Freed descendants named children after their former enslavers

Evidence

I started seeing the names of the slaveholders were George, Benjamin, John, Mary, William, and Sarah. These are also names of my own family members, for generations. Renty Taylor Thompson, for instance, named his daughter Tena after his mother, and his other daughter, Annie, after the woman who had enslaved him. This struck me, as she was born after emancipation. — Tamara Lanier, From These Roots, 395

Categorization

• SEED: Essay angle: what it means that a family names a child born after emancipation after the woman who enslaved them — naming as both residue and strategy of survival.