Historic vocabulary: Manumit

Manumit: To release from slavery

www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/manumit

Slavery in Missouri, 1804-1865, page 90s

http://archive.org/stream/slaveryinmissour00trex#page/100/mode/2up

The old slave masters without exception declare that the system was patriarchal in Missouri and that the bond between the owner and the owned was very close. The small number of slaves held by the vast majority of the masters was one reason for this condition. When the young Virginian or Kentuckian and his negroes emigrated to far off Missouri, they suffered in common the pangs of parting and together went to develop the virgin soil amid common dangers and common hardships. Thus there undoubtedly grew up an attachment that the older communities had long since outgrown.