In their efforts to trace the descendants of enslaved people connected to Harvard, researchers with American Ancestors first had to tackle a surprisingly difficult question: Who were the University’s pre-Civil War leaders, faculty, and staff?

Now, a once-scattered record is steadily coming into focus.

The work started soon after the University accepted the recommendation of the Presidential Committee on Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery to identify, engage, and support direct descendants of slavery. In their report, released in 2022, the committee identified several Harvard leaders, faculty, and staff who enslaved people. Among them were philanthropist Benjamin Bussey, who built his wealth through the trans-Atlantic trade of products produced by enslaved people and later donated his estate to Harvard College, and steward Andrew Bordman, who owned and relied on eight enslaved people to feed Harvard students and complete his job duties.

Efforts to identify pre-Civil War leaders, faculty, and staff have been underway since 2023, in parallel with research to identify direct descendants of enslaved individuals. Researchers with the Harvard Slavery Remembrance Program led this aspect of the work, while American Ancestors advanced the direct descendant research. In January, American Ancestors also took the lead on the research to identify Harvard officials.  

“At first glance, it seems like a straightforward task to ‘identify leadership, faculty, and staff,’” said Lindsay Fulton, chief research officer at American Ancestors. “But that’s a modern perspective that’s shaped by access to yearbooks, alumni directories, and carefully maintained records. Those tools didn’t always exist, so our researchers had to get creative in locating where, and how, these names were documented. In our experience, this work takes time to do well.”

“Those tools didn’t always exist, so our researchers had to get creative in locating where, and how, these names were documented. In our experience, this work takes time to do well.”

Lindsay Fulton

For well over 200 years — from Harvard’s founding in 1636 to the end of the Civil War in 1865 — the University existed when slavery was legal in at least parts of the U.S. Even after 1783, when slavery was effectively banned in Massachusetts, leaders, faculty, and staff could still come into ownership of enslaved people, often referred to as servants, through relatives or have businesses that were closely tied to the labor of enslaved people.

While positions like the University’s president and treasurer are easy to trace through hundreds of years of history, others are not.

“The University doesn’t have its own compiled digital staff directory before the modern era,” said Gabriel Raeburn, senior research project manager at American Ancestors. “The first step, even for finding enslaved people, was to go through thousands and thousands of pages of dense archival records in 17th- and 18th-century cursive to work out who the people are who worked at the University.”

To identify leaders, faculty, and staff, researchers continue to comb through handwritten notes from University meetings, as well as stewards’ books, faculty records, colonial and state legislative charters, church rosters, city archives, and a variety of other sources to recreate a roster from the ground up. Through this work, researchers at the Harvard Slavery Remembrance Program and American Ancestors have verified more than 3,000 members of leadership, faculty, and staff from this period.

A foundation for deeper knowledge

Figuring out who worked at pre-Civil War Harvard often begins with fragments of information: a brief mention in centuries-old meeting notes, a class registry. For Harvard’s early history, identifying the makeup of the leadership, staff, and faculty requires a deep understanding of the University’s connections to colonial and local church leadership and knowing where to look. Unearthing this information leverages proven genealogical methodologies which the researchers at American Ancestors are skilled at applying.

For example, for two centuries, certain members of the colonial government and ministers of local towns and cities were automatically granted positions on Harvard’s Board of Overseers. Therefore, researchers looked to legislative acts and Harvard’s colonial charters to see which roles were automatically granted leadership positions — like the Congregational ministers of Boston, Cambridge, Charlestown, Watertown, Dorchester, and Roxbury — and are using church documents to determine which individuals were on Harvard’s board.

These contextual methods are particularly important to try to bridge gaps in Harvard’s own archives. One such gap owes to a 1764 fire that destroyed much of the University’s collections.

Additionally, for those without extensive experience in records-based genealogy, the records that the University has in its possession can be difficult to decode. Most are written in script of variable clarity and consistency.

