African American Cemeteries by Gordon Trueblood:

 I do not believe the Perquimans site would be complete and truly
 representative if it did not include data for African American
 genealogists.

 In addition to African-American Cemetery data, additional data (names and
 sometimes kinships) can be gleaned from the wills of slave holders.

 Another source of data would be Free Negro census, etc.   Perquimans and
 Pasquotank Counties had one of the largest Free Negro populations of 
 ante-bellum North Carolina.

 In colonial North Carolina the manumission of slaves except for meritorious
 service was forbidden by law.  This was challenged when the earliest gesture
 among North Carolina Quakers to free their slaves was made on April 6, 1774
 at the Perquimans Monthly Meeting when Thomas Newby rose to express his
 uneasiness about keeping Negroes in slavery and asked advise about giving
 them their freedom.   The matter was too grave for the monthly meeting to
 render judgement, so it was referred to the Yearly Meeting for resolution.
 The Yearly Meeting did a bit of a side step by recommending that any peson
 wishing to free a slave should apply to the Monthly Meeting for permission.

 The Monthly Meeting would in turn appoint a committee to draw up manumission
 papers and ascertain if the free Negro would be able to earn a livelihood.

 Accordingly, Thomas Newby again approached the Monthly Meeting on 9 August
 1774.  The Monthly Meeting appointed a counsel him also side-stepped the
 issue.  The committee, in fact, never met but advised Thomas Newby that in
 their judgement it was not best to be hasty in such a matter.   Thomas
 Newby's petition to the Monthly Meeting was dropped from the records, not
 to emerge again for two years.

 Meanwhile, the Yearly Meeting again, in 1775,  took up the slave issue, and
 declared "(We) order than no Friend in unity shall buy or sell a Negro
 without the consent of the Monthly Meeting to which they bleong..." --this
 is, not even to another Friend.

 At the same time one of the more serious problems in Perquimans and
 Pasquotank Counties was that certain blacks who had been manumitted were
 being seized and re-sold into slavery.  In 1776 the Yearly meeting decided
 to take a direct hand in the matter of manumission, and appointed a
 committee to assist those Friends who wished to free their slaves.  At the
 same time the Monthly Meetings were instructed to protect free slaves from
 recapture, all expenses to be undeerwritten by the Yearly Meeting.

 Finally, in 1777 Thomas Newby and 10 other Friends in Perquimans M.M.
 succeeded in freeing some 40 slaves.

 My intention here was not to give anyone a history lesson, but to provide
 some rational basis for the inclusion of African-American genealogical data
 on the Perquimans website.

 Gordon Trueblood



Name (from the printed form of the census) 
http://www.freeafricanamericans.com/1790NCa.htm 

Perquimans County 1790 
Ashburn, Winifred 5 Perquimans County 
Overton, Lemuel 2 Perquimans County 
Overton, Parthena 10 Perquimans County 
Overton, Rachel 7 Perquimans County 
Overton, Samuel 1 Perquimans County 


"Other Free" Heads of Household in the 1800 North Carolina Census 
by family name 
http://www.freeafricanamericans.com/1800NCa.htm 

Perquimans Co. 1800 
Jones, William 2 Perquimans County page 647 
Jones, William 2 Perquimans County page 661 
Overton, Frances 2 Perquimans County page 657 
Overton, Pathinia 12 Perquimans County page 657 
Tolson, Isaac 3 Perquimans County page 647 
Tolson, William 1 Perquimans County page 647 



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