1804-09-17 Manumission: Joe

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Identifier
NJS-EVE-00126
Source
Middlesex County Manumissions and Removals, page 101

Manumission of Joe (certificate dated 1811-04-08, deed dated 1804-09-17), recorded in Manumissions and Removals Book, p. 101. Middlesex County (N.J.) Records, 1688-1929, Vol. XI (MC 784.1). Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University Libraries.
Event Description
Joe was manumitted by Samuel Cutter of Woodbridge, Middlesex County, New Jersey.

Samuel Cutter executed a deed of manumission for Joe on September 17, 1804. Joe was proximately 20 to 25 years old at the time. Cutter died several months later in 1805.

Approximately six years later, on April 8, 1811, William Bloomfield (the executor of Samuel Cutter's estate) brought Joe to court to complete the process and obtain a certificate of manumission for Joe. The certificate of manumission was signed by the Overseers of the Poor of Woodbridge (Ezekiel Ayers, Lewis Kelly) and Justices of the Peace for Middlesex County (Ichabod Potter, Ephraim Harriot). The document stated that Joe was examined in court and met the eligibility requirements for manumission in New Jersey, i.e. the person was 21 to 40 years old and was "sound in mind and not under any bodily incapacity" of obtaining a livelihood. This manumission was recorded by the Middlesex County Clerk (William P. Deare) on April 29, 1811.

The clerk also recorded a copy of Cutter's original deed of manumission from 1804, which states that Joe was "of about the age of twenty 'five' years" at the time the deed was issued. A notation below the document states "word 'five' in the sixth line being first interlined." It is possible that Joe was 25 years old at the time the deed was written by Samuel Cutter in 1804. It is also possible that Joe was only 20 in 1804 and that the word "five" was inserted between the lines (interlined) by William Bloomfield years later, closer to 1811.
Event Type
Manumission
Date
September 17, 1804 – April 8, 1811
Location of Event
Woodbridge
Primary Participants

Joe
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00571
Role: Manumitted Person
Age: 25
Status: Transition
Enslaver(s) of this participant:
- Samuel Cutter (1761-1805)
Additional Participants

Samuel Cutter (1761-1805)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00168
Role: Enslaver, Manumitter

William Bloomfield (1753-1821)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00505
Role: Executor or Administrator

Ichabod Potter
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00032
Role: Judge

Ephraim Harriot
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00165
Role: Judge

Ezekiel Ayers
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00028
Role: Overseer of the Poor

Lewis Kelly
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00100
Role: Overseer of the Poor

William Philips Deare (d. 1826)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00008
Role: County Clerk
Record Contributor
Isaac Guzmán
Jesse Bayker
Resource class
Event