Benjamin Herndon Rice papers, 1854-1875.

ArchivalResource

Rice, Benjamin Herndon, 1809-1888. Benjamin Herndon Rice papers, 1854-1875.

Benjamin Herndon Rice papers, 1854-1875.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/744938795

Letters of a cotton planter in Union District, S.C., re farming during antebellum and Reconstruction eras. Three letters, 22 Feb. 1854 - 2 Apr. 1866, written from Union District, S.C.,; includes copy of letter, 16 May 1865, from Rice to S[impson] Bobo of Spartanburg, S.C., protesting Bobo's decision to send Rice's recently freed African Americans back to Rice "in consequence of the Yankee robbery," stating that he could neither employ nor feed them, and demanding that Bobo agree to accept return of the African Americans who had been hired out to work in the iron works while enslaved. Seven letters, 29 Dec. 1855 - 16 Feb. 1875, from J. M. Wallace of Tennessee re land sales, investments, and race and labor relations during Reconstruction, including a letter, 4 Feb. 1870, informing Rice that the labor situation had improved with the return of several African American freedmen, stating "I am somewhat surprised at my having any - as I alone have been unyielding to their new demands and treated the whole of them, with cold indifference and ridicule," remarking "the truth is, I am wearied to death in my efforts to make a living with them and after this year I am positively done," and advising Rice to buy stock of the Memphis and Charleston Rail Road at 11 cents; an incomplete letter describes disapproval of the operation of the S.C. Rail Road Company, stating, "its officers & they are Legion, it has fed-filled-fattened and not a crumb has been thrown to Orphans and Widows who fill the lists of its stockholders."

10 items.

University of South Carolina, System Library Service, University Libraries