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This collection consists of two large manuscript volumes of tax records for Amherst, Virginia from 1819 to 1820, bound in leather. These ledger's identify enslavers and taxes paid for unnamed enslaved laborers among other things. Each volume lists hundreds of taxpayer names on the left side with comments about payments on the right. An alphabetical index in the front of each volume lists the page on which each name appears on the page in the volume, referring to tax transactions. The amount of tax is itemized for each taxpayer's land, enslaved laborers, horses, "muster fines," and levies. Volume one documents 1819 and contains 26 unnumbered pages and 271 utilized pages. Volume two documents 1820 and contains 23 unnumbered pagesand 224 utilized pages. Front endpaper indicates the records were compiled by George Holloway of Amherst for 1819 and his name is found on the end papers for 1820.

The papers of Anna Maria (Campbell Hickman) Otis Mead Chalmers (1809-1891) and her family offer a deep look into a 19th century American family with a sharp focus on enslaved and formerly enslaved persons. The collection documents the life of a young, widowed woman, Anna Maria Mead Chalmers, who was the granddaughter of General William Hull (1753-1825). She was a mother of four children and became a businesswoman in Richmond, Virginia. She was a writer, an editor of the Southern Churchmen, an educator and founder of Mrs. Mead's School for Young Ladies, and a director of The Southern Churchmen Cot ("Retreat for the Sick"), a hospital for children. Anna Maria's family enslaved people who are represented in the papers including Othello "Tillo" Freeman (1790's-1860's?). It includes a letter from William written in [1875], who was their carriage driver, and letters about Sam the fiddler, who settled on the farm after escaping harsher enslavement in Louisianna, and Jordan who was described as being hired out in a letter dated September 8, 1841 from Thomas R. Blair.

This collection consists of a family journal kept by the Goodman and Farrow families of Albemarle county. The journal includes five pages labeled "Black register of births" recording the first names and birth dates of more than 49 enslaved people. Also included are handwritten recipes, a few draft letters, and ancestral information.