Breaking the 1870 Brick Wall: Comprehensive Strategies for Tracing Formerly Enslaved African American Ancestors
Andre Kearns, Ayo Heinegg Magwood
Content
Welcome
1m 24s
Speakers' Introductions
2m 18s
Introduction
8m 38s
Pitfall 1
6m 4s
Pitfall 2
10m 36s
Pitfall 3
10m 54s
Announcements/ prizes
4m 32s
Questions / answers
25m 39s
About this webinar
Overcoming the 1870 brick wall in African American genealogy is challenging, but possible. This session presents a clear, step-by-step roadmap for tracing formerly enslaved ancestors using the Genealogical Proof Method. Learn how to reconstruct the freedmen generation, identify potential enslavers, and mine enslaver records for hidden ancestral clues. We’ll explore records on Ancestry and FamilySearch, including census and vital records, Freedmen’s Bureau files, cohabitation records, and estate records. If you're ready to move beyond 1870 and build a fuller picture of your family’s past, this webinar will equip you with the tools and confidence to begin.
About the speakers
Andre Kearns, founder and CEO of Black Ancestries is a recognized genealogist, author, and historian with 20 years of research experience, including tracing his own family’s history as early as 1619 a...
Learn more...
Ayo Heinegg Magwood is a Senior Genealogist with Black Ancestries and has worked closely with her father, Paul Heinegg, for several years. She co-authors many of his client reports on both enslaved an...
Learn more...Key points and insights
Tracing formerly enslaved ancestors often leads to the infamous "1870 brick wall," the point at which the first federal census to list all African Americans by name ends, leaving researchers struggling to bridge the gap into the era of enslavement. In this insightful webinar, Andre Kearns and Ayo Heinegg Magwood of Black Ancestries dismantle the myth that this barrier is insurmountable due to a lack of records. Instead, they demonstrate that by shifting from modern assumptions toward historically informed methodologies, researchers can uncover a wealth of documentation. The presentation provides a robust framework for navigating the complexities of Reconstruction-era records, offering practical strategies to transform vague family lore into verifiable genealogical proof.
- Move Beyond the Individual: One of the most common pitfalls is searching for ancestors in isolation; successful researchers instead reconstruct entire family networks and "first name clusters" to overcome inconsistent surnames and indexing errors.
- The Power of the Enslaver’s Tree: Because enslaved individuals were often inherited within families, building the family tree of the enslaver is an essential "Rosetta Stone" for locating vital clues in probate, property, and equity court records.
- Leverage Advanced Search Operators: Utilizing specialized tools like FamilySearch’s full-text search combined with Boolean operators (such as the plus sign and asterisk) allows genealogists to find specific ancestors in unindexed handwritten documents that traditional searches often miss.
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Comments (62)
Very helpful, especially the full text search! Thanks!
I learn so much through these African Diaspora series! So much information, I know I will definitely have to look at this one several times!
Excellent presentations-clear, beautifully researched and enlightening!
The webinar was informative and provided me with valuable insights and methods for approaching my research.
Wonderful presentation! The information was explained very well. Quite easily understood.
The presenters gave me some great ideas about broadening my search in order to get the information I need. I had only given the enslaver a cursory examination in the past but now I know there's much more to be found by building his/her tree.
The webinar was very informative and chock full of tips and strategies. This is always helpful for genealogists of all levels.
Great information that can be used on any research… by using every field on every record and triangulating across records and reconstructing the entire family not just the vertical lineage! YES! Excellent takeaways from the webinar! Thanks!