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| St. Helena Parish Courthouse |
I found the succession records of Benjamin Richardson and my
ancestors Carrie and her child Thomas were listed in his inventory as well as how much they appraised for. Some of the records are
crumbling up and are in bad shape and need to be preserved. There are records such as: the Asylum
Records, Crop Lien Records, Marriage Records, Land Records, and Court Records
housed in the vault.
If your ancestors were slaves in St. Helena Parish, the inventory list can be very vital to
anyone who is researching their family history, especially if they come from St.
Helena Parish, Louisiana.
Researching the history of the slaveholder family might give you some
answers you were looking for.
I got a full understanding of crop liens when I found the
application of those who were borrowing
money to plant their crops. The application named the person who applied for the services. They also gave you a legal description of the property and how much money they borrow against the crops.
money to plant their crops. The application named the person who applied for the services. They also gave you a legal description of the property and how much money they borrow against the crops.
When I first opened the drawer to access the files in the vault, my eyes filled with tears of excitement when I found
my ancestors in the succession records. I was pulling their files for the very
first time, I found them and who owned them.
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| Bernice A. Bennett and Antoinette Harrell inside the vault |
Standing inside the vault and looking at old file cabinets
that I had seen on the television series "Gunsmoke" wondering how long it had been since anyone opened these files outside of
the employees who are employed there.
Pulling the files for the first time and opening them to look at the
records was like freeing my ancestors and letting them know that I came back to
learn more about their lives as slaves in St. Helena Parish, Louisiana.
I took the files and sat at the desk with my fingers cross in high hopes that I would find more of my ancestors. Reviewing the succession records
of Benjamin and Celia Bankston Richardson and looking at all the slaves they own on
their plantation. I wanted to know if any of the other slaves were related to Carrie, could one of the women on this inventory list be her mother?
I wanted to know more about Carrie. Where did she come from?
Who did they purchase her from? Was she one of the Africans’ who was kidnapped
and sold into slavery? Who were her mother and father? Did she have other
siblings? What cemetery is she buried in?
As I continued to look inside the vault, I found the crop
lien records of people who borrowed money to grow their crops. I found my
maternal grandmother Emma Mead Harrell and her son Jasper in those files.
Jasper’s brother Palmer Harrell’s application was there also.
Scanning the room looking at the old books, the policy jury
records, criminal records, and the asylum records, my curiosity has gotten the
best of me and I wanted to look at those asylum records. For what medical reason was that person sent to East Louisiana Mental Hospital? I knew my maternal great-grandfather
Thomas Richardson spent many years in the asylum and I was hoping that I would have found his medical records, but I was out of luck here.
When I visit the St. Helena Clerk of Court office to conduct
genealogy research, I can stay all day. There is so much to see and so many
records and document to look at. The marriage records are indexed in books and
if you would like to see the original marriage license you can tell the clerk
and she would be glad to pull them for you.
