Mississippi Slave Narratives
In the late 1930s, Federal Writers as part of the Works Project Administration (WPA) recorded the life stories of more than 10,000 men and women from a variety of regions, occupations and ethnic groups. An important part of this project was the interviews of the surviving ex-slaves.
The MSGenWeb Project, a division of the USGenWeb Project, has attempted to collect as many of the interviews done of Mississippi residents who were born in slavery as we can. If you know of any we have missed, please feel free to contact us and we will be happy to include it.
African-American Research is extremely difficult because of the lack of historical records before the Civil War. We hope this project will be of some help to researchers of those of African-American ancestry. While we are aware of what is and is not politically correct today, we are dealing with historical data and all data on this site is transcribed exactly as written and no offense is meant and none should be taken.
The Index of ex-slaves includes the Mississippi County, if known, listed beside the name.
NOTE: Remember many of the slave owner's names are mentioned in these narratives also!
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