Abstract: The Atlantic Coast Line was based in Wilmington, N.C., and possessed rail that ran through Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and Florida. The Atlantic Coast Line later formed part of the CSX Transportation System. The collection contains records, 1900s-1950s, of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad. Files are divided between President’s Files, which document railroad operations and relations with other companies, and Tax Files, which contain records of federal, state, and local taxes paid by the Atlantic Coast Line. There are also a set of financial journals and a series of files related to the reorganization of the Florida East Coast Railway Company. Addition of 2011 consists of records, 1918-1963, of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company Police Department. Reports document often extensive investigations into crimes such as trespassing and vandalism, especially by juveniles; petty larceny of railroad and personal property; vagrancy and train hopping; public drunkenness; and assault. Reports typically mention age, race, and sex of the suspects, many of whom were African American, and often personal or family information. There are also lost luggage claims, reports of injuries sustained in the rail yard, and personnel records that document relief checks, retirement traditions, job applications, and funerals.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: The addition of October 2011 contains records of the Atlantic Coastline Railroad Company Police Department, and includes investigative reports and arrest records for juveniles as well as adults. Many of the records involve African American men and women, suspected of crimes as well as victims.

Abstract: Farish Carter was a planter, land speculator, and entrepreneur of Scottsborough Plantation, near Milledgeville, Baldwin County, Ga., and owner of a plantation at Coosawattee, Murray County, Ga. Carter married Eliza McDonald, sister of Charles J. McDonald (1793-1860), and had five children: Mary Ann (d. 1844), Catherine (d. 1851), James Farish (b. 1821), Samuel McDonald, and Benjamin Franklin (d. 1856). The collection is primarily business papers, 1830-1860, and some family correspondence. Most papers relate to Carter’s buying, selling, and renting land in Georgia, Florida, and Tennessee; his financial interest in New Hope, a sugar plantation in Louisiana; his part ownership of the Coweta Falls Manufacturing Company, a textile mill in Columbus, Ga.; his buying, selling, and hiring out of slaves; his investments in railroads, banks, gold mining, steamboats, toll bridges, ferries, mills, and other ventures; and his and his sons’ operations of plantations in Georgia and Alabama.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: The collection primarily documents Carter’s business activities, including the buying, selling, and hiring-out of slaves. Letters also cover topics such as the treatment of slaves (1825); problems of slave management (1830-1850); news of house servants and field hands (1851-1858); effects of an ordinance passed in Marietta, Georgia, concerning African Americans’ autonomy to hire out their services and relating to their residences (1854); and marriage customs among slaves (1854). Financial and legal materials include bills of sale for slaves (1812, 1821); a certificate of character for a slave (1830); bills for hire of slaves (1840); and terms for hire of slaves (1850). The papers also document Carter’s involvement in legal controversies over ownership of slaves in Florida. Microfilm available.

