Manuscript document. Jacksonville, Illinois, 7 December 1840. 2 pages, folio, 7 1/2 x 12 3/8 in. Docketed to verso.

A rare and fascinating document recording the indenture of an orphaned Black adolescent in Illinois to medical doctor, Owen M. Long (1809-1882), who would serve in the Union Army and later as consul to Panama during the Grant Administration. 

The document records that James A. Graves and Horatio G. Reid, Justices of the Peace "place and bind out, Isabella alias Kitt a Negro Girl aged about twelve years, who has neither parents or Guardians residing in this state, as a servant to" Owen M. Long, to be instructed in the arts and mysteries of housekeeping, to live with and serve him as a servant for the term of six years from the date hereof, that is to say, untill she, the said servant shall arrive to and be of the age of Eighteen years, which the said party of the first part are informed and believe, will be in the first day of January in the year of our Lord one thousand Eight hundred and forty seven."

It was stipulated that Long was required "to teach and instruct the said Isabella alias Kitt as his servant, or otherwise; to cause her to be taught to read and to be well and sufficiently instructed in the art and mystery of house keeping, after the best way and manner he can; and also to train her to habits of obedience, industry and morality and provide for and allow her meat, drink, washing, lodging and apparel for summer and winter, and all other necessaries proper for such a servant, during the term of her service as aforesaid, and at the expiration of said term, will give unto the said servant two new suits of Clothes suitable to her condition, also a Bible."
 

Illinois has a complicated history with slavery and indentured servitude, existing for much of its antebellum existence as a quasi-slave state. Beginning as a French colony, slavery was introduced to the territory, and French "Code Noir" laws were adopted. The 1787 Northwest Ordinance stated that there would be neither slavery nor indentured or involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime, but the institution remained contentious. Even after statehood in 1818, loopholes were codified into law, often redressing enslavement with the formalities of indentured contracts, often for time periods measured in decades, some even exceeding 99 years. This was particularly relevant to the southern area of the state, flanked by slave states Kentucky and Missouri. 

In June 1827, the Illinois General Assembly passed "An Act Concerning Minors, Orphans, and Guardians" that empowered probate courts to appoint guardians for orphans under the age of 14. Although a minor and an orphan, it is clear that young Kitt was given no agency and was thus bound to the Smedleys for over a decade, until he was 21 in 1843.  

Owen Long (1809-1832) was a Kentucky-born physician who moved to Jacksonville, Illinois in about 1840. During the War, he enlisted in the Union Army and served st the surgeon of the 11th Illinois Infantry, as the medical director for General Grant's Corps at Cairo, and Director of the Overton General Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. After returning to his medical practice for a brief time, President Grant appointed him as consul to Panama.

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