Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

A portion of the Lynchburg (Va.) Apprenticeship Indentures, Pre-1865 relating to Black and Multiracial individuals are digitized and available through Virginia Untold: The African American Narrative Digital Collection on the Library of Virginia website. Please use digital images if available.

Use Restrictions

There are no restrictions.

Preferred Citation

Lynchburg (Va.) Apprenticeship Indentures, 1798-1875. Local government records collection, Lynchburg Court Records. The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Va.

Acquisition Information

These records came to the Library of Virginia in a transfer of court records from the city of Lynchburg in an undated accession

Processing Information

Lynchburg (Va.) Apprenticeship indentures were processed in 2019 by E. Jordan. Indentures relating to Black and multiracial individuals were later indexed by E. Jordan for the purposes of digitizing them for the digital project Virginia Untold: The African American Narrative.

Additional Lynchburg (Va.) Apprenticeship indentures were identified and removed from "Miscellaneous records" in October 2024. These were processed by M. Mason in October 2024.

Encoded by G. Crawford, 2019; Updated by M. Mason, October 2024

Historical Information

Context for Record Type: In 1765, the General Assembly established that illegitimate children of "woman servants, Negroes, white women by Negroes were to be bound out" until the age of 21 for males and 18 for females. In the late eighteenth century, the General Assembly established the Overseers of the Poor, an appointed body that provided food, clothing, shelter, and medical treatment for people who were too poor to support themselves or too ill to provide for their basic needs. They also bound out children whose parents could not support them and those who were orphaned through apprenticeship contracts. These agreements arranged for white children to be taught a trade or domestic skills as well as educated in reading, writing, and arithmetic. In 1805, the General Assembly amended the previous act to no longer require the master of "black or mulatto orphans" to teach reading, writing, or arithmetic, with the intent that this would prevent Black children from learning these skills.

Locality History: The city of Lynchburg was established in 1786. It was incorporated as a town in 1805 and as a city in 1852. Parts of Campbell and Bedford counties were annexed in 1976.

Scope and Content

Lynchburg (Va.) Apprenticeship Indentures, 1798-1875, consists of contracts or agreements binding out white, Black, or multiracial children, sometimes those who were orphaned, to learn a particular trade or craft. These indentures may be written agreements between the family of the apprentice and those responsible for the indentured. In many cases this includes the direct involvement of the Overseers of the Poor. They typically contain the name of the person or institution binding out, the person to whom bound, the name of the person being indentured, the length of the apprenticeship, and the responsibilities of the person taking on the indenture.

Arrangement

This collection is arranged

Related Material

See also: Lynchburg (Va.) Free and Enslaved Records, 1834-1837, undated

Records related to free and enslaved people of Lynchburg (Va.) and other localities are available through the Virginia Untold: The African American Narrative Digital Collection on the Library of Virginia website.

Additional Lynchburg Land Records can be found on microfilm at The Library of Virginia web site. Consult "A Guide to Virginia County and City Records on Microfilm."

Adjunct Descriptive Data