Ancestry.com has added a collection of over 3.5 million Freedmen's Bureau records that are free to search. The U.S. Freedmen’s Bureau was established in 1865 to help the nearly four million newly freedmen and women manage their transition from enslavement to citizenship, the Freedmen’s Bureau assisted with land and property, relief programs, medical care, and educational support—among many other important endeavors. What is little known is that the Freedmen's Bureau also contain many records of poor white people.
Here is a link to an introductory video by Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
From a genealogical standpoint, these records have the potential of extending research back into the 1700s for some families.
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