Actor Michael K. Williams traces his ancestry back to the period of Reconstruction, discovering that his great-great-grandfather William Murrell was living in the South during this period of time. 

The end of the Civil War brought about the freedom of nearly four million slaves and ushered in the Reconstruction era. Reconstruction sought to remedy the inequities of slavery while readmitting the Southern states back into the union. The Reconstruction Amendments (13th – 15th Amendments) were important steps in that process and helped to usher in a “second founding” of the nation based on freedom, birthright citizenship and equal protection under the law, as well as voting rights. 

Although Reconstruction offered a glimmer of hope, its promise was ultimately not fulfilled. It was succeeded by a backlash that sought to restrict the freedom of African Americans in the South, including suppressing the African American vote. Many African Americans were also consigned to working as sharecroppers, often in the same fields that they had worked as slaves, owning little and thwarted in building or passing on wealth to their descendants. 

William Murrell was an exception. After over thirty years spent in slavery, Murrell owned a farm with one hundred acres of land.