Abstract: Prominent members of the Hentz family included French revolutionary Nicholas Arnould Hentz (1756-1832); his sons Nicholas Richard Hentz (1786-1850), an officer in the French Imperial Army; and Nicholas Marcellus Hentz (1797-1856), a prominent entomologist; the latter’s wife, the writer Caroline Lee Whiting Hentz (1800-1856); two of Nicholas Marcellus and Caroline Hentz’s children, Charles Arnould (A.) Hentz (1827-1894) and Thaddeus William Harris Hentz (1830-1878), who were both physicians; and Charles A. Hentz’s son, William Booth Hentz (b. 1860). The collection includes personal, medical, financial, and legal papers, and diaries and autobiographies of members of the Hentz family of France, Alabama, and Florida. Correspondence describes activities of family and friends in Alabama and Florida, teaching at a female academy in Alabama, medical and dental practices, and a Confederate soldier’s camp life and experiences as a prisoner of war. The diaries of Caroline Lee Hentz discuss her life and work in Alabama. The diary of Thaddeus W. Hentz, her son, details his experience in the Confederate army. The diaries and autobiography of Charles A. Hentz are concerned with travels in the southern United States; the Mexican War; his medical education and practice, including treatment of slaves; recreational drug use and drug addicts; the flora and fauna of the Panhandle region of Florida; descriptions of inhabitants of and life in Louisville, Ky., Cincinnati, Ohio, New Orleans, La., Mobile and Tuskegee, Ala., and Jackson and Gadsden counties, Fla.; a journey on horseback to Tampa Bay, Fla.; treatment of the wounded at the battles of Marianna and Natural Bridge, Fla. The execution of Confederate deserters; his citrus and vegetable farms; and a lynching. Other items include military records of an officer in the French Imperial Army; notes and writings on yellow fever and grave-robbing for dissection purposes, descriptions of fish and plants, and drafts of plays and stories; records of Charles A. Hentz’s obstetrical cases; drawings and pictures of human, botanical, and animal subjects; biographical and genealogical sketches; and a phrenological character analysis. The Addition of June 2000 includes two framed photographs and one cased ambrotype, all undated. The photographs are childhood portraits of Julia Keyes Hentz Dumbar (b. 1862) and William Booth Hentz (b. 1860), probably taken circa 1865. The ambrotype is a portrait of Charles A. Hentz. The Addition of May 2005 contains two documents relating to the medical practice of Charles A. Hentz. The Addition of September 2005 consists of the Hentz Family Bible, with scattered genealogical material. The Addition of May 2009 includes eight diaries. The 1862 diary documents Charles A. Hentz’s activities as a doctor in Quincy, Fla., and his work at the military hospital established there. Diaries, 1880-1901, describe Charles A. Hentz’s everyday activities as a doctor in Quincy and as a citrus farmer in City Point, Fla. Included is a 17 May 1880 entry describing an operation Hentz performed to remove part of the skull of an African American man who had suffered a fractured skull. In an 1899 diary, Ella Hentz described traveling with William Booth Hentz from their home in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to a family wedding in City Point; in a diary, March-May 1901, William Booth kept a March-May 1901 diary during a visit to City Point and Quincy.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights:  An autobiography (1827-1893) includes descriptions of slave life in Alabama;  comments on northern impressions of slavery; the medical treatment of plantation slaves in Florida; the punishment of slaves in Florida; black Union troops in the Civil War; the murder of a white sheriff by four black men and their subsequent trial and execution; northern schoolteachers and their treatment of freedmen in Florida; and the murder of a white man by a freedman and the arrest and lynching of the latter in Florida.(See Folders 23-26 for the autobiography and typed transcriptions).

Folder 19 includes Volume 1 of Charles Hentz diary includes discussion of the amputation of an African American woman’s leg.

Folder 27 contains obstetrical records in order by date, with an index to patient names in the back of the volume. Case descriptions for both white and black patients are included. (This folder has been digitized, click here to link to the finding aid and access the digital material).

Folder 28 contains a medical journal of Hentz’s cases from 1858 to 1863. Entries give details on symptoms and treatment of cases for both black and white patients (This folder has been digitized, click here to link to the finding aid and access the digital material).

Folder 33 contains a copy of Charles Heinz diary from 1880, which contains an entry 17 May 1880 that describes an operation performed by Hentz to remove part of the skull of an African American man who had suffered a fractured skull.

Abstract: Correspondence, chiefly 1866-1867, of William Louis Criglar with firms in Mobile and New Orleans concerning supplies, equipment, and financing for Criglar, Batchelder and Co., his lumber milling business in Escambia County, Ala., and the adjoining Florida counties of Escambia and Santa Rosa; a descriptive list of slaves belonging to the company, 1862; and other related items.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: The collection includes a slave list and a deed of bequest from Criglar to his wife which names and describes the slaves of the mill (1862). Microfilm available.

