When this project was begun in 2001, published information giving names of slaveholders was not readily available, and lists of the number of slaves they held were virtually non-existent. As pointed out in the updates section below, some slaveholder name index books may now be available in larger research libraries, and an 1860 slaveholder index with information on individual slave age, gender and race is now available on line to subscribers at Ancestry.com. However, it is still possible to locate an ancestor on the free U.S. census for 1860 or earlier and not realize that ancestor was also listed as a slaveholder on the slave schedules. The last U.S.census slave schedules were enumerated by County in 1860 and included 393,975 named persons holding 3,950,546 unnamed slaves, or an average of about ten slaves per holder. The actual number of slaveholders may be slightly lower because some large holders held slaves in more than one County and would have been counted in each County. Excluding slaves, the 1860 U.S. population was 27,167,529, with about 1 in 70 being a slaveholder. It is estimated by this transcriber that in 1860, slaveholders of 200 or more slaves, while constituting less than 1 % of the total number of U.S. slaveholders, or 1 out of 7,000 free persons, held 20-30% of the total number of slaves in the U.S. The transcribing of slaveholder names beginning with these largest holders, and publishing the names for free on the Internet, results in identifying the holders of the most slaves with the least amount of transcription work.
PUBLISHER:
LARGE SLAVEHOLDERS OF 1860REQUIRES MEMBERSHIP:
NoCLICK ICON TO EXPLORE IN SPATIAL.IO 
LINK TO SOURCE:
https://freepages.rootsweb.com/~ajac/genealogy/