What Happened to Your Family After Slavery?

I often think about the day that my ancestors received the news that slavery has been abolished by President Abraham Lincoln  in 1865. I can only imagine the tears and joy they felt knowing  they were no longer slaves. After the tears of joy settled down, now they must face a new life as free people. Where do we go? What are we going to do now? How did your ancestors  reconstruct their lives as free people? Are did they end up in a new form of slavery called sharecroppers or peonage?

Some  of the questions that many genealogist and famiy historians try and answer through their genealogical  research is; What happen to our ancestors after slavery?  Did they remain in the area where they  received their freedom from slavery? Did they become sharecroppers?  Did they leave the area and where did they go? How did they provide for themselves? Please join host and genealogist Antoinette Harrell for this dicussion.