Smithsonian’s Freedmen’s Bureau Records Now Searchable and Available OnLine

The Smithsonian’s Freedmen’s Bureau Records are now searchable for free online. Smithsonian has been using volunteers for years transcribing documents from the Freedmen’s Bureau so that they are now searchable and recoverable by anyone with access to a computer. Here is all you need to do to search the records.

First follow this link to the Smithsonian’s transcription search page. On the page you will see two boxes. On the left is a box for the search term. This is fairly standard territory for anyone who googles every day. If you are looking for a name or a specific combination of words, a quote, or an organization, put the phrase in quotes. Otherwise just type in the word you want to look up.

On the right side is a box with a drop-down menu. Click on “Freedmen’s Bureau.” Here is a screen shot showing how it looks on my computer.

Here is a screenshot of what the search results looked like for the term “Charlotte.”

For this particular search I got 6,768 “pages found,” click on the thumbnail you want to look at and you will get something like this:

You get the actual document on the left and the transcription and notes on the right. You can zoom in or zoom out, as well as rotate the document.

I hope that this encourages you to check out this great new resource. Most of the transcriptions appear to have been done during the Pandemic, so having people stuck inside for many months may have encouraged volunteers to take on this project! Thanks to everyone who has participated in putting this together and thanks most of all to the volunteers.

Note: The transcriptions process is still underway and I expect many more documents will enter the searchable database. In my own searches, I found a number of documents that were posted in September of 2022. I also saw an interview with one of the transcribers published last week after she completed an internship with the project, so I know this database will only get better. It is free to use.

If you are interested in volunteering, follow this link.

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