Cape Town Slave Lists 1816 - 1838 Register Database (F - J)  Arranged alphabetically by slave owner surname

This database includes records of Cape Town slave registrations mandated by the British starting in 1816. On December 1, 1834, the British abolished slavery at the Cape, but implemented a four-year "apprenticeship" period that preserved slave owners' access to unpaid labor. This abolition triggered a compensation process for slave owners, who sought reimbursement for their "assets"—the slaves. However, the evaluation process was fundamentally flawed, as the appraisers were also slave owners, leading to a corrupt system of devaluation of certain high priced categories of slaves, and inflating the worth of lower categories of forced labour. This corruption, combined with considerable fees for collecting settlement amounts (which could only be obtained in Britain), severely impacted the Cape Colony's credit network, a system intrinsically reliant on slaves as financial assets, and further discontented the already disgruntled slave owners. The emancipation of slaves constituted a pivotal factor in the genesis of the Groot Trek, beginning in the Cape Colony in 1835.

Slave records - South African National Archives

Archive copying by Lara Seaward