Nel Hatcher wrote:
>I have been working on a particular research problem for a while that
involves an 1830 census showing William Hatcher, 20-30 (probably closer to
30 based on kid's ages) and recorded with 43 slaves.
>This is very perplexing to me since, if he is who I believe he is, it
raises the question - where/how did he come into possession of so many
slaves at such a relatively young age?
>Now I am wondering if he actually owned these slaves. My question is this -
could he have been an overseer living on land he did not own but owned by an
absentee land/slave owner? Would ownership of the land have been a concern
to the census taker whose only responsibility was to record all persons
living on that particular property?


Nel, you are squarely on target in questioning the incongruity between this
man's age and the number of slaves attributed to him. Your proposed
interpretation is a sound one, IMO. The enumerators were to record the head
of the household and the occupants of that household--a census definition
that included slaves. Enumerators were not instructed to ask: "Who is the
titular owner of these people?" From the East Coast to Texas, I've seen many
examples of slaves held by absentee landowners being attributed to the
household of the overseer or farm manager--all cases in which a
reconstruction of the man's life provided direct evidence to support this
interpretation of the census.

Elizabeth

---------------------------------------------------------------
Elizabeth Shown Mills, CG, CGL, FASG
Advanced Research Methodology & Evidence Analysis
Samford University Institute of Genealogy & Historical Research

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