Abstract: Edward McCrady L’Engle (1834-1900) of Florida was a railroad president, lawyer, and Confederate army officer. L’Engle’s legal, business, political, and family correspondence, chiefly 1856-1897. Papers before 1866, a small part of the collection, relate to railroad development, plantation life and slavery, social conditions, and public opinion before and during the war in Florida. Antebellum papers include letters from other southeastern states and from an army officer on the Texas frontier and in the Oregon and Washington territories.Postwar papers chiefly concern the Florida Central Railroad, which was entangled in the Reconstruction manipulations of George William Swepson and general Milton Smith Littlefield. The postwar papers also relfect L’Engle’s legal practice, banking, and business activities in general, including relations with northern businessmen, and contain material on the political opinions of the conservative white element in Florida during Reconstruction. Correspondents include most of the antebellum, Confederate and Conservative leaders of the state, many of whom were L’Engle’s relatives or close friends, and a number of prominent persons from other southern states.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Papers dated before 1866 often pertain to plantation life and slavery and postwar papers contain materials reflecting the political opinions of the conservative white element in Florida towards Reconstruction. (See Folders 1-8).

Included are letters expressing the difficulty in acquiring slave labor in 1857 (Folder 4) and the fear of slave uprisings in Florida in 1865 (Folder 7).

Some of the materials in this collection have been digitized and are available online. Click here to link to the finding aid for this collection and to access the digitized content.

Abstract: Croom, native of North Carolina, botanist, planter in Gadsden County, Fla., died with his immediate family in a shipwreck. Papers gathered in the course of litigation over Croom’s estate, consisting chiefly of his correspondence, including letters to his wife, letters received from relatives about family affairs, letters concerning his plantation and slaves, and correspondence with botanists John Bachman and John Torrey.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Papers in this collection were gathered in the course of litigation over Croom’s estate and consist chiefly of his own correspondence. Included are letters concerning his plantation slaves. Microfilm available.

Abstract: Sylvan Meyer (1921- ) of Gainesville, Ga., and Miami Beach, Fla., journalist; editor of the Gainesville Times, 1947-1969; the Miami News, 1969-1973; and Miami Magazine, 1975-1987; and founder of Meyer Publications. Meyer, who received an AB in journalism from the University of North Carolina in 1943, was an editor of The Daily Tar Heel, 1942-1943. Personal and business correspondence, 1940-1988, of Sylvan Meyer, including letters from Jimmy Carter; speeches, 1960s, many concerning the role of the press in race relations; notes from a trip to the Soviet Union in 1969; and correspondence, records, and reports relating to the Pulitzer Prize Advisory Board, 1969-1975, and other organizations with which Meyer was involved, including the American Society of Newspaper Editors, the American Newspaper Publishers Association, and the Curriculum Committee of Florida International University.Also included are subject files from the Gainesville Times on local Georgia politics, people, and issues, especially desegregation and other racial matters, and papers relating to the Miami News, Meyer Publications, Miami Magazine, and Computer Living NY. There are also clippings from newspapers and magazine articles and columns Meyer wrote and several of his book manuscripts.Among the miscellaneous papers are items from Meyer’s time as a student at the University of North Carolina, including letters, writings, several issues of Truth and Consequence (a student newsletter), and notes relating to The Daily Tar Heel.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights:  Several documents concern the role of the press in race relations. The collection contains a film entitled White South: Two Views . Note: unprocessed; may be used only with special staff assistance.

Abstract: The Southern Tenant Farmers’ Union, organized at Poinsett County, Ark., in 1934, was especially active in Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas. The Union spread into the southeastern states and to California, affiliating off and on

with larger national labor federations, and maintaining headquarters at Memphis, Tenn., or, from 1948 to 1960, at Washington, D.C. It has become successively the National Agricultural Workers Union and the Agricultural and Allied Workers Union. Correspondence files of H. L. Mitchell and others at union headquarters at Memphis, Tenn., Washington, D.C., and in Louisiana; executive committee minutes, legal papers, surveys, annual reports, special reports, membership records, applications for local charters, financial records, and contracts; data on conventions, strikes, litigation, and legislation; histories and articles; clippings; relevant mimeographed and printed matter; and miscellaneous forms, lists, and routine local organization papers. The papers concern union organizing, financing, relationships with various federal agencies, strikes, legal defense, and other activities, mainly among cotton field workers in Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas, sugar cane workers in Louisiana, and migrant laborers in Florida and California, but also among agricultural workers in other states.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Formed to challenge many of the injustices remaining from the old plantation system, the Union papers include thousands of letters from members, including African-American sharecroppers.

