1818-02-11 Removal Registration: Simon
- Research Tips
-
To learn about the removal registration system in New Jersey, see What Is a Removal Certificate? You can use the Removal Records Index to review all removal registrations by origin, destination, and other criteria.
This event is related to a notorious slave trading ring in Middlesex County, New Jersey. See our guide to the Van Wickle Slave Trading Ring for more information.
- Identifier
- NJS-EVE-00227
- Source
-
Middlesex County Manumissions and Removals, page 238
-
Removal certificate for Simon (1818-02-11) recorded in Manumissions and Removals Book, p. 238. Middlesex County (N.J.) Records, 1688-1929, Vol. XI (MC 784.1). Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University Libraries.
- Event Description
-
A removal certificate for an adult Black man named Simon (age unspecified) was issued by the Court of Common Pleas of Middlesex County on February 11, 1818, authorizing Simon's move to Pointe Coupee, Louisiana. The certificate was signed by two judges (Jacob Van Wickle and John Outcalt) and recorded by the County Clerk (William P. Deare) three months later on May 20, 1818.
This document is unusual. Removal certificates were typically issued for people who were enslaved because their consent was required before their enslavers could take them away from New Jersey to another state. Simon, however, is listed in the removal certificate as a "Coulored freeman." Simon had been enslaved by General James Morgan of South Amboy, but he obtained a manumission from his enslaver on February 11, 1818. On the same day, then, a removal certificate was issued by the same judges who had signed Simon's manumission certificate. The removal certificate stated that the judges examined Simon and that he "did declare that he was desirous of leaving his present place of residence and go with Colonel Charles Morgan of Point Coupee in the State of Louisiana and there to serve him in the capacity of a servant for the term of two years two months & eighteen days." This removal certificate suggests that Simon would be an indentured servant in Louisiana, serving Charles Morgan, who was the brother of Simon's original enslaver.
This removal certificate is found among the group of documents prepared by Judge Jacob Van Wickle to facilitate the business of his notorious slave trading ring. In 1818, Van Wickle falsified many removal certificates, signing the certificates without the consent of the enslaved people named in the documents, and then putting Black New Jerseyans on ships bound for Louisiana. Charles Morgan and James Morgan were Jacob Van Wickle's brothers-in-law. - Event Type
- Removal Registration
- Keywords
- Removal signed by Judge Jacob Van Wickle
- Removal of free person
- Date
- February 11, 1818
- Date Certainty
- Questionable
- Primary Participants
-
Simon
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00675
Role: Relocated Person
Age category: Adult
Status: Transition
Enslaver(s) of this participant:
- Charles Morgan (1775-1848)
Verbatim description from source:
"Simon a Coulored freeman lately a slave to General James Morgan of South Amboy" - Additional Participants
-
Charles Morgan (1775-1848)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00073
Role: Enslaver
Comment: taking enslaved person to his plantation in LouisianaJacob Van Wickle (1770-1854)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00068
Role: JudgeJohn Outcalt (1770-1853)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00035
Role: JudgeWilliam Philips Deare (d. 1826)
Person identifier: NJS-PER-00008
Role: County Clerk - Record Contributor
- Jesse Bayker