African-American Research
in Greenbrier County, West Virginia

Data On-Line - Greenbrier County VA/WV

• Slaves in Probate Records/Wills
• Slave Owners
• Birth Records
• Death Records
• Marriage Records
• Census/Tax Lists
• Free Inhabitants
• Emancipations
• Court Records
  • THOMAS MATHEWS v. JOSHUA WADE, et ux, 1868
• Military Records
• Occupations of Early Greenbrier Black Residents
• Graduates of Bolling High School 1936 - 1946
• Famous Greenbrier County African-American Residents
  • Edward A. BOLLING
  • Dick POINTER
  • James P. D. GARDNER (Lawyer)
  • Richard H. CAIN
    • Political Graveyard Bio
    • Congressional biography
• JOHN WESLEY UNITED METHODIST CHURCH - PASTORS

• A History of Brushy Ridge (Colored) by Frank U.G. Peck
• Deaths at the West Virginia Colored Tuberculosis Sanitarium at Denmar
  from "West Virginia History". (Mentions Greenbrier Co. residents.)
• African-American Population of Present-day West Virginia Counties in 1860
• Undated Will of Elizabeth STUART
• The Old Lewisburg Academy
  (from Greenbrier Independent, 7/20/1882) mentions Caesar Messenbourg, "an old colored minister"
• December 10, 1931: The State Upholds Its Anti-Lynching Law

• http://www.wvculture.org/history/blacks.html -- History of African Americans in West Virginia
• http://www.wvculture.org/history/civwaran.html -- "Researching Your Civil War Ancestor"
  - states that the 45th US Colored Infantry was the one Black regiment assigned to W.Va.
• http://www.wvculture.org/history/medals.html -- Unclaimed Union Civil War medals.
• http://www.wvculture.org/history/timeline.html -- "A Timeline of African-American History in West Virginia"

• BLACK RESIDENTS OF GREENBRIER AND MONROE COUNTIES, WEST VIRGINIA
  - from settlement to 1920 (compiled by Carol L. Haynes). Inquiries can be directed to Carol L. Haynes at chaynes704@aol.com.
• Visit the main Look-Up Volunteer page for more resources.

• Slavery in West Virginia, by John Edmond Stealey, ( ).
• The Negro in Greenbrier County, West Virginia, a Social, Economic, and Educational Study by Earl C. Clay. (M.Ed., Virginia State University, 1946)
• INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF THE COLONY AND ANCIENT DOMINION OF VIRGINIA, APPENDIX Southern literary messenger, devoted to every department of literature and the fine arts. Volume 14, Issue 1 pp. 17-26 Richmond, Virginia; Publisher, T. W. White [etc.]
• Deitz, J. Dennis. The Greenbrier Ghost and Other Strange Stories. South Charleston, West Virginia, Mountain Memories Books, 1990.
• Posey, Thomas. The Negro Citizen of West Virginia. Institute: Press of West Virginia State College, 1934.