Week 6: Clark County

I continued my search in Clark County this week, visiting the county offices in Springfield. The first place I went was to the Clark County Heritage Center. The Heritage Center is located in Springfield's old City Hall and Marketplace building on South Fountain Ave. The building itself is 13,000 sq. ft. and features a museum, Un Mundo Café, meeting rooms and rental spaces, the Huenke Family Farm Store, the Fisher Family Library and Archives, the Springfield Arts Council, and office spaces for United Way of Clark County and Clark County Veteran's Support Services.

Clark County Heritage Center

The Fisher Family Library and Archives is located on the second floor. The library was actually closed on the Tuesday I went, but their lovely archivist, Natalie Fritz, allowed me to come up and search their probate records for manumission, emancipation, and freedom paper records. 

Fisher Family Library and Archives

Fisher Family Library and Archives

The archives had a wide variety of Clark County, and Ohio, history including books, microfilm, and other reference material. They have the original probate court indexes, but also have them typed out so patrons can better read the names and cases. The typed indexes are also less awkward to handle and peruse as the original books are oversized and very heavy. While looking through the indexes, I made a discovery. There was an entry for a man named William H. Williams who was emancipating his slaves in 1860. 

Index entry for William H. Williams.

Not only did the Heritage Center have the entry in their original index book, but they also had both documents from probate court in their archival storage.

William H. Williams emancipation documents.

Williams set free five enslaved people from Kenton County, Kentucky on the 29th of November, 1860: Morris, Nancy, Mary, Alexander, and Robert Wilson.

While I was scanning the indexes for more records, Mrs. Fritz was searching the storage room for another court record she had remembered seeing. It was a deed of emancipation that had been donated to the Heritage Center whose donor and donation information had been lost over the years. The record was from one Polly Bell of Augusta County, Virginia, who emancipated 22 enslaved people in October of 1849. 

Deed of Emancipation from Polly Bell to 22 enslaved people.

All though these records were all the Fisher Family Library and Archives had, they were phenomenal finds. Done for the day, I packed up and headed to the Clark County Clerk of Courts office to check for records at the Court of Common Pleas.

Clark County Court of Common Pleas.

The employees of the Clark County Clerk of Courts office were exceptionally friendly. I had called the day before to let them know who I was and what I was looking for so they wouldn't be surprised. They were very helpful and let me look through whatever books I wanted. I was a little disheartened to note that they were missing a lot of physical records from before the 1900s, however there are microfilmed copies at Wright State University's Special Collections and Archives, so I will be making a trip back there soon.

Luckily the Clerk of Courts office did have a complete index to common pleas cases from 1819 to 1852. While scouring the index, I found an emancipation entry.

Deed of emancipation for "Ralph."

The entry was a deed of emancipation from A. Givens to a man named Ralph. I asked one of the employees if I could see the book the complete record was in, but it unfortunately was not found in their storage room. Hopefully I will be able to find the complete record on microfilm at Wright State - we will see!

That's all I have for Clark County until I can get to Wright State and hit up their microfilm collection. I hope you all enjoyed and stay tuned for next week when I travel up to Logan County.

Thanks, and be good!