35 items. Ca 1797-1870 (mostly 1835-1857).
As a cadet at the US Military Academy at West Point, Alfred Ward Grayson Davis was a roommate of Jefferson Davis, whom he described in characteristic Southern fashion as his third cousin once removed. Although he left West Point before graduating, Davis enjoyed success in his career, traversing the southern states in search of increasing opportunity. After studying law, he was appointed by Andrew Jackson as attorney general for Arkansas Territory, after which he was recorded as a cotton planter in the Mississippi Delta in the early 1830s, with later adventures in Virginia and Texas.
A unionist by inclination, Davis nevertheless enlisted in the southern cause when the blows of Civil War came. In Dec. 1862, he was appointed Quartermaster in the Confederate army with the rank of Major, and given command of the important hub of Greenville, SC, although failing health and conflict with superior officers led to his transfer within a year.
This small collection of letters to A.W.G. Davis document the peripatetic antebellum life of an ambitious southerner, with good material on antebellum society, the web of connections that linked families and friends in Virginia, the Carolinas, Tennessee (especially West Tennessee), Mississippi, and Philadelphia; southern politics; investments; land; and the economy; and there are a couple of particularly fine letters from women in Davis's life concerning the harsh facts of separation from family and loss.
Many of the letters are deeply intimate and profoundly personal, drenched in southern manners and morals and a characteristic sense of the meaning of family and friendship. F.D. Meredith, for example, writes to James Critz (Sumter Co., AL), Feb. 26, 1843:
you have not been forgotten by my by any means for I look upon you as one of my best friends and when I look back upon our first acquaintance and think of the friendly manner in which I was treated by you and the whole family and the pains you took to make me feel that I was welcome I never will forget it no never will time wipe it out of my memory so long as I live. I know I have spent some of my happyest days with you and a great many with your friends... Several letters touch on the development of western Tennessee in some surprising ways. Dr. Samuel Gilbert, wrote about his private practice (Gilbert's Infirmary) in Memphis, July 28, 1848, in terms that seem to strike a tone somewhere between a committed professional and a charlatan:
Local news: Capt heart and wife are Dead. The fashionable MDs let them slip through. As it regards my success it is very far beyond what it was when you was here. I have restored some that had scroffula so very bad that they have been blind for years not only cured them but restored the sight. I shall move to New Orleans this fall... As might be expected, slavery was a fact of life for the Davises, as seen in an agreement between George N. Davis and his son Alfred, Aug. 1836,
in consideration of the love and affection which he has for (his son A.W.G. Davis), grants him right and title to
a negro girl named Martha upon Special Trust and Confidence, by
to permit the said party of the third part [AWGD] to have control and use the said negro & her increase to his own purposes & for his benefit, provided Davis pay one dollar a year to Armistead B.C. Davis until 1850 after which AWGD would
have and control the said negro in any way most advantageous to his interest untill the end of his life... More important are several letters touching on the growth of the political scene, including a scarce petition to congress from the citizens of Shelby County, TN, undated (but probably 1840s):
Whereas it is a cardinal principle in the administration of our political affairs, that majorities should make liberal concessions to minorities not only to secure to them those constitutional rights to which they are entitled but to promote that harmony and concert so essential to governmental action. And whereas the political parties in Tennessee are so nearly balanced as to require all the conservative weight which can be brought to bear in the primary assemblies of the people, to turn the scale for the constitution and confederacy... seeking to urge their representatives in Washington to elect their senators, one from each party, and
one of the Senators should be a resident citizen of West Tennessee as this important Division of the state has never been honored by representative in the Senate... The petition mentions Congressman Adam R. Alexander who served only from 1823-1827 and who was succeeded in Washington by Davy Crockett, however this document presumably dates from his later tenure in the state house in the early 1840s.
Davis's sojourn in Texas is not thoroughly documented, but the two letters that survive from that time are certainly noteworthy. First is a letter from Texas pioneer Hiram George Runnels, June 23, 1835:
my present impressions are that my election is not doubtful, though I cannot yet tell the extent of the injury that the white question may do me. You know that I have no capacity for deception and have to rely on a straightforward and decisive stand for the Baltimore nomination. I regret much however that Wm. C. Rives was not in the place of Johnson, he is my favorite of all party for vice president, but I do sincerely hope that Mr. R will acquiesce in the nomination of Johnson. I do not go with Mr. Johnson on the doctrines of internal improvement nor could I be induced to vote for him in any event for the first office, but this is really the action of the Administration – I speak from a knowledge of Mississippi, if we divide the presidential ticket we may be defeated in all which would be a death blow to Democracy throughout our union. Runnels, the man for whom Runnels County, TX, is named, was a planter and politician from Mississippi who had moved to Texas in 1842. Famous for caning one political opponent in the streets and for dueling with another, he represented Brazoria County in the Convention of 1845.
Perhaps the most important item in the collection is a remarkably flavorful taste of life in early post-Republic Texas, a rare