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4pp., 3 x 8” (docketing panel), expanding to 12 x 15.5”, signed by the land owners, Daniel and Peggy Sullivan (who were Boyd’s daughter and son-in-law), by the county clerk and registrar, and several witnesses, including John Boyd’s son, James - York’s “owner”, who freed the slave immediately after his father’s death in July 1822.

In 1820, John Boyd owned 16 slaves, ten of whom were under the age of 14. There were also three young women and three young men – one of whom, apparently, was the fortunate “York”, Boyd's “man servant”, whom he "bequeathed" to his son until he could be “liberated according to law”.

Documents of land-holding by freed Southern slaves in the early decades of the 18^th century are far more rare than certificates of emancipation.