Resources for studying African-American Heritage at the CT State Library

For additional materials, please check our Library Catalog. Also look in the Manuscripts and Archives Catalog under the subject heading "Crandall, Prudence" and in the Biography Vertical File in the History and Genealogy Reading Room.

• Connecticut. Supreme Court of Errors. Report of the Arguments of Counsel...Boston, Garrison & Knapp, 1834 [CSL call number Cage K540 M5 v. 3]
• Fuller, Edmund. Prudence Crandall; An Incident of Racism in Nineteenth-Century Connecticut. Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1971 [CSL call number LC 2802 .C8 F8].
• Williams, Donald E., Jr. Prudence Crandall's Legacy: The Fight for Equality in the 1830s, Dred Scott and Brown vs. Board of Education. Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 2014. [CSL call number LA 2317. C73 W55 2014].

Documents relating to the passage of an addition to "An Act for the Admission and Settlement of Inhabitants in Towns" are found in the State Archives. See:

Record Group 002, Records of the General Assembly, Boxes, 17-18, General Assembly Papers, 1833. Includes petition from the town of Canterbury, April 9, 1833, signed by 131 residents; petition from the town of Canterbury presented "By Their Agents"; 145 printed petitions from Connecticut communities, April 8, 1833; Senate Resolution, May Session, 1833, appointing Philip Pearl to head a committee to consider changes to "An act for the admission and settlement of inhabitants in towns;" report of Philip Pearl's committee; and "An act in addition to an act entitled an act for the admission and settlement of inhabitants in towns."

Court records pertaining to the Prudence Crandall case are also found in State Archives:

Record Group 003, Windham County, County Court, Files, Box 498, March 1833-December 1833, Bundle August Term, 1833. Includes complaint against Prudence Crandall, June 26, 1833; warrant of arrest on Prudence Crandall, June 26, 1833; Sheriff's arrest, June 27, 1833; expenses. [Note: these items appear to be copies of the documents served on Prudence Crandall. What may be the original writ binding Prudence Crandall over to the Superior Court, September 26, 1833, is in the manuscript collection, Main Vault 920 C85w.] Also includes summons of witnesses, August 16 and August 22, 1833; warrant of arrest on Amelia E. Wilder, August 22, 1833; and bill of costs, state v. Prudence Crandall, August term, 1833.

Record Group 003, Windham County, County Court, Records Vol. XXIX

p. 280. State v. Prudence Crandall, continued to County Court of December 1833.

p. 299. Case continued to March 1834 term.

p. 315. Case continued to August 1834 term.

p. 304. State v. Frederick Olney, March 1834.

Record Group 003, Windham County, Superior Court,  Files, Box 210, Bundle October Term, 1833. Includes complaint against Prudence Crandall, September 25, 1833; warrant of arrest on Prudence Crandall, September 25, 1833; sheriff's arrest, September 26, 1833; Justice Court, Canterbury, September 26, 1833; summons of witnesses, September 25, 1833; summons of witnesses, October 1, 1833.

Record Group 003, Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors Files, Box 34, Windham County, 1820-1843, Bundle July term, 1834. Includes Judge David Daggett's account of the October 1833 Superior Court trial, including the jury's verdict, the State's opinions, and Prudence Crandall's appeal to the Supreme Court of Errors.