Database of Virginia slave names made public

Names of people enslaved in Virginia, pulled from some of the Virginia Historical Society ’s 8 million documents, have been compiled into Unknown No Longer, a searchable database now available to the public.

The online tool includes more than 1,500 names found in letters, wills, court records and other sources. Each name is connected to a digital copy of the original document in which it was found. Society spokeswoman Jennifer Guild said the work of extracting the information began more than a year ago.

“It is possible these names have never been seen before,” she said. “This is the first time we have published them.”

The database can be searched by keywords such as name, occupation and plantation. “For instance, if all you knew was your great-great-great-grandmother was named Ann and she had been a slave in Virginia,  that is enough to begin a search with this database,” Guild said. “Or, if all you have is a plantation name, you go to that name and you will find what we have on the slaves who lived there.”...