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 To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-roots.html