DHHRM – Enslaved Frontier: Women and the Institution of Slavery in Texas

The history of women in Texas – particularly during the antebellum and Civil War years – remains limited and often overlooked. Women’s involvement in the institution of slavery, both as enslavers and as the enslaved, may shed some more light on their lives on the frontier. Under Texas law, free women could buy, sell, lease, and contract enslaved men, women, and children, as well as inherit and bequeath them. Using original records from courthouses across the state, Deborah Liles, Ph.D., joins us to offer a closer look at the history of slavery in Texas and the women who, whether by choice or circumstance, participated in its legacy.