The court orders that preceded the actual apprentice bonds may be found in the minutes of the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions. In cases where the apprentice bonds no longer exist, the court order can be the only reference to children being bound as apprentices. These minutes have a major gap from the September 1740 Court Term to the June 1751 Court Term, several minor gaps of six months to a year, and then gaps between the January 1794 and April 1798 Terms and the July 1834 and July 1841 Terms. All court orders through the January Term of 1843 are currently included. In cases where there is both a court order and an apprentice bond, you will see that the bond may have been executed at a date after the court order.

The columns in the extract of apprentice bonds and court minutes should be self-explanatory. The date of the bond or the court term is followed by the name of the master and then the name of the apprentice(s). Next are the trade the master is to teach the apprentice(s), the term of service (if listed) and the source of the record, bond or court. Sometimes an apprentice's parent or parents and/or ages were listed. These are listed in addition to the apprentice's name in the apprentice column. The term of service can also be used in determining age, based on the fact that service was terminated at the age of 21 except for white females, whose term of service was 18 years.

North Carolina law provided for binding out as apprentices all free base born children, all children under age whose fathers have deserted their families and have been absent for one year, all orphans whose estates are so small that they will not cover their education and maintenance, and where application is made to the wardens of the poor. It also provided for apprenticeship of all free base born children of color and all the children of free negroes and mulattoes where the parents of such children are not gainfully employed. In fact, during the last 30 years before the Civil War, the children of free persons of color were apprenticed en masse.

Keeping in mind that all free base born children were bound as apprentices around age seven and that bastardy bonds do not normally list a child's name, apprentice bonds can be used in conjunction with bastardy records to ascertain a child's name. For example, my gggrandfather, George Merritt, was the base born son of Joseph Gibson and Keziah Merritt. This was established through bastardy bonds and wills. I also noted in bastardy bonds that Keziah's sister had two base born children, but had never been able to determine their names. It is possible to do that through apprentice bonds. Besides George Merritt, Jeremiah and Asa Merritt appear in apprentice bonds at approximately seven years after bastardy bonds identifying their mother.

These extracts are the result of one pass through the actual bonds. Court minutes are currently being extracted and added on a periodic basis, so check back from time to time if you do not find what you are seeking.