Free Negro Register – The UncommonWealth

A Virginia Untold Update

In today’s blog post, I want to share some new material available in Virginia Untold, the Library’s digital project featuring records of enslaved and free…

Lydia NeurothAugust 27, 2025

Archives Conservation Digital Projects

Virginia Untold: Looking Back and Moving Forward

Editor's Note: Neither Virginia Untold nor Virginia Untold Project Manager Lydia Neuroth is going anywhere, but as we transition out of our two-year NHPRC grant…

Lydia NeurothJune 28, 2023

Archives Digital Projects The Stacks

Time Well Spent: Indexing and reviewing the Free Register Collection from Virginia Untold

For this month’s blog post, I asked Callie Freed, Local Records Archivist, to reflect on her experience indexing and reviewing our “Free Negro Registers” collection…

Callie FreedMarch 29, 2023

Archives Education & Programming

Beyond “Mary Bowser”: Researching & Writing a Biography of Black Activism in 19th-Century America

Editor’s Note: The Library of Virginia, in partnership with Virginia Humanities, sponsors residential fellows during the academic year to conduct in-depth research in the Library’s…

Lois LeveenFebruary 2, 2022

Archives

“Manifest Danger” : Smallpox Epidemics Hit 19th-Century Chesterfield

Given the current coronavirus health crisis, processing a small collection of Chesterfield County smallpox epidemic records from the 19th century seemed to be a timely…

Tracy HarterApril 22, 2020

Archives

What a Difference a Day Makes: Serendipity in the Reading Room

The Library of Virginia employs both reference archivists and processing archivists. Reference archivists work exclusively with the public—the Library’s front line. Processing archivists work behind-the-scenes…

Callie FreedJanuary 24, 2019

Archives

A Wedding, a Death, and a Pension: Charles and Sarah Butler’s Story

Portsmouth, Virginia, occupied by the Union army, was the scene of a wedding in November 1863. The happy couple was Charles “Charley” Butler, a private…

Bill BynumJune 3, 2015

Archives Digital Projects

Elizabeth City County Chancery Causes Online

The Library of Virginia is pleased to announce that digital images for Elizabeth City County (Va.) Chancery Causes, 1747-1913, are now available online through the Chancery…

Sarah NerneyOctober 29, 2014

Conservation

History Restored: Free Negro Registers Conserved

While watching the February 2012 episode of NBC’s Who Do You Think You Are? featuring actor and Petersburg native Blair Underwood investigating his family history, Library of…

Sarah NerneyMarch 27, 2013

Archives

Pre-Civil War Chancery Causes Rediscovered in Middlesex County Courthouse.

Local Records archivists recently travelled to the Middlesex County Circuit Court Clerk’s office to transfer their pre-1913 chancery causes to the Library of Virginia as…

Greg CrawfordMarch 29, 2011