Washington University, St. Louis, MO, reports it has received one of the largest grants in the school’s history to digitize pre-Civil War lawsuits from slaves that sued slave-holders in the Saint Louis Circuit Court.

The grant will require 30 staff members from the library and two years to complete.  The university formally calls the project St. Louis Circuit Court Historical Records Project.  The project will scan some 20,000 pages from various city sources such as city directories and court documents.