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The Preservation of the History of African Slaves

In Somerset County, New Jersey

"A lot of people do not know that the slaves in New Jersey were not free until 1866, six months after the ones in Galveston, Texas". Bernice Jalloh, Somerset County Surrogate.

Somerset County received a grant to preserve and digitize the stories of former enslaved people in the county's "inventory of assets" books.

The old pages of these inventory books list everything people owned in Somerset County from the past century and a half.

But go through each fragile sheet line by line, you'll find nuggets of hidden history.

"What I didn't know and I think a lot of other people were naive about it is that the inventories kept in our office had a list of all the slaves," said Bernice Jalloh, Somerset County Surrogate.

Mrs. Jalloh wants their stories to be preserved and told, and soon they will be thanks to a new grant from the New Jersey Council of Humanities. She has been following a paper trail of hundreds of slaves, hoping to make their stories available online.

She says so often, African Americans have been unable to trace their histories since records of Blacks weren't systematically kept.

As the first African American woman to be Surrogate in Somerset County, bringing these records to light is personal for Jalloh.

"Our stories are not always told the way they should be told and told by us," she said.

PRESENTER:

Bernice Jalloh, Esq. was sworn in as the Somerset County Surrogate on January 1, 2021. She is admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court of New Jersey and the New Jersey Bar. She received a Juris Doctor from Rutgers University, a Masters degree in Public Administration from Rutgers University, and a Bachelor of Science from Syracuse University.

Mrs. Jalloh serves on the Board of Directors of Egen of Early Childhood Learning Center and the Civic Knights. She is also a member of the National Council of Negro Women, the Association of Black Woman Lawyers, the New Jersey Muslim Lawyers Association, the New Jersey Muslim Voters Project,,she is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated and served on the Somerset County Complete Count Committee. Mrs. Jalloh has received the following awards: The 2019 Legal Services of New Jersey Equal Justice Award, the 2019 Outstanding Woman in Somerset County, the 2019 Family Unification Day Hero - Legal Services of New Jersey, 2018, New Jersey Judiciary Recognition Award, the 2018 National Council of Negro Woman New Jersey Recognition Award for Outstanding Woman in Industry, the 2018 Plainfield NJ NAACP Award, 2017 Eleanor Roosevelt Award, 2017 Lawyers of Distinction Award, the 2018 Certificate of Recognition for Pro Bono Service from the New Jersey Judiciary, and the Union County Woman of Excellence Award.

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