In June 1855, Stephenton Page Jr. of Wilson County, a slave dealer, conveyed a 19 year-old enslaved woman named Milly in trust to John Norfleet of Edgecombe County for the sole use of Zilla Ann Peel, “free from the control or management of [her husband] Henry W. Peel”.

Page warranted that Milly was “sound in every respect, her eyes excepted which are known by both the parties to be defective, the defect being or supposed to be short or near sightedness.”

The deed was registered in Edgecombe County in March 1859.

Source: Deed book 27, page 856, Edgecombe County Register of Deeds, Tarboro, N.C.
Retrieved from Black Wide-Awake- Lisa Y. Henderson