Links

Georgetown Memory Project (GMP)

Since 2015, Judy has been the lead genealogist in the Georgetown Memory Project, a project to trace the lives and descendants of some 272 slaves sold in 1838 by Georgetown University to plantation owners in South Louisiana. She has worked to locate documents regarding those slaves and to trace their descendants to the present day. The GMP has been featured in:

• The New York Times.com - "272 Slaves Were Sold to Save Georgetown. What Does It Owe Their Descendants?" (4/16/16)
• TheHoya.com - Bayonne-Johnson: "My Goal Was Just to Tell My Story" (4/29/16)
• TheHoya.com - "Crump: It's Been There All Our Lives" (4/29/16)
• WAFB.com - "Sold to Save Georgetown" (5/3/16)
• BRProud.com - "Georgtown University, 272 Slaves Local Connection" (5/4/16)
• TheAdvocate.com: "It's a puzzle': Georgetown University comes to grips with sale of slaves to Louisiana plantations" (5/8/16)
• WWLTV.com - "What about Cornelius?" Local woman learns ancestor was Georgetown slave" (5/11/16)
• The Spokesman-Review.com - "Genealogical society pieces together history of Georgetown University slaves" (5/11/16)
• BlogtalkRadio.com - The Georgetown Memory Project with Judy Riffel and Patricia Bayonne-Johnson (5/19/16)
• The New York Times.com - "A Million Questions' From Descendants of Slaves Sold to Aid Georgetown" (5/20/16)
• WUSA9.com - Descendant of Georgetown University's slave trade era speaks out (5/20/16)
• TheCatholicCommentator.org - Tracking History (5/20/16)
• The Washington Post.com - "Georgetown's priests sold her Catholic ancestors. Then she found out in an unexpected way." (6/17/16)
• TheAdvocate.com - "Louisiana families begin digging into their family history, find they are descendants of slaves sold by Georgetown University"(6/19/16)
• CBS News: Georgetown University confronts its history with slavery (7/11/16)
• The Houma Times.com: "Slave 'reparations' to include Terrebonne, Lafourche kin" (9/6/16)
• Nurturing Our Roots, October 2016 (10/4/16)
• Nurturing Our Roots, January 2017 (1/3/17)
• BlogTalkradio.com - "Georgetown 272 Discovery Journey with Karran Harper Royal & Sandra Green Thomas" (1/5/17)
• The New York Times.com - "A Glimpse Into the Life of a Slave Sold to Save Georgetown" (3/12/17)
• The Charlotte Observer.com - "Her 'Grandpa Frank' was a slave and she'd never seen his face – then her phone rang" (3/23/17)
• The New York Times.com - "Tracing His Roots, Georgetown Employee Learns University Sold His Ancestor" (3/24/17)
• The Houma DailyComet.com - "Slave's photos put face to tragic reality" (3/29/17)
• WBYU.com - Top of Mind with Julie Rose: "The Slaves Who Saved Georgetown University" (4/17/17)
• NPR.org - Planet Money Podcast: Episode 766 Georgetown, Louisiana Part One (4/21/17)
• TheAdvocate.com - "Georgetown project topic for Audubon DAR" (4/18/17)
• WVUE.com - "Fox 8 - "Echoes of Injustice: The image of a slave brings closure to a Terrebonne parish Family" (5/24/17)
• WashingtonPost.com - "Her ancestors were Georgetown's slaves. Now, at age 63, she's enrolled there — as a college freshman" (8/30/17)
• TheAdvocate.com - "63-year-old Georgetown freshman aims to connect families torn apart during slavery through school's Slavery Archive" (9/3/17)
• APM Reports - "Shackled Legacy" (9/4/17)
• TheHoya.com - "179 Years Later, Descendants of Slaves Seek Future at Georgetown" (9/15/17)
• WBRZ.com - "Local woman hopes to inspire others with ancestry research " (2/4/18)
• CBC News.com - "Students of history" (4/7/18)
• WashingtonPost.com - "They thought Georgetown University's missing slaves were 'lost.' The truth was closer to home than anyone knew." (4/28/18)

The GMP is an independent group founded by friends, allies, and alumni of Georgetown University. Their mission is to:

• Identify the people sold in 1838
• Locate their living descendants
• Acknowledge them as members of the Georgetown family
• Honor their sacrifice and legacy

For more information or to join, email them at joinGMP@gmail.com.

"The Lost Jesuit Slaves of Maryland, Searching for 91 people left behind in 1838." - 62 page PDF of article
- Research-Memo-2019-Update.pdf
- Research-Memo-2023-Update.pdf

To access the Georgetown Memory Project's GU272 Ancestors and Descendants databases, visit American Ancestors' GU272 Memory Project's website. You must first create a free account.

Publications

Jean Baptiste Legrand: His French Origins, Louisiana Descendants, and Relatives Around the World
by Judy Riffel
Paperback, 106 pages
ISBN 9781329554047
This is the story of Judy's maternal ancestor, Jean Baptiste Legrand. A native of a small town in northern France called Festubert, he came to Louisiana in 1848 and settled among the Cajuns of South Louisiana. Her book explores his French ancestry, collateral relatives, and descendants in Louisiana. The book also includes numerous historical and family photographs, an appendix on the Usé family, and a full-name index.

Buy now at Lulu.com

Other Books by Judy Riffel

For a list of genealogical books written or edited by Judy Riffel, see the list of publications on the website of Le Comité des Archives de la Louisiane at www.lecomite.org/publications.html