history interviews are both similar to, and different from, interviews conducted in the WPA Ex-Slave Narratives project.
Additional Relevant Digital Resources
1850 U.S. Federal Census - Slave Schedules
1860 U.S. Federal Census - Slave Schedules
- During the 1850 and 1860 United States Federal Censuses, enslaved individuals were recorded separately in what were called slave schedules. This database provides details about those persons, including age, sex, and color, but unfortunately, most schedules omit personal names. Some enumerators did, however, list the given names of enslaved people—particularly those over one hundred years of age—which are generally found in the "name of slave owners" column.
- AfriGeneas is a site devoted to African American genealogy, to researching African Ancestry in the Americas in particular and to genealogical research and resources in general. It is also an African Ancestry research community featuring the AfriGeneas mail list, the AfriGeneas message boards and daily and weekly genealogy chats.
African American newspapers available through Chronicling America
Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society
Ancestry - African American Collection
- The Black Cemetery Network is a comprehensive directory of African American cemeteries throughout the U.S., including those which have been neglected, displaced or are currently at risk of erasure.
- BlackPast.org is the largest free and unrestricted reference center on African American and Global African History currently on the Internet. This website has nearly 8,000 pages reflecting the vast array of information on the history of people of African ancestry. The User’s Guide is designed to help you access this information as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Enslaved Community of President James Monroe
- This database, searchable by name or by year, is the result of several years’ research to locate and analyze documents relating to President James Monroe’s slaves, primarily the enslaved community in Loudoun County. Monroe owned land and slaves in several Virginia locations, including Loudoun County, where in 1830 he owned 1,828 acres and 66 slaves. This database will provide researchers with rare genealogical and historical insight within that slave community.
Freeman Bureau Records at the National Archives
- The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands (Record Group 105), also known as the Freedmen’s Bureau, was established in the War Department by an act of Congress on March 3, 1865. The Bureau was responsible for the supervision and management of all matters relating to the refugees and freedmen and lands abandoned or seized during the Civil War, duties previously shared by military commanders and US Treasury Department officials.
Family Search African American Genealogy Records Wiki
- An index of more than 200 advertisements is taken from a rare, complete collection of the Genius of Liberty newspaper, a four-page weekly published in Leesburg, Loudoun County, Virginia from 1817-1843.
A Glimpse Into Loudon County's African American History
- The GU272 Memory Project is the product of a collaboration among the GU272 descendants, the Georgetown Memory Project, and American Ancestors, the oldest non-profit genealogical society in America. The collective work of these groups -- which is accessible via this website -- includes a searchable online database of genealogical data for GU272 families, oral histories of more than 40 descendants, and educational material about genealogy.
Indiana African American Genealogy Group
- Our Black Ancestry Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing resources for African American genealogical research, preserving historic materials and properties, and promoting healing of wounds that are the legacy of slavery.
Research Guide - African American family research on Ancestry
- The Slave Voyages website is a collaborative digital initiative that compiles and makes publicly accessible records of the largest slave trades in history.