Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

There are no restrictions.

Use Restrictions

Patrons are to use digital images with searchable transcription available through the Library of Virginia's Virginia Memory website or the microfilm Surry County (Va.) Reel 59.

Preferred Citation

Surry County (Va.) Record of Marriages Made in Obedience to Circular No. 11, 1866. Local government records collection, Surry County Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia 23219.

Acquisition Information

This item was microfilmed by the Library of Virginia's Imaging Services Division. Digital images were created by the Library of Virginia's Photographic and Digital Imaging Services under the accession number 50486. Photolab number 12_0571.

Historical Information

Surry County was formed in 1652 from James City County.

The Virginia legislature passed an act on 27 February 1866 to legalize the marriages of former slaves who had been cohabiting as of that date and provide for the legitimization of their children. See Virginia Acts of Assembly, 1866-1867, Chapter 18, An act to amend and re-enact the 14th section of chapter 108 of the Code of Virginia for 1860, in regard to registers of marriage; and to legalize the marriages of colored persons now cohabiting as husband and wife.

The federal Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands directed the Assistant Superintendents of the states to order the county clerks to make a registry of such cohabiting couples and their children. See Circular No. 11, dated 19 March 1866, in Orders, Circulars, Circular Letters, and Letters of Instruction, vol. 2 (1866). Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, Records of the Assistant Commissioner for the State of Virginia, 1865-1869. Miscellaneous reel 3880, Library of Virginia. National Archives microfilm M1048 (reel 41), Record Group 105.

Scope and Content

Surry County (Va.) Record of Marriages Made in Obedience to Circular No. 11, 1866, is a register of freedmen's marriages. It is also commonly called both the Surry County (Va.) Freedman's Marriage Register and the Surry County (Va.) Cohabitation Register. It includes the names of parties married, time of marriage, age of parties, place of marriage, place of residence, place of birth, names of parents of parties married, condition (whether single or previously married), occupation of husband, and names of children by another wife which the husband acknowledges as his and who are thereby legitimate. There is an index on p. 6 that indicates on which page of the register that letter of the alphabet begins.

At the beginning of the register, a copy of the Freedmen's Bureau Circular No. 11 is included.

Related Material

Additional Surry County Marriage Records and Vital Statistics can be found on microfilm at the Library of Virginia. Consult "A Guide to Virginia County and City Records on Microfilm" found on the Library of Virginia web site.

Additional cohabitation registers are available digitially with searchable transcriptions through the Library of Virginia's Virginia Memory website.

Index Terms

Corporate Names:

• Surry County (Va.). Circuit Court.
• United States. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands.

Subjects:

• African Americans -- Employment -- Virginia -- Surry County.
• African Americans -- History.
• African Americans -- Virginia -- Surry County.
• Freedmen -- Virginia -- Surry County.

Geographical Names:

• Surry County -- History -- 19th century.

Genre and Form Terms:

• Local government records -- Virginia -- Surry County.
• Marriage records -- Virginia -- Surry County.
• Marriage registers -- Virginia -- Surry County.
• Registers (lists) -- Virginia -- Surry County.

Adjunct Descriptive Data