My African-American Cousins

The story of the African-American Slaydens opens with a romance. Back in 1705 in New Kent, Virginia, Sarah Slayden – a white woman – fell in love with a “mulatto” named John Bunch. Sarah and John petitioned the council of Virginia for permission to marry.

The council mulled over whether the colony’s laws would “prevent Negroes & White persons intermarrying.” But the council members – as politicians do – postponed their decision. To this day, we don’t know if Sarah Slayden and John Bunch were allowed to marry.

Sarah Slayden was most likely the sister or cousin of Arthur Slayden. Arthur’s son, Joseph Slayden, was a slave owner. Joseph ended up in Pittsylvania County, Virginia, where tobacco – and slave labor – ruled.

My great-great-great grandfather, William Everett Slayden, was the eleventh of Joseph’s 16 children. William Everett – who becomes a key player in the Slayden story – was born in 1789 in Pittsylvania County.

Around 1821, William Everett and other members of the Slayden family – including their African-American slaves – left Virginia for Tennessee. They settled in the Wood Valley, nestled in the rolling hills of Dickson County, Tennessee.

Dickson County was slave country, but there were no thousand-acre cotton plantations like the Deep South. Instead, farmers grew corn and tobacco on small tracts of land. Dickson County had no need for hundreds of slaves, and most families kept fewer than ten slaves.

William Everett Slayden was a wagon maker. According to family lore, he was an “expert wagon and buggy maker.” The tiny town of Slayden, Tennessee, probably named for William Everett’s brother, is still on the map.

In 1850, William Everett owned ten slaves, many of them children.

Sadly, our story of the African-American Slaydens begins here. But researching the African-American side of the family is a challenge. William Everett, apparently illiterate, marked his legal documents with an “X.” He left no letters or journals, and his will made no mention of the names or identity of his slaves.

So to research the African-American Slaydens, we have nothing but government records and census reports. As you’ll find out later, these records are grossly inadequate for researching African-American family history.*

But this blog will try – with these limited resources – to tell the stories of Julia Slayden, Allen Slayden, and Rufus Slayden. Hopefully, the living descendents of the African-American Slaydens will someday come forward so we can continue to piece together our common stake.

*If you’re interested in seeing the original historical records for this story, request an annotated version at carol.s.arnold@gmail.com.