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Description |
Papers of John Gray Blount of Washington, N.C., planter, merchant, shipper, land speculator, and politician, including many letters from his partner-brothers Thomas (1759-1812) of Tarboro and William (1749-1800) of Greenville and later Tennessee. Correspondence of John Gray is concentrated in the period 1783-1800. Plantation operations are reflected in correspondence with brothers and letters from overseers and farmers, as well as in tax listings, slave lists and bills of sale, and receipts. Mercantile papers include correspondence with Thomas and William, letters from another partner, John Wallace, at Shell Castle, Ocracoke Inlet; bills of lading, receipts, lists; correspondence from commission merchants, ship captains, and agents aboard Blount vessels in American, European, and West Indian ports; and letters from Thomas Blount in England on the firm's business, 1785-1788. Many papers are concerned with land speculations in Beaufort, Bladen, Brunswick, Carteret, Craven, Cumberland, Columbus, Duplin, Hyde, Jones, Martin, Montgomery, Moore, New Hanover, Onslow, Robeson, Tyrrell, and Wake counties, as well as western lands (Buncombe and Burke counties) and Tennessee, especially the military bounty lands. In addition to surveys, plats, grants, deeds, courses, and maps, there is correspondence from or about Blount associates among the surveyors, entry takers, speculators, title searchers, and other agents, including John Allen, David Allison, John and James Armstrong, Stockley Donelson, Francis B. Fogg, Micajah Thomas, and Blount's sons Thomas Harvey and John Gray, Jr. All three brothers were state legislators in the period from 1780 to 1796 and Thomas was congressman for twelve years between 1793 and 1812. Their letters often refer to state and national politics, and political news is also in letters from Hugh Williamson, Abishai Thomas, Richard Dobbs Spaight, Sr., and later William Blackledge and Joseph B. Hinton. Letters from William Blount and Benjamin Hawkins concern relationships with Indians from the Treaty of Hopewell in 1785 until after William moved to Tennessee in 1790. Personal correspondence is chiefly from women in the family. After 1833 the papers are those of John Gray Blount's son William Augustus (1792-1867), a militia general (1816), legislator (1824-1828), and Literary Board member (1837-1841). Correspondence includes detailed explanations of herring fishery by Joseph B. Skinner (1841), shad fishing by C. Caphart (1846), fertilizer for Irish potatoes by Charles W. Bonner (1853), and a tanyard by Richard W. Haywood (1850), as well as Blount's explicit instructions to his overseer, Mr. Faithful, for planting crops, operating a mill, and for the work load, food allotment, and health care of his slaves (1856). There are also letters from James Caruthers, agent for Blount land in Tennessee, and correspondence with nephew William B. Rodman about Blount lands and son-in-law Lawrence O'B. Branch about agriculture, business, and politics. Miscellaneous items include Jacob Blount's pocket notebooks (1764- 1767, 1771-1774); draft of speech to militia (ca. 1775); minutes of the Court of Vice Admiralty for the port of Beaufort, held at New Bern (1766-1771); accounts and commissions reflecting service of Jacob Blount and son as paymasters during Revolution and letters from John Gray Blount's sons in the War of 1812; manuscript music book, ca. 1790; tax lists for Wayne Co. (1792, 1805, 1808, 1810); printed material and correspondence on French spoliation claim; sermons by Episcopal minister John Singletary (1792-1848); estates papers of Louisa Blount Blackledge (d. 1788), Reading Blount (d. 1807), and John Gray Blount (d. 1833); and correspondence on duels in Baton Rouge and Norfolk involving Dr. Isaac W. Hughes, Nathaniel Smith, and a Dr. Carthy (1827-1828). Additional correspondents include John Alderson, John B. Ashe, Benjamin Atkinson, Martha Baker, James Barr, Reading and Willie Blount, Capt. Thomas Bonner, Capt. Stephen Brooks, Joseph Branch, John H. Bryan, Richard Caswell, James Causten, Benjamin Coakley, Capt. Ezekiel Cossa, John Cowper, William R. Davie, John Devereux Delacy, John Donelson, John R. Donnell, Ebenezer Emmons, Charles Fisher, John Fries, William Gaston, John Gaylard, James Glasgow, W. M. Green, William B. Gulick, Alexander Hamilton, Anne Harvey, Augustus and John Harvey, John Haywood, John G. Hogg, James Iredell, Samuel Johnston, Calvin and Willie Jones, Andrew Joyner, William Kennedy, Richard Lake, J. W. Littlejohn, Capt. William McDaniel, Frances Anne McCauley, Nathaniel Macon, Peter Mallett, Willie P. Mangum, Alexander Martin, Alfred Moore, R. L. Myers, J. C. Montflorence, Abner Neale, Thomas and Titus Ogden, Benjamin and William Orr, Joseph Palmer, Thomas J. Pasteur, William Pennock, Timothy Pickering, Thomas, William, and Sarah Polk, Henry Potter, Eliza and James Robertson, John Roulhac, Dr. Nicholas Romayne, Benjamin Russell, William Savage, John Sevier, John Sitgreaves, Fulwar Skipworth, John Steele, Montfort Stokes, Peter Schermerhorn, William Shannon, Henry Irwin Toole, Samuel Topping, and Capt. James Webster. Of the 5,550 letters in this collection, ca. 1,500 have been published in Alice Barnwell Keith and William H. Masterson (eds.), THE JOHN GRAY BLOUNT PAPERS, 1764-1802, 3 vols. (Raleigh, 1952, 1959, 1965). Also in Collection are photocopies of Mf.P. 3. |
