Edward H. Nabb Research Center for Delmarva History & Culture Enduring Connections: Exploring Delmarva's Black History

Record Detail

Record #22 from Free Black Families of Colonial Delmarva (abstracted by Paul Heinegg)

State Maryland
County (Primary) Talbot
Other Counties Somerset
Family Name Coursey, Kersey
Family History Notes Mary Kersey, born say 1720, the servant of Nicholas Glen, was fined by the Talbot County court in August 1742 for having an illegitimate child. She was called "Mary Kerse Mulatto" in Glen's account that he recorded in court in November 1744 in a case he brought against her for running away for eighty days and bearing two children in his house. In June 1745 she received corporal punishment for having another illegitimate child [Judgment Record 1742-3, 289-90, 301; 1744-5, 109; 1745-6, 134]. She was the mother of i. Nero, born in February 1741/2. ii. ?James1 Carse, head of a Talbot County household of 13 "other free" in 1790. iii. Jane, born about March 1745, three months old when she was bound to Nicholas Glen/ Glynn until the age of eighteen. Endnote: 1. There was a Charles Coursey who was an Indian living in Somerset County, Maryland, when he owed 13 shillings to the estate of Mathias Gale in 1731 and 2 pounds, 3 shillings to the estate of Levin Gale in 1743 [Prerogative Inventories 77 (1762): 121, 158], but there were no non-white Courseys mentioned in the records of Sussex County, Delaware or Somerset and Worcester counties until the 1820 census.
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[Author (if known)], Free Black Families of Colonial Delmarva (abstracted by Paul Heinegg), [Date (if known)], Enduring Connections: Exploring Delmarva’s Black History, Nabb Research Center, Salisbury University.

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