This list of Archives & Special Collections holdings briefly describes manuscript collections related to the antebellum period. Most of the collections relate to Mississippi, although some have a broader geographical scope. Click on the link to the collection finding aid for a more detailed description of the contents.
Account Books. 1852-1872. Two account books detailing wage and other expenditures of an unnamed business (1 box).
Jennie and Lucia Adams Collection. 1845-1944. Papers of Jennie and Lucia Adams who owned Cedar Mount Plantation in Coahoma County, Mississippi just outside of Clarksdale (13 boxes).
Samuel Agnew Diary Photocopies. 1851-1902. Photocopies of a diary kept by Samuel Agnew, who moved to northeastern Mississippi in 1852 where he was a Associate Reformed Presbyterian minister, teacher, farmer, and prominent local citizen (23 boxes).
Aldrich Collection. 1840-1940. Personal and business correspondence of the Aldrich and Treadwell families who settled in northeastern Mississippi around Lamar and Davis Mills (now Michigan City). Includes slave lists and valuations (25 boxes).
Alumni Association Minutes Collection. 1853-1976. Minutes from meetings of the University of Mississippi Alumni Association (1 box).
Andrew Brown & Son / R.F. Learned Lumber Company Collection. 1837-1974. Correspondence, business records, accounts, photographs, and reports related to Andrew Brown (and Son) and its immediate successor company, R.F. Learned Lumber Company in Natchez, Mississippi. Includes non-lumber records related to Natchez Ice Company, Natchez Department Store, and Learned Plantation (117 boxes and 611 ledgers). Selected materials are available in the Civil War digital collection. Patrons should provide notice at least two business days prior to prospective visits so that staff may transfer requested boxes from the Library Annex (an off-site facility) to the Special Collection Reading Room. Please contact Special Collections at (662) 915-7408 to specify requested material.
Audubon Mississippi/Strawberry Plains Finley Collection. 1830-2008. Correspondence, documents, photographs, and other material related to the lives of the Finley and Davis families of Marshall County, Mississippi and the Strawberry Plains plantation (29 boxes). Selected materials are available in the Civil War digital collection.
Bank of Mississippi Collection. 1825-1834. Ledger and other materials related to the Bank of Mississippi (3 boxes).
Bank of Oxford Collection. 1853-1898. Ledgers and cash books documenting the operations of the Bank of Oxford in Mississippi, as well as a drug store account book (6 boxes).
F.A.P. Barnard Collection. 1831-1889. Letter, articles, and memorabilia related to Frederick Augustus Porter Barnard, president of the University of Mississippi from 1856 to 1861 and later president of Columbia University (2 boxes).
Lionel Baxter Collection. 1851-1986. Includes 1851 document signed by W.E. Jones and W.W. Loring on the Oregon Territory; an 1860 letter from Robert F. Crenshaw in Pontotoc, Mississippi; and an 1839 document signed by Albert Sydney Johnston as Secretary of War (9 boxes).
Dr. Frederick Robert Bernard Collection. 1855-1892. Papers of medical doctor Frederick Robert Bernard of Lake Providence, Louisiana (1 box).
Blanton-Smith Collection. 1844-1988. Correspondence of the Blanton and Smith families which originated in Virginia and Kentucky and settled near Greenville, Mississippi on several plantations (2 boxes & 2 binders).
Board of Trustee Reports and Minutes. 1845-1991. Minutes of the Board of Trustees of the University of Mississippi (15 boxes).
Boynton Collection. 1856-1861. Glass plate negatives of antebellum scenes at the University of Mississippi campus as well as family portraits and self-portraits of the photographer Edward C. Boynton (3 boxes). The collection has been digitized and is available in the University Archives Photographs digital collection.
Juanita Brown Collection. 1829-1948. Includes antebellum correspondence and business documents of a Tennessee and Mississippi family (7 boxes).
