Smith, William, 1720-1799. Smith and Robert family papers, ca. 1741 - 1879.
Title:
Smith and Robert family papers, ca. 1741 - 1879.
Correspondence and papers, ca. 1741-1879, of various members of the Smith and Robert families. The families were related by marriage; Mary Smith, the daughter of Judge William Smith and Ruth Woodhull Smith, married Dr. Daniel Robert in 1788. A good deal of the material relates to litigation concerning the family's lands in Brookhaven (Long Island), much of it related to ambiguities in the will of Mary Smith's grandfather, William Henry Smith. Some copies of seventeenth-century deeds and patents are included. There are also some wills and legal papers related to other members of the Smith and Robert families, including papers about the settlement of the estate of Daniel Robert, Jr., who died intestate. The largest groups of letters are those addressed to Mary Smith's father, William, her husband, Dr. Daniel Robert, and her son, Daniel Robert, Jr. The letters to William Smith, ca. 1741-1782, include 47 from his brother, the Rev. Caleb Smith, written from Yale College and elsewhere, and numerous letters from another brother, Merrett Smith, and James Sproutt, the husband of his sister Sarah. Two letters from David Jones, dated 1752, request permission to search on Smith's beachfront for a whale he had killed and lost. There are also letters from his sister, Sarah Sproutt, and his daughter, Hannah Woodhull. Letters to Dr. Daniel Robert include some from his brother-in-law, the U.S. Senator John Smith, 62 from William Rhinelander (1791-1818), and a large number from his brother, Christopher Robert of Dominica, discussing business there, with some mention during the 1790s of the effects of the war. There are also some business letters from Edmé Desabayel in Martinique. Daniel Robert's commissions as physician general and surgeon to the militia of Dominica, dated 1777 and 1785, are also included in the collection. Other material includes maps of the family estate, lottery tickets, part of a scale drawing of a ship, printed ephemera issued by the U.S. Pension Agency in the 1870s, and printed documents issued in 1827 and 1828 by the South Bay Navigation Company and the Long Island Canal Company, describing a proposal to link Gravesend Bay, Jamaica Bay, and the Great South Bay by canal.
ArchivalResource:
1.2 linear feet (3 boxes)
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