A database featuring the names of thousands of Bermudian slaves will be posted on the internet this summer.

Bermuda Slave Registers logged in the early 1800s — kept in storage for two centuries — are being published to mark the bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade in Britain and its colonies.

It means people will be able to research their families’ past by accessing the names of slaves, their sex, colour, age, country of birth and how they were employed.

The move, by heritage website Ancestry.co.uk, comes as Bermudian historians reveal a similar project will be at Bermuda Maritime Museum later this year.

Local researchers are currently compiling a comprehensively indexed, microfilmed account of Bermuda’s slaves based on the Island’s copies of the slave registers.

The documents were made compulsory after the Slave Trade Act made the slave trade illegal in 1807. They were intended to monitor plantation owners and other masters to ensure they did not buy new slaves.

It is believed the Island’s first volume was completed in 1821, with updated versions following in 1827, 1830-31 and 1834, the year of emancipation.

Ancestry.co.uk is to publish details on three million slaves in Britain’s colonies throughout the course of this year. An archive providing details of nearly 100,000 slaves in Barbados has already gone on the website.

Website spokesman Simon Ziviani said Bermuda’s would hopefully be up by September.

“It’s an amazing collection — so complete and comprehensive,” said Mr. Ziviani. “And the subject matter is very timely with the bicentenary taking place this year.

“The British Government was trying to stamp out the slave trade, so some Islands withheld information from their records. But Bermuda was pretty good in terms of returning of its registers. There was more consistency than on some of the Islands, which makes the record more comprehensive. It shows who was working where and at what time.”Ancestry.co.uk’s entire collection has been drawn from about 700 registers taken from 23 British territories and dependencies.

Each colony kept its own registers, while copies were also submitted to the UK’s Office for the Registry of Colonial Slaves. After the office was disbanded, an estimated 200,000 pages of names were placed in the National Archives in London.

Bermudian researcher LeYoni Junos is the driving force behind the Island’s project.

Ms Junos said she found it impossible to find information quickly while studying the slave registers because they were essentially a huge list of names with no index.

She began a mammoth project to index them clearly around three years ago and hopes that, with the help of museum staff, it will be finished by the end of this year.

Ms Jones said: “There’s lots of interest in this. Most people that I mention this to get very excited. I really think it’s going to be very valuable to the community in healing race relations.

“It’s a period that’s part of the evolution of Bermuda. This will dispose some myths and create some truths. A lot of what we believe stems from those myths, but they can be dispelled when the actual text is put before you.”

While carrying out the project, Ms Junos said she has discovered some fascinating details about her own ancestors. Previously, she had known little about her great great great great grandfather Thomas Bassett other than he was a slave who worked as a corker, sealing the seams of boats.

Through the archives, she learned Mr. Bassett’s owner Amy Lowe had decided to free him because he had been “true and faithful” and then made efforts to ensure he was never re-enslaved. After winning his freedom, Mr. Bassett married a slave, Elizabeth Dill, before he died in 1865.

“It’s a very good feeling to find out something like that about your past,” she said.

The Royal Gazette has been marking the bicentenary of the Slave Trade Act with its Break The Chains campaign, which highlights the plight of at least 12 million modern day slaves. We have been calling for world leaders to take action to end all forms of human captivity, including human trafficking, child labour, bonded labour and forced marriage.

To sign Anti-Slavery International’s on-line petition, visit www.antislavery.org/2007/actionsign and fill in your details.

To comment on the campaign, call 278-8359 or email tsmithroyalgazette.bm

Special slave records to be posted on the Internet