Our Collection

At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Slavery contract

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC08397 Author/Creator: Place Written: s.l. Type: Document Date: 30 May 1831 Pagination: Order a Copy

Contract between James Reed and "Providence, a negro man aged about twenty-eight years," binding Providence to Reed for ninety years. Reed planned on emigrating to Texas, then a provice of Mexico, where slavery was not legal.

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