Lone Star Slavery Project / Texas Runaway Slave Project

Lone Star Slavery Project / Texas Runaway Slave Project The Lone Star Slavery Project goal is to make digitally accessible Texas's documentary record of its slave society. The project began in January 2020.

The Texas Runaway Slave Project is a database of over 2,500 runaway slave found in Texas archival documents. The Lone Star Slavery Project researchs, photographs, transcribes, curates, and make digitally accessible Texas’s documentary record of its slave society. The project focuses on 18 counties that accounted for 38 percent of the enslaved population of Texas in 1860. The only records online so

far are for Nacogdoches County, but continue to check back. There will be more content soon!! The goal is to one day have hundreds of thousands of records documenting slavery online and available for research. https://cdm16649.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/lonestarslave

The Texas Runaway Slave Project is a database of runaway slave advertisements, articles and notices from newspapers published in Texas, as well as materials from court records, manuscript collections, and books. It documents more than 2,500 fugitive slaves from Texas. https://digital.sfasu.edu/digital/collection/RSP

Here's a good reminder that when you're doing slavery research in Texas, don't stop at Juneteenth. I now regularly resea...
04/12/2026

Here's a good reminder that when you're doing slavery research in Texas, don't stop at Juneteenth. I now regularly research into early 1866 because of records like the one below. Filed in 1864 but not recorded in the deed book until September 1865!!

Marion County Deed Book C, pages 247-248

A nice little segment on the Lone Star Slavery Project in this article:
03/15/2026

A nice little segment on the Lone Star Slavery Project in this article:

A Baptist church document from the Republic of Texas era is donated to Stephen F. Austin State University — and with it, a snapshot of life in the frontier days.

Sterling McGraw emancipated seven enslaved people in Newton County in 1847. The freedom papers document their entire tim...
07/17/2025

Sterling McGraw emancipated seven enslaved people in Newton County in 1847. The freedom papers document their entire time in Texas:

Winter 1833: Jane and her four children Gilbert, Sally, Jinsey, and Irvine arrive with McGraw in the Department of Nacogdoches.
Winter 1836: Jane has a fifth child, Henry.
1836-1845: Live in Jasper County, Republic of Texas.
(11/10/1841: Sally has a daughter, Mary Jane)
Dec. 1845 - Apr. 1846: Jasper County, Texas, United States
April 22, 1846: Newton County created from their part of Jasper County.
February 1, 1847: McGraw makes out the emancipation papers.
February 4, 1847: Filed and recorded with the County Clerk.

Newton County Deed Book A, pages 31-33. This volume was transcribed from the original by the County Clerk's office in 1903.

Address

Ralph W Steen Library
Nacogdoches, TX
75961

Telephone

(936) 468-1590

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