Census of African Americans at Philadelphia Alms House, Blockley

In 1847, Philadelphia Quakers conducted a census of the city’s African American population. Their intent was to document the existence of an “industrious and thriving” portion of that population, and also to discover what sectors of the community may have been in need of attention and assistance. The manuscript volumes they produced contained forty-three elements of information for each of more than four thousand households in Philadelphia. Their survey was distilled into a forty-four-page report titled "A Statistical Inquiry into the Condition of the People of Colour of the City and Districts of Philadelphia" (1849). This volume contains the raw data gathered from the Philadelphia Alms House, separated by gender and ordered by last name. It also includes a table giving the average weekly number of African Americans admitted to the Alms House in each month of 1845 and 1846.