An Act to remove pecuniary Impediments to the Manumission of Slaves, and to extend the Benefit of Testimony to free Persons manumitted not according to the Laws of this Island, and to repeal certain Acts and parts of Acts relating thereto.

WHEREAS it is deemed expedient to remove the necessity of depositing any sum of money on the manumission of a Slave in this island, and also to extend the benefit of testimony to such free persons as have been manumitted since the fifth day of February, one thousand eight hundred and seventeen, by deeds not executed in this island.

[Clause 1] Be it therefore enacted by his Excellency Sir Henry Warde, Knight, Commander of the most Honourable Military Order of the Bath, His Majesty’s Captain General and Governor in Chief of this Island, Chancellor, Ordinary and Vice Admiral of the same, the Honourable the Members of His Majesty’s Council, and the General Assembly of this island, and by the authority of the same, that from and after the passing of this Act, all deeds of manumission, executed within this island, shall be proved and recorded in the secretary’s office of this island within ten days after the date of the execution of the same, which shall be effectual to manumit and set free any Slave to whom such deed of manumission is given without the payment of any sum of money into the hands of the churchwarden of any parish in this island, anything in any other Act of this island to the contrary notwithstanding.

[Clause 2] And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that from and after the passing of this Act, the sixth clause of an Act of this island, entitled “An Act for amending an Act of this Island, entitled an Act for the Governing of Negroes, and for providing a proper Maintenance and support for such Negroes, Indians, and Mulattoes as hereafter shall be manumitted or set free, and also for preventing certain Inconveniences from them arising to the inhabitants of this Island,” passed the twenty-seventh day of February, one thousand seven hundred and thirty-nine: And also an Act of this island, entitled “An Act to amend an Act of this Island, entitled an Act for amending an Act of this Island, entitled an Act for the Governing of Negroes, and for providing a proper Maintenance and support for such Negroes, Indians, and Mulattoes as hereafter shall be manumitted or set free, as also for preventing certain Inconveniences from them arising to the inhabitants of this Island,” passed the twenty-second day of January, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three: And also the second clause of another Act of this island, entitled “An Act allowing the Testimony of Free Negroes and Free People of Colour to be taken in all cases,” passed the fifth day of February, one thousand eight hundred and seventeen, shall be and the same are hereby repealed and made null and void.

Read three times and passed the Council unanimously, the seventeenth day of October, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-six.

(Signed)               WM. HUSBANDS, Deputy Clerk of the Council.

Read and passed the General Assembly, this seventeenth day of October, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-six.

(Signed)               JOHN MAYERS, Clerk of the General Assembly.