Valuable research that deserves study. Thank you for sharing. --Joanne Paul Heinegg <[log in to unmask]> wrote: In 1670 Indians who arrived in Virginia by land were bound as servants until the age of 30 years, but a law of 1682 made them slaves for life. Thus, the court records of Henrico County differentiate between Indians "who came in amongst the English before the last act of assembly" (1682) and those that arrived after. I have a file on my site in which I quote the colonial county court records for most mentions of Indians: http://www.freeafricanamericans.com/free_Indians.htm Sometime around the Revolution, Virginia acknowledged that enslaving Indians had been illegal, and they freed many slaves who could prove they were descendants of Indian women. This process continued until about 1810 or 1820 when testimony about what had occurred in the early 1700s was no longer accepted. From their descriptions in the registers of free Negroes, it is obvious that the Indian slaves blended with the African slaves: "Daniel Coleman (born about 1752) registered in Petersburg on 10 February 1798, a dark Brown free Negro or Indian, six feet two inches high, about forty six years old, short bushy hair, a little grey, formerly held as a slave by Joseph Hardaway but obtained his freedom by a judgment of the Gen'l Court in Nov. 1797" [Petersburg Register of Free Negroes 1794-1819, no.170]. Carolyn Goudie researched this subject while at the LVA, but I do not know if she published her research. You can read the family history of some of the Indian families who gained their freedom (Coleman, Findley, Jumper, Vena/ Venie) on my site: http://www.freeafricanamericans.com/Virginia_NC.htm Paul --------------------------------- Luggage? GPS? Comic books? Check out fitting gifts for grads at Yahoo! Search.