The online data base is a wonderful idea and a very useful service. And Anita's story is fascinating.
I thought you might be interested in the Christ's Hospital or Blue Coat School records. Christ's Hospital was the first Blue Coat School and was essentially a boarding school for boys who were orphaned or poverty stricken, "through no fault of their own". There is some debate about whether or not all students were actually orphans. At any rate, the boys stayed at the school until a family member claimed them, or until they were bound out for service. Some of the students were born in America and went to the school in London, after the death of a parent.
These children were bound out for a period of at least 7 years, in order to learn a trade. They were generally from "respectable", middle class families. I understand that the records of the London school, Christ's Hospital, still exist, and I think the records of at least some of the other Blue Coat schools do, as well. The London Christ's Hospital had an entry book that gave the date of birth of the student, the admission date, and parent's name. A receipt book gave the date of departure and to whom the child was bound, and sometimes gave the length of servitude.
Zachariah Leigh's record states that he was born 9 April 1704, admitted to Christ's Hospital in April 1711, from Carlsharlton Parish, and bound out for service in 1718, at the age of 14, by Micajah Perry, a London/Virginia merchant, to master James Roscoe, Merchant in Virginia. I've found no further record of Zachariah in Virginia, until 1745, so I'm not so sure all indentures were for 7 years. Sometimes the register gave the length of servitude, but in his case, it didn't.
I think some of the records have been published. Maybe someone else knows by whom.
Langdon Hagen-Long
Nathan Murphy <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
That's a fantastic article. Thanks for pointing it out. Though I've read through more than 100 works about indentured servants, I'm sure there are still 1000 more!
Best,
Nathan W. Murphy, MA, AGŪ
Researcher and Marketing Director
Price & Associates, Inc.
http://www.pricegen.com
________________________________
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history on behalf of Brent Tarter
Sent: Fri 2/2/2007 12:45 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VA-HIST] New Online Database of Indentured Servants
For the Virginia Company's sending out women to Jamestown, start with
David Ransome's article in the William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 48
(January 1991), which has references to some lists.
Brent Tarter
The Library of Virginia
[log in to unmask]
Visit the Library of Virginia's Web site at http://www.lva.lib.va.us
-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mildred Fournier
Sent: Friday, February 02, 2007 12:15 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: New Online Database of Indentured Servants
While we are on the subject of "forced" emigration, does anyone have a
list of the women sent to Virginia in 1619 to marry the planters? I am
told that most of them came out of prisons or orphanages.
MWF
-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Nathan W. Murphy
Sent: Friday, February 02, 2007 12:11 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: New Online Database of Indentured Servants
ANNOUNCEMENT: Free Online Database of Indentured Servants,
Redemptioners, and Transported Convicts
PROJECT TITLE: Immigrant Servants Database
PROJECT URL: www.immigrantservants.com
DESCRIPTION: Nathan W. Murphy, Ph.D. candidate at the University of
Utah, is using skills he developed as a social historian and
professional genealogist to reconstruct a passenger arrival list of
indentured servants coming to Colonial America. The project will
continue for several years. It follows in the spirit of Peter Wilson
Coldham's efforts to publish passenger departure lists from sources in
the United Kingdom and Ireland for indentured servants and transported
convicts, but focuses on tapping American sources of immigrant servant
arrivals to complement the UK data.
Murphy, an Accredited Genealogist who resides in Salt Lake City, Utah,
has quick access to Colonial American and European sources through the
Family History Library. He has received permission from the major
publishers of Colonial Virginia's court orders to extract evidences of
imported servants from their books and make them available for free on
the Internet. He hopes to complete his search of seventeenth-century
court orders by Spring 2007.
NOTE: The approximately 10,000 immigrant servants currently in the
database do not derive from the same sources as those in the Virtual
Jamestown project. The numbers of immigrants in this new database will
continue to grow in the future.
PROJECT HIGHLIGHTS:
- Three search engines: SIMPLE SEARCH (queries all text in database),
ADVANCED SEARCH (search by any of more than 50 fields in database), and
LETTER SEARCH (browse through lists of servants arranged by the first
letter of their surname). The search engines are equipped with SOUNDEX,
which retrieves servants with surnames that sound alike, i.e. Murphy,
Morphew, Murfee, Murfew, Murfey, Murphew, and Murphey all come back as
possible matches with the surname "Murphy."
- LEARNING CENTER, includes a copy of Murphy's ARTICLE "Origins of
Colonial Chesapeake Indentured Servants: American and English Sources,"
published in the March 2005 edition of National Genealogical Society
Quarterly, which provides tips for tracing the immigrant origins of
English indentured servants; GLOSSARY of terms associated with the
practice of indentured servitude; extensive list of LAWS from Colonial
Virginia pertaining to indentured servants; lengthy BIBLIOGRAPHY
identifying sources Murphy has used and hopes to use to build this
database (includes references to 12 personal accounts of immigrant
servants); and a list of LINKS that will interest researchers of
immigrant servants.
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Nathan W. Murphy
[log in to unmask]
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the
instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the
instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions
at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions
at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions
at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
|
