Creator: Nash County Historical Association.
Collection number: 5480
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Abstract: The Nash County Historical Association (NCHA), a non-profit group headquartered in Rocky Mount, N.C., was organized in 1970 to promote the study and preservation of local history and genealogy. Since 1975, NCHA has been responsible for the administration, restoration, and
preservation of Stonewall Manor, an antebellum plantation home in Rocky Mount. The collection consists of account books, 1806-1928; physicians’ ledgers, 1835-1874; a mathematical instruction book, 1827; Saint Anne’s Guild meeting minutes, 1919-1921; a log from the Claims Committee of the United States House of Representatives, 1892-1893; and other items. Most of the materials are from Rocky Mount or surrounding Nash and Edgecombe counties. Among the individuals mentioned in the materials are Bennett Bunn (1787-1849), a Nash County planter and builder in 1830 of Stonewall Manor; Redmond Bunn (1806-1883), builder of the Benvenue plantation; Redmond Bunn’s son, Benjamin Hickman Bunn (1844-1907), a Civil War veteran, mayor and postmaster of Rocky Mount, who served three terms in the United States House of Representatives; other Bunn family members; James Jones Philips (1798-1874), a physician and planter of Nash and Edgecombe counties; other Philips family members; and Thorp family members. A few items contain records of schools or church groups, and there are also some references to slaves owned and sold, as well as a few accounts of African American schools, field hands, and house workers.
Repository: Southern Historical Collection
Collection Highlights: Folder 5 contains a ledger from a grocery store, where the last few pages include the accounts of many African American schools from the Stoney Creek Township District (1873 and 1874)
Folder 20 contains a farm account book (1914-1926) from Rocky Mount, where the work of African American laborers is recorded.
Folder 24 contains the Benvenue account book (1906-1928), where the wages and meals of Benvenue farmhands, many of whom were African American, are also included.
Folder 32 includes the Frederick K. Philips account book (1806-1833), where purchases of enslaved individuals were also recorded.
Folder 34 contains an account book of the Bunn and Thorp (1853 – 1876), which includes a list of slaves owned by Redmun Bunn, as well as the accounts of African American field hands and house workers.