Roane Fleming Byrnes Collection. 1854-1937. Papers of a Natchez, Mississippi family which includes a copy of an invitation to Andrew Jackson's 1840 Inaugural Ball and the 1854 receipt for the jail fees of a runaway slave (46 boxes).
Eugene Craven Callaway Collection. 1824-2005. Family letters and documents principally belonging to the family of Rev. James Render Callaway, a Methodist minister and significant landowner who settled in Pontotoc and Lafayette counties of Mississippi in the 1830s (2 boxes).
Chilton Collection. 1837-1882. Legal documents, primarily deeds and tax records, for the Chilton family of Mississippi and Texas (1 box).
Clark Family Collection. 1832-1868. Includes antebellum business papers of T.G. Clark of Sarepta, Mississippi (2 boxes).
Coit Collection. 1856-1939. Includes an 1856 document regarding business transactions (1 box).
C.E. Colbert Collection. 1826-1953. Miscellaneous historical documents including facsimile of a letter by Henry Clay; land grants issued by presidents John Quincy Adams and Martin Van Buren; 1852 diary of Francis M. Campbell; 1832-1835 notebook of sold items; handbook entitled "The Ready Reckoner for Ship Builders, Boat Builders, and Lumber Merchants..."; bill of sale for slaves; and legal documents from Noxubee County, Mississippi from 1830s-1870s (1 box).
Commencement Collection. 1854-2004. Programs, invitations, articles, and speeches related to graduation ceremonies at the University of Mississippi (8 boxes).
Craft/Fort Family Letters. 1840-1878. Transcribed correspondence of the
Craft family. (1 box).
Charles Nunnally Dean Jr. Collection. 1837-1930. Correspondence, legal documents, photographs, and ephemera related to the Dean family of Marshall County, Mississippi. Includes bills of sale for slaves and plantation records. Finding aid available in Special Collections (32 boxes).
Diploma and Certificate Collection. 1850-1955. Various diplomas and certificates conferred by the University of Mississippi and other institutions.
Edmondson/Bray/Williams/Stidham Collection. 1834-1987. Correspondence, diaries, ledgers, and documents for several families of North Mississippi and Tennessee (35 boxes). Selected materials are available in the Civil War digital collection.
Evans Collection. 1806-1832. Correspondence and documents related primarily to the Evans family of Natchez, Mississippi. Includes bills of sale for slaves and letters regarding the Choctaw Indian Agency in Mississippi (1 box).
Faculty Minutes and Committees Collection. 1848-1984. Minutes from faculty meetings at the University of Mississippi (14 boxes).
Fant Collection. 1848-1936. Diary, correspondence, photographs, slave bill of sale, and other documents related to the Anderson, Fant, and McNeill families of Marshall County, Mississippi (1 box).
Featherston Collection. 1824-1952. Legal documents, correspondence, speeches, pamphlets, and miscellaneous items related to the family of Winfield Scott Featherston of Holly Springs, Mississippi (16 boxes). Selected materials are available in the Civil War digital collection.
Eugene B. Ferris Collection. 1826-1984. Includes antebellum letters from the Micou family (4 boxes).
Elijah Fleming Collection. [1859]. Twenty-one tintype images of University of Mississippi faculty and students. These images available in the University Archives Photographs digital collection.
Gage Family Collection. 1830-1937. Correspondence and other materials documenting the life of the Gage family of Holmes County, Mississippi (3 boxes).
Roxana Chapin Gerdine Collection. 1858-1892. Papers of Roxana Chapin Gerdine, a native of Chicopee, Massachusetts who married William Louis Crawford Gerdine in 1858 and moved to his home in West Point, Mississippi (3 boxes).
William Franklin Hamilton Autograph Book. 1859-1860. Autograph book signed by friends and family of University of Mississippi student William Franklin Hamilton (1 box).
Hermaen/Phi Sigma Societies Collection. 1857-1934. Programs, correspondence, speeches, invitations, minutes, ledgers and other items related to the Hermaen and Phi Sigma debate societies at the University of Mississippi (5 boxes).