Researchers must also know where to look. For example, in earlier years of the University’s existence, it was during Harvard Corporation meetings that leaders appointed paid staff members — often current or recently graduated students. In most cases, notetakers did not list the new staff members by full name. Instead, most are referred to by last name, and in cases where there are multiple students at Harvard with that same name, by a mark of seniority. Someone with the last name Smith who was appointed as head cook, for example, might be referred to as Smith Jr.

Genealogists at American Ancestors now have a system for categorizing people with the same last name. For certain periods of University history, figuring out which Smith was appointed for a new position means going through records and establishing which Smith was the youngest at the time. In other periods, whether a person was referred to as senior, junior, III, or IV depended on their relative social standing. Both require researchers to peruse contemporary records and identify the proper Smith. At times, distinguishing between family members requires researchers to search through birth and death records held both in Massachusetts and across the country.

Understanding who worked at the University allows researchers to then explore whether these individuals owned enslaved people. It also gives researchers a bird’s-eye view of the interconnected names, families, and communities that shaped Harvard.

“These individuals did not operate in isolation,” said Fulton. “They studied together, taught together, published together, worshipped together, and often their children married one another. Understanding this complex, living network makes our conclusions more comprehensive, more accurate, and more reflective of the institution’s true historical landscape.”

“Understanding this complex, living network makes our conclusions more comprehensive, more accurate, and more reflective of the institution’s true historical landscape.”

Lindsay Fulton

During the period being studied by researchers, the size of the University — both students and staff — increased greatly. Harvard’s first graduating class, in 1642, included just nine students. Throughout the 17th century, there were five years in which no students graduated at all. Precise documentation of staff and faculty was sometimes hard to come by. Over time, the number of Harvard faculty, staff, and students grew and documentation improved. In 1860, Harvard awarded more than 200 degrees across the College, Medical School, and Law School.

As the University expanded, the number of individuals to sort through increased, but documents produced during these times help simplify the process. For instance, entries in the Massachusetts Register, published annually by the state beginning in 1767, recorded each new appointment to the University. Researchers can use the list and verify it with primary sources.

‘Marathon of research’

This work to establish a robust list of Harvard leaders, faculty, and staff is enabling American Ancestors not only to more accurately identify individuals who enslaved people, but also to begin uncovering the names of those who were enslaved — and, ultimately, to trace their living descendants.

The researchers emphasize that the different components of this work continue simultaneously. In addition to identifying former University leaders, faculty, and staff, researchers contributing to the Harvard Slavery Remembrance Program are working to identify those who were enslaved and their living descendants. To date, 964 formerly enslaved people and 591 living descendants of these individuals have been identified.

The meticulous nature of records-based genealogy is slow, and the scope can be hard to predict. On TV shows like “Finding Your Roots,” hosted by Alphonse Fletcher University Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., guests learn about their genealogy in a single episode. In reality, the genealogical work behind each episode of “Finding Your Roots,” which is fact-checked at American Ancestors and focuses on a single person, takes about six months.

“Genealogical research is painstaking work — poring over centuries-old records, tracing forgotten names, and piecing together histories that have often been lost or obscured,” said Gates. “It demands not just patience and rigor, but a passion for discovery. That’s why American Ancestors is the perfect organization to do this work for Harvard. Their deep expertise, meticulous attention to detail, and unwavering commitment to uncovering the stories of our past make them uniquely qualified to take on this vital work.”

“Genealogical research is painstaking work — poring over centuries-old records, tracing forgotten names, and piecing together histories that have often been lost or obscured.”

Henry Louis Gates Jr.

The identification of a clear list of pre-Civil War leaders, faculty, and staff, according to American Ancestors researchers, will lead to a much fuller picture of the University’s ties to slavery — and create a useful foundation for future research and engagement with living direct descendants. Fulton said that the 3,000 individuals they’ve identified as leaders, faculty, and staff far exceeded their initial estimate and gave the group a more accurate — and expansive — view of their work.

“Getting this right is critical — it’s the starting line for what will be a marathon of research,” Fulton said. “And in a marathon, you don’t want to head off in the wrong direction and realize halfway through that you need to double back.”