In March 1807, the United States Congress adopted a law forbidding the importation of enslaved people into the United States, effective from 1 January 1808. The domestic slave trade eventually displaced nearly a million people from the Upper South to the Lower South, and New Orleans became the largest slave market in the nation. Enslaved people were exported from Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri and the District of Columbia. In Virginia, the largest supplier, slave breeding became a very lucrative business (Johnson, 1999; Sublette and Sublette, 2016). After the Louisiana Purchase, labels such as nègre américain (American Negro) and négresse américaine (American Negress) became common on German Coast plantation inventories and referred to those who came from the East Coast of the United States. Some were identified by the state or city of origin, such as nègre de Virginie (Virginia Negro) or nègre de Baltimore (Baltimore Negro). Enslaved people born in Louisiana were invariably called 'Creoles' and those of Afro-Indian descent were called 'griffes'.  
Documenting slavery on the German Coast is a relatively easy task. Under the French Code noir (Black Code), the baptism of enslaved people was mandatory and deaths were recorded in the sacramental registers of the Catholic Church. This tradition was retained under Spanish rule (1769-1803) and after the Louisiana Purchase. However, the primary sources used for the study of the Haydel plantation are mostly courthouse records. These are located in different parishes on the German Coast, the Louisiana State Archives in Baton Rouge, the New Orleans Public Library and the Notarial Archives of Orleans Parish. Throughout the antebellum period, the documents were written mostly in French. Although documents were produced in Spanish and English, French remained the principal language used for official documents before the American