October 20, 1829-Dated Partially-Printed Tax Receipt Issued to Thomas G. Gooch for his 1828 Revenue Tax and County Levy, Itemizing 136 Acres of Land, Five Horses, and Seven Enslaved Black Individuals as Taxable Property, Signed by Thomas S. Slaughter, Choice Extremely Fine.
This Slave related Tax Receipt, measures 7 x 2 inches, completed in bold brown ink manuscript and signed by Thomas S. Slaughter, dated October 20, 1829. It acknowledging receipt of sixty two dollars and sixty two cents from Thomas G. Gooch, paid "in full for his revenue tax and county levy" for the year 1828. This receipt itemizes what that tax was assessed against, 136 acres of land, five levies, seven enslaved individuals listed simply as "Blacks," and five horses, with this entire taxable estate valued at $2,519. Tax receipts like this one lay bare how thoroughly slavery was woven into the ordinary financial and administrative machinery of the antebellum South, with human beings assessed for taxation in this same line as acreage and livestock.
This Tax receipt offers a stark, unembellished record of one household's taxable holdings on the eve of the 1830s, a decade that would see slavery become an ever more central and contested issue in American life.

Reads: "Received of Mr. Tho. G. Gooch six dollars, sixty two cents, in full for his revenue tax and county levy on 136 acres of land, five levies, 7 blacks, five horses, valued at $2519, for the year 1828, this 20th day of Oct 1829.

PLEASE NOTE: This document is offered strictly as a historical artifact.
[Antebellum Period, Virginia, 19th Century America] [Slavery and Abolition, Taxation, Local History] [Manuscripts, Documents, Tax Records]