Week 5: Clark County

I began my journey to Clark County this week with a lovely trip to Springfield. Clark County, Ohio became a county in 1818 and is named after American Revolution General George Rogers Clark. Clark County was originally just parts of Greene, Champaign, and Madison Counties before it was officially partitioned off as a separate county. When the National Road was completed, Springfield, the county's seat, found itself at the end of that road thus creating plentiful opportunities for the young county.
It was a hot and humid day, so I decided that it might be nice to visit the Clark County Recorder instead of strolling around the historic downtown. Both the Recorder and the Auditor are located in the same building on North Limestone Street next to the courthouse. The reference room was filled with deed and mortgage records, records of mechanics liens, partnerships, and mortgage releases. It was two stories!

Recorder and Auditor Offices.

First floor of the record room.

Second floor of the record room.

The employees at the Recorder's Office were incredibly helpful and showed me exactly where everything was that I wanted to look through.

I started looking through the deed indexes to see if I could find anything that was labeled "BoS" (bill of sale), "Emcptn" (emancipation), or "Fdom Pprs" (freedom papers). I found one entry for a bill of sale, but it was just that - a bill of sale between a father who is giving his land to his son. 

I also found a few names who were marked as free Blacks on the 1830 census, but those were all just land and lot deeds. I did take a picture of a peculiar name that made me smile, however.

Deed record for Cindarilla Hauke.

A deed record for a woman named Cindarilla Hauke stood out from the pages filled with mostly men's names. While I did not find any Manumission records this week, Cindarilla certainly made me glad that I was looking. 

I hope you enjoyed this week's post and stay tuned while I continue my search in Clark County.

Thanks, and be good!