Every entry in the British register of Black people who sailed from New York in 1783, as the clerks wrote it: name, age, sex, vessel, master and destination, with a link to the page image at the Nova Scotia Archives.
The clerks wrote a name, an age and a letter: “m” for a man, “f” for a woman, “c” for a child. Many entries carry only a first name; some add a note such as “his wife” or “child of.” The full register page, at the link in the last column, also gives a description, how the person came within British lines, and the name of the person who had claimed them. We do not repeat the claimants’ names here; they are on the page images. Entries shaded gold are the twenty-nine from around Franklin Township. About the register and its three copies.
About this data. The dots, ships and names come from the Nova Scotia Archives open dataset “Book of Negroes”, 1783 (xxcy-v3fh, Nova Scotia Open Government Licence), a transcription of the British copy of the register in the Carleton Papers (The National Archives, Kew, PRO 30/55/100): 3,009 entries with name, age, sex, vessel, master, destination and register page. Ship names and ports are standardized for the charts (“L’Abondence”, “L’Abundance” and “L’Abondance” are one ship; “Port Mattoon” is Port Mouton); the search shows each entry as written. The dataset has no dates: where a date is given it is placed by register order between dated inspections (April 23, July 31, September 22, November 19 and November 30, 1783) and is approximate. Each entry links to the page image at the Nova Scotia Archives. The register does not record the people who were seized before sailing, who left without registration, or who sailed from other ports. About the register · The twenty-nine.