This book promises to become the standard work of the history of the
slaves, slaveholders, and the free black population of Antebellum
Baltimore. For five years, Mr. Clayton has collected, transcribed,
and cross-indexed a great variety of documents: applications for
certificates of freedom, slave schedules, field assessor work books,
census schedules, mortality schedules, general property tax records,
city directories, newspaper advertisements and articles, the
Schomburg collection at the Pratt Library in Baltimore, original
letter manuscripts, and acts of the General Assembly of Maryland. The
growth of Baltimore’s black community, free and slave, was
supported by two geographical factors of Baltimore. The city’s
thriving harbor offered a large employment market that attracted free
blacks and offered slaveholders the opportunity to hire out their
slaves. And Baltimore’s position between the North and the South
made it a logical station for escaped slaves either trying to reach
the North or hoping to blend in with Baltimore’s large free black
population. The result of Mr. Clayton’s labors is a comprehensive,
fascinating, and sometimes painful view of an important period in the
history of Charm City for which researchers everywhere will thank
him.