Before the outbreak of the Civil War, Hertford County had one of the largest populations of free people of color in North Carolina. Although they lived in a rur

In North Carolina’s Free People of Color, 1715–1885, Warren Eugene Milteer Jr. examines the lives of free persons categorized by their communities as “neg

When Hertford County was established in 1759, Eastern North Carolina had served as a home to African Americans for more than 170 years. Over time free blacks an

In 1928, Eli Reid purchased 400 acres of picturesque property on the banks of the Chowan River in Hertford County, North Carolina. Soon after he acquired the la

On the eve of the Civil War, most people of color in the United States toiled in bondage. Yet nearly half a million of these individuals, including over 250,000