Johnson, William E., 1797-1880. William E. Johnson papers, 1837-1871.
Title:
William E. Johnson papers, 1837-1871.
Chiefly bills and receipts for household and personal expenses reflecting legal and political issues during antebellum, Civil War, and Reconstruction eras; personal correspondence, legal papers and correspondence as president of the Bank of Camden with certificates appointing Johnson to act as proxy for certain stockholders; and correspondence re Kirkwood, Miss., railroads, land interests in Alabama and Mississippi, will and bequests of W.E. Johnson, and installation of a turbine at his home. Letters, 16 Nov. 1845, to his son, William, re family news, the attendance of students from Camden at medical lectures in Charleston, S.C., and news of the Shannons, Curetons, and other families in the region, and stressing importance of developing both mind and body; letters, 12 Mar. and 10 Oct. 1851, Kirkwood, Miss., from S.C. native and U.S. Congressman, W[illiam] McWillie, re African American slaves, cotton crop and other prospects for the harvest, land prices, political divisions in South Carolina, support for Jefferson Davis, and Mississippi politics, "the Democratic States Rights Party... dropped Southern rights and resistance to the glorious compromise"; and 5 letters, 1860-1862 (Vicksburg and Morton, Miss.), from W[illiam] C. Smedes, Southern Rail Road Company, re secession, business conditions, the need to extend his note, loss of "all saleable value" in the railroad, the Stay law, which prevented creditors from seizing the property of debtors, and "the proclamation." Letter, 9 Jan. 1861, Camden, from N.C. & J.A. Snider, Coffeeville, Miss., legal opinion re interest rates allowable on contracts made outside of Mississippi but performed within said state Topics discussed include real estate transactions; correspondence from King's Mountain Military Academy (York, S.C.); a petition for pardon, dated 18 Aug. 1865; 12 letters, 1867-1869 (Vicksburg, Miss.), from J.H.D. Bowman, re sale of his lands in Mississippi, provided the government would pay "about $300,000... to Negroes... on Bounty claims" as stated by a "Yankee lawyer," farm tenancy and renting to African American freedmen, crop prospects, "great stagnation in business & the depreciation of real Est[ate], taxes... we confidently look for better times though we may be accursed with the domination of the Radical Party," and proposing division of property to facilitate sale. Letter, 26 Oct. 1868, from Phoenix Iron Works (Columbia, S.C.) to A.J. Freitag (Camden, S.C.) sending a bill for work on a pump, soliciting business, and offering "handsome Railing for Cemetery Lots and house piazzas"; 3 letters from W.S. Yerger writing from Yazoo City, Miss., (17 May, 2 July 1867 and 2 Dec. 1869), discussing concern re security of his title to certain lands and expressing sentiment that the U.S. Supreme Court "has given way to popular sentiment at the North, and is now no more to be trusted than any other branch of the body politic," fee for legal service, and value of his property in the future growth of Vicksburg, Miss. Printed items, 1870, listing return of income and certain taxable property to the U.S., and correspondence with the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, re "Delinquent Revenue Tax Payers," claim for "Remission of Taxes Improperly assessed," with letter, 8 May 1871, from Joseph Galluchat, Jr., directing W.E. Johnson to pay his taxes; and the Cash-Shannon duel of 5 July 1880, including letter, 10 Aug. 1880, from Joseph B. Kershaw, "You have asked my opinion as to what action should be taken by the sons of the late Col. Shannon, in relation to the letter said to have been written by Mr. W.B. Cash to our friend Captain John M. Cantey... my deliberate judgment is that no action whatever is required of those gentlemen.... Col. Shannon... vindicated himself by his death on the field...."
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360 items.
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