On 3 October 1863, the War Department issued General Order No. 329 as a means to facilitate recruitment into the U. S. Colored Troops. This order contained a section that allowed for loyal slave owners in Union-controlled territories, who allowed (or demanded) their slaves to enlist in the military service, to be compensated, “for the service or labor of said slave.”[1] This led to the creation of Slave Claims Commissions under the direction of the Bounty and Claims Division of the Adjutant General’s Office. Slavery had been gradually abolished in the northern states since the Revolutionary War. When South Carolina voted to secede from the Union shortly after the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, nearly all of the other remaining slave-holding states followed suit, with but a few exceptions: Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri. The western counties of Virginia voted to secede from Virginia and return to the Union, creating the new state of West Virginia. Tennessee, which had actually seceded from the United States to join the Confederacy at the start of the War, had by this time come back under the control of the Union Army. These six states—Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, Missouri, West Virginia, and Tennessee—thus became the only Union-controlled slave states, and benefitted from General Order 329.
In order to claim compensation for a slave enlisted in the U. S. Colored Troops, a slave-owner had to furnish proof of enlistment of the slave, proof of ownership of the slave, proof of their own loyalty, and a deed of manumission freeing the slave. Some of these records of proof may be found among the compiled military service records of former slaves, including evidence of title and evidence of loyalty. Deeds of manumission are recorded in the county of residence of the owner, as in the following manumission from the Prince George’s County, Maryland, deed books:
Whereas my slave Isaac Hawkins has enlisted in the Service of the United States; now in consideration thereof I Sarah S. Baden of Prince Georges County, State of Maryland, do hereby in consider-ation of said enlistment manumit, set free, and release the above named Isaac Hawkins from all Service due me, his freedom to Commence from the 5th January 1864, the date of his enlistment as aforesaid in the 19th Regiment of Colored Troops in the Service of the Service [sic] of the United States.[2]
The most common amount of compensation to each owner was three hundred dollars, which the General Order specified as the maximum amount awardable for claims. This amount was awarded to those whose slaves were considered “slaves for life,” or slaves held to a term of service of over ten years. Slaves under a term of service from five to ten years carried an award to their owners of two hundred dollars, while slaves under five years carried an award of just one hundred dollars.
Not all of those who made claims to the Commissions were approved for awards, however. The inability to provide evidence of enlistment or proof of title were common reasons for the rejection of claims, but there were also many slave-owners who were denied due to disloyalty to the Union.
About These Records
The Records of the Slave Claims Commissions are held in their original form at the National Archives and Records Administration Building in Washington, D. C. These records have not been microfilmed or digitized. The series is identified as “Entry 348” in PI17: “Preliminary Inventory of the Records of the Adjutant General's Office (RG 94).” The records consist of fourteen total items: ten loose volumes, and four boxes containing additional volumes. The Register of Claims of Delaware Commission is designated the first of these records.
To cite this specific volume, use the following format:
Register of Claims of Delaware Commission, 1864-1865. Records of the Slave Claims Commission, 1864-1867. Records of the Adjutant General’s Office, 1762-1984, Record Group 94. National Archives, Washington, D. C.
The Register of Claims of Delaware Commission contains 114 claims entered before the Delaware Slave Claims Commission in 1864 and 1865. Each claim provides at least the name of the claimant/slave-owner and the name of the slave, providing direct evidence of the final slave-owner of each of the slaves thus claimed. Each entry may include additional information including date and place of enlistment of the slave, events in the processing of the claim, and the amount of award, if any. For rejected claims, one might learn that the claimant was considered disloyal, for example, or that the slave being claimed was not a chattel slave but a free black apprentice. Other information may also be found among the claims.
To purchase Records of the Slave Claims Commission, Volume One: Register of Claims of Delaware Commission, visit the author's site.
[1] U. S. National Archives, Compiled Military Service Records of Volunteer Union Soldiers Who Served with the United States Colored Troops: 1st United States Colored Infantry, 1st South Carolina Volunteers (Colored), Company A, 1st United States Colored Infantry (1 Year), Descriptive Pamphlet M1819 (Washington, D. C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1996), pg. 2.
[2] Prince George’s County Circuit Court, Land Records, Liber FS 2, ff. 523-524, Sarah S. Baden, deed of manumission of slave Isaac Hawkins, 28 Mar 1865, MSA CE64-9; Maryland State Archives, Annapolis, Maryland.
Comments
Hello, I enjoyed reading your article because you write about actual material and not just a previously published book on the subject.
Would you know if Slave owners from North Carolina would have had similar claim commissions? With my cemetery preservation work, dealing with Former Slave graves, obtaining data is always part of my research.
Best wishes,
Jack
www.resurrection-mission.com
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