[10] The final page is dated to 1834 and 1835 and records Woodroof's expenses ($340.75) to transport "33 negroes" from Lynchburg, Virginia from Natchez, Mississippi, a journey that took from January 17 to February 18.

[11] The fifth and sixth pages seem to refer to a deal done from 1835 to 1838; the entry records payments made to "John M. Williams for the Niggers of Betsey Red.

[14][15] At the time of the 1840 census of Amherst County, Virginia, Seth Woodroof was the head of a household consisting of four enslaved people, namely a female aged 24 to 35, a girl under 10, and two boys under 10.

[18] At the time of the 1850 U.S. census, Seth Woodroof of the town of Lynchburg, Virginia, was listed as the owner of 21 enslaved people, all male, aged 10 to 40, with the majority being in their teens and 20s.

The letter, preserved in the archives of Sweet Briar College, informed businessman, plantation owner, and former Lynchburg mayor Elijah Fletcher that she had been sold in Lynchburg, was being held in the slave jail of "Mr. Woodrough", and that she expected her jailor would soon ship her further south (where she could be sold at a higher price).

Martha Pen your humble servant Lynchburg Va.[20] According to Steven Deyle's Carry Me Back: The Domestic Slave Trade in American Life (2005), in 1856, Woodroof carried on a rivalry of some kind with Richmond, Virginia slave trading firm Pullium & Davis, the principals of which were David M. Pulliam and Hector Davis:[21] Per Deyle, "In a letter to his friend, the Richmond auctioneer Richard Dickinson, Woodroof noted how several agents for the Richmond firm of Pulliam & Davis were 'determined to Give me and you Hell & Rub it in.'

[22] In an earlier letter, Woodroof had reported to Dickinson that there was evidence of sexually transmitted infections "in slaves he was shipping and on that basis advocated delaying their sale".

[23] According to one history of Lynchburg, in the years immediately prior to the outbreak of the American Civil War, "Many great discussions were going on in regard to slavery, and questions connected with it.

[2] Woodroof appears on the 1860 slave schedules twice: He is listed as the owner of a 26-year-old black female who is employed by William R. Robinson,[25] and of 43 people ranging in age from eight months to 45 years old.

[27] Seth Woodroof served on the Lynchburg city council immediately before and during the American Civil War, for the years 1858, 1859, 1860, and during the Confederate era of 1861, 1862, 1863, 1864, and 1865.

[35] Historian Frederic Bancroft reported in Slave-Trading in the Old South that "In the little city of Lynchburg four traders George Davis, M. Hart, E. Myers, and Seth Woodroof were advertising in the Christmas (1845) and other numbers of the Lynchburg Republican, and auctioneer Charles Phelps was selling slaves both privately and publicly...Woodroof sought from 75 to 150 between the ages of 10 and 25, later extended to 30.

By 1852 he had erected a brick building on First or Lynch street, behind the Farmers' Bank, where he would 'board negroes sent to Lynchburg for sale or otherwise on as moderate terms, and keep them as secure, as if they were placed in the jail of the Corporation.'

"[38] The slave trade in Lynchburg was comparatively decentralized, with advertised sales taking place at taverns, inns, and outside the Ninth Street market house.

[42][d] One of Woodroof's frequent advertisements was featured in Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1853 non-fiction polemic, A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin, in a chapter on the topic of family separation in American slavery.

He, likewise, wants negroes between ten and thirty years of age; but his views turn rather on mechanics, blacksmiths, and carpenters...There is no manner of doubt that this Mr. Seth Woodroof is a gentleman of humanity, and wishes to avoid the separation of families as much as possible.

Doubtless he ardently wishes that all his blacksmiths and carpenters would be considerate, and never have any children under ten years of age; but, if the thoughtless dogs have got them, what's a humane man to do?

This, That, and the Other's order,—that's a clear case; and therefore John and Sam must take their last look at their babies, as Uncle Tom did of his when he stood by the rough trundle-bed and dropped into it great, useless tears.

Nay, my friends, don't curse poor Mr. Seth Woodroof, because he does the horrible, loathsome work of tearing up the living human heart, to make twine and shoe-strings for you!