Abstract: After a political and judicial career in Georgia, Robert Raymond Reid (1789-1841) was appointed judge of the Superior Court in the Eastern District of Florida in 1832. He was a member of the Florida Constitutional Convention of 1838 and was territorial governor from 1839 to 1841. Two volumes, 31 January 1833-10 October 1833 and 22 January 1835- 25 September 1835, in which Reid recorded his opinions on the nullification controversy, abolitionism, and the black population of the South, both free and enslaved. The journal also gave Reid the opportunity to express, in a tone apparently influenced by his readings of Byron, whom he mentions, his deep feelings of melancholy. Similarly, theological speculations reveal his struggle for faith. The legal communities in St. Augustine and Tallahassee, an epidemic in the former town, Reid’s repeated, unsuccessful attempts to adhere to a daily schedule, and the character of John C. Calhoun, Andrew Jackson, and especially John Randolph, are also addressed.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Reid recorded his opinions on various topics including abolitionism and the southern black population, both free and slave. Microfilm only.

Abstract: Elsie H. Booker (1923- ) of Durham County, N.C., collector of antiques, artifacts, and family papers. Papers of various families. Series 1 Markham, Leigh, and related families: Correspondence, business and legal papers, account books, genealogical information, pictures, and other materials of the Markham, Leigh, and other related families, chiefly of North Carolina. Markham family correspondence includes letters, 1873-1928, from William David Markham of Missouri, the Indian Territory, Texas, and New Mexico, containing information about crop and herd conditions, religion, business, and politics; and letters, 1880s-1900s, mostly from Wake County, N.C., and Bayboro, Ga., concerning Baptists, pregnancy, childbirth, education, deaths, and other matters. Also included are records relating to slaves; legal documents, 1867-1869, pertaining to the backruptcy proceedings of Elizabeth C. Yancey of Chapel Hill and Durham, N.C.; post cards, 1907, picturing men hanged in Durham; scrapbooks of materials collected by Harold Cole Markham, while he was a high school student in Durham, N.C., and during his World War II tour of duty in the United States and Europe; photographs, collectors’ cards, and prints, ca. 1935-1945, relating to Adolph Hitler, the German military, and scenes in Europe during World War II; and ballads. Series 2 Durham and Lloyd families: Documents relating to the Lloyd and Durham families of Chapel Hill, N.C., include a teacher’s application, 1900, for a position at a black public school, probably in Orange County, N.C.; an extensive series of love letters, 1941-1942, discussing dating, high school, and other topics of concern to teenagers; and a labor payroll schedule, 1947-1948, for state roadway construction work in Granville County, N.C. There are also twenty merchant’s account books, 1884-1928, many of which probably belonged to W. A. Lloyd, and a diary, 1934-1938, documenting work on a roadway construction crew in piedmont and western North Carolina. Series 3. Abernathy, Blackwood, and other families: Items relating to the Abernathy, Blackwood, Moore, Peeler, Shepherd, Steele, and other unrelated famili

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: The collection contains business and legal papers primarily of the Shephard, Leigh, and Markham families of Orange and Durham Counties, North Carolina. Papers include a will that calls for the sale of land and slaves (1819); a property inventory listing slaves (1821); and documents relating to the hiring of slaves (1832, 1839). Among the Durham and Lloyd family correspondence is a letter of application for a position as a teacher at an African-American public school in the Beth-Carr district, probably in Orange County, North Carolina. (1900). In addition, the collection contains post-Civil War letters of three African-American families: the Goodwins of South Carolina, the Pickens of Connecticut, and the Mitchells of Durham, North Carolina.