LibGuides: Primary Sources: Reconstruction Era (After U.S. Civil War): Freedmen

Find Books

Search the FAU Library Catalog to see what materials are available for check out. Search for books, government documents, DVDs, electronic books, streaming videos, and more.

Book Sources: Freedmen

Click the title for location and availability information.

The American Freedman
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Autobiography of James L. Smith
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Autobiography of Oliver Otis Howard by Oliver Otis Howard
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Bureau of Freedmen and Refugees by United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

Report of Hon. T. D. Eliot, chairman of the Committee on freedmen's affairs, to the House of representatives, March 10, 1868
Case and Claims of the Emancipated Slaves of the United States by Society of Friends in Great Britain and Ireland for the relief of the emancipated slaves of the United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

being the address of the Central committee of the Society of Friends in Great Britain and Ireland, to the British public
A Documentary History of Emancipation, 1861-1867 by Ira Berlin (Editor); Barbara J. Fields (Editor); Joseph P. Reidy (Editor); Leslie S. Rowland (Editor); Thavolia Glymph (Editor)
Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection E492.9 .D36 1985

ISBN: 9780521229791

Publication Date: 1986-01-31
Families and freedom : a documentary history of African-American kinship in the Civil War era by Ira Berlin (Editor); Leslie S. Rowland (Editor)
Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection E185.2 .F27 1997

ISBN: 1565840267

Publication Date: 1997-01-01
First Annual Report of the Educational Commission for Freedmen by Educational Commission for Freedmen (Boston, Mass.)
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

With extracts from letters of teachers and superintendents.
Free at last : a documentary history of slavery, freedom, and the Civil War by Ira Berlin; Steven F. Miller; Barbara Fields; Joseph P. Reidy; Leslie S. Rowland (Editor)
Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection E185.2 .F8 1992

ISBN: 1565840151

Publication Date: 1992-11-01
Freedmen's Bureau : Speech by Thomas D. Eliot
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

Hon. Thomas D. Eliot, of Massachusetts, in the House of Representatives, May 23, 1866.
The Freedmen's Record
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
The Freedmen of South-Carolina by Charles Nordhoff
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Freedom's soldiers : the Black military experience in the Civil War by Ira Berlin; Joseph P. Reidy (Editor); Leslie S. Rowland
Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection E540.N3 R45 2008

ISBN: 0521632587

Publication Date: 1998-03-13
After slavery : race, labor, and citizenship in the reconstruction South by Bruce Baker (Editor); Brian Kelly (Editor); Eric Foner (Afterword by)
Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection E185.2 .A34 2013

ISBN: 9780813044774

Publication Date: 2013-10-01
Letters and Diary of Laura M. Towne by Laura M. Towne
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

written from the Sea islands of South Carolina, 1862-1884
Letters from the Commercial Correspondent of an Association of Cotton Manufacturers
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Letters from the South, Relating to the Condition of Freedmen, by John Watson Alvord
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

addressed to Major General O. O. Howard. Commissioner Bureau R., F., and A. L., by J. W. Alvord, Gen. Sup't Education, Bureau R., F., & A. L.
A Narrative of the Life of Rev. Noah Davis, a Colored Man by Noah Davis
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

written by himself, at the age of fifty-four.
The Negroes at Port Royal by United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

Report of E. L. Pierce, government agent, to the Hon. Salmon P. Chase, secretary of the Treasury
The Pennsylvania Freedmen's Bulletin
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

1862-69; 1866 Jun, Nov-Dec

Publ. by The American Freedmen's and Union Commission.
Organ of the Pennsylvania Freedmen's Relief Association
Preliminary report touching the Condition and Management of Emancipated Refugees by American freedmen's inquiry commission
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

made to the Secretary of war, by the American freedmen's inquiry commission, June 30, 1863
Records of the field offices for the state of Kentucky by United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, 1865-1872.
Records of the field offices for the state of Louisiana by United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, 1863-1872.
Records of the Mississippi Freedmen's Department by United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

("pre-Bureau records"), Office of the Assistant Commissioner, Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, 1863-1865
Report of the General Superintendent of Freedmen by United States
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Report Relative to Leasing Abandoned Plantations by William P. Melle
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

and affairs of the freed people in first special agency. By William P. Mellen, Washington.
Semi-annual Report on Schools for Freedmen by Bureau Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

3rd-9th (1867-70)
Seven years among the Freedmen by M. Waterbury
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
Speech of Hon. J.R. Doolittle, of Wisconsin, on Homesteads by James R. Doolittle
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

for white men in the temperate zone-- homesteads for black men in the tropics-- white immigration to and black emigration from the United States-- a continental policy, embracing all climes and races, bringing freedom and homes to all, delivered in the Senate of the United States, April 11, 1862.
The Wartime genesis of free labor : the lower South by Ira Berlin (Editor); Steven F. Miller (Editor); Joseph P. Reidy (Editor); Leslie S. Rowland (Editor)
Call Number: Jupiter General Collection E185.2 .W372 1993

ISBN: 9781107405790

Publication Date: 2012-07-26
The Wartime Genesis of Free Labour, 1861-1867: The Lower South by Ira Berlin (Editor); Thavolia Glymph (Editor); Steven F. Miller (Editor); Joseph P. Reidy (Editor); Leslie S. Rowland (Editor); Julie Saville (Editor)
Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection E185.2 .W37 1990

ISBN: 0521394937

Publication Date: 1990
Why Colored People in Philadelphia are excluded from the Street Cars
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust
A Woman's Life-work: Labors and Experiences by Laura S. Haviland
Call Number: Online - free - HathiTrust

Online Sources: Freedmen

Roanoke Island Freedmen’s Colony
more... less...

"During the Civil War, Union-occupied Roanoke Island, which lies between the North Carolina mainland and the barrier islands known as the Outer Banks, became home to thousands of former slaves. Initially these refugees settled near the Union headquarters, creating a community that included churches and a school. In the spring of 1863, this camp evolved into a government-sanctioned colony. Major General John G. Foster, Commander of the 18th Army Corps, ordered Horace James, a Congregational minister from New England who was serving as a chaplain in the Union army, to establish a colony of former slaves on the island. " The site provides a variety of resources - both primary and secondary about the colony.
Minutes of the Freedmen's Convention
more... less...

Held in the City of Raleigh,
on the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th of October, 1866
from Documenting the American South
Pennsylvania Freedmen's Relief Association Broadside
"The Freedmen's Bureau." by W.E.B. Du Bois
more... less...

Atlantic Monthly 87 (1901): 354-365
Select Freedmen's Bureau Records (digital images)
Freedmen and Southern Society Project
more... less...

Placed in the context of the Civil War and Reconstruction with the aid of original essays, the documents uncovered by the project's editors are presented in Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation, 1861–1867.
A selection of documents from Freedom is available on this web site.