E.W. Hilgard Collection. 1856-1872. Transcriptions of correspondence largely from F.A.P. Barnard to Eugene Woldemar Hilgard. Barnard served as chancellor of UM from 1856 to 1861. Hilgard was appointed Mississippi state geologist in 1855 and served as professor of chemistry and agriculture at UM between 1869 and 1873 (1 box).
Daniel Holland Ledger. 1837-1865. The first portion of the ledger dates from 1837-1845 and appears to be for a store in Natchez, Mississippi (1 box).
Holly Springs Ledger. 1837-1904. Ledger from Holly Springs, Mississippi (1 box).
Howry Family Collection. 1838-1981. Includes two letters dating from 1838 and 1842 from James K. Polk to J.M. Howry of Mississippi (6 boxes).
John F. Johnson Collection. 1849-1911. Journals, correspondence, and other documents related to John F. Johnston, a farmer, tax assessor, and postmaster of Greensboro, Mississippi (4 boxes).
John Wesley Johnson Collection. 1853-1930. Johnson was a UM professor of Physics from 1899 to 1906. Collection includes correspondence, diaries, clippings, and biographical sketches of UM alumni (1881-1911) (6 boxes).
Kavanough Collection. 1853-1858. Two ledgers from a tavern, possibly located in Aberdeen, Mississippi (1 box).
Kelley Family Collection. 1839-1987. Correspondence, sermon notes, ledgers, and other material related to the family of Joshua Kelley in Port Gibson, Mississippi (15 boxes).
Kraus/Overstreet Collection. 1809-1967. Promissory notes, tax receipts, bank drafts, and other financial documents from Mississippi residents, banks, and businesses (1 box).
Felix LaBauve Collection. 1846-1883. Colonel Felix LaBauve immigrated to the United States from France and eventually settled in Mississippi (1 box).
L.Q.C. Lamar Collection. Circa 1860-1885. Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar represented Mississippi in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1857 to 1860 and again from 1873 to 1877. He sat in the U.S. Senate from 1877 until 1885. Lamar served as a delegate to the Mississippi Secession Convention of 1860 and held the office of lieutenant colonel in the Confederate Army until 1862 when he entered the Confederate diplomatic service. After the war, he served as a member of Mississippi's Constitutional Conventions in 1865, 1868, 1875, 1877, and 1881. President Grover Cleveland appointed Lamar as Secretary of the Interior (1885-1888) and then Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1888-1893). The L.Q.C. Lamar Collection consists of fifty-three photocopied items dating between 1868 and 1885. Most of them are letters from Lamar to Oxford resident and former law partner E.D. Clark. Location: Small Manuscripts 76-6 (1 box).
Landry-Hume Collection. 1780s-1871. Correspondence, plantation ledgers, and legal/financial records associated with the plantation-owning Farar, Ellis, and Rapalje families of Adams County, Mississippi (12 boxes).
William and Marjorie Lewis Collection. 1828-1908. Correspondence, genealogical research, clippings, photographs, and legal documents related to Jacob Thompson of Oxford, Mississippi. Jacob Thompson served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1839 to 1851 and chaired the Committee on Indian Affairs. President James Buchannan appointed him Secretary of the Interior in 1857. Thompson resigned in 1861 and during the Civil War served as Inspector General of the Confederate Army and as a confidential agent of the Confederacy to Canada (2 boxes). Portions of the collection are available in a digital collection.
Locust Grove Plantation Slave Ledger. 1825-1845. Ledger from Locust Grove Plantation in Jefferson County, Mississippi containing cotton harvest data for each slave as well as names, marriages, births and deaths of slaves on the plantation (1 box).
John Guy Lofton Collection. 1860-1863. Includes one 1860 letter from S.W. Clark to his mother (1 box).
Longstreet-Hinton Collection. 1830s-1955. Includes antebellum invoices and financial documents related to the family of Augustus Baldwin Longstreet of Georgia and Mississippi (3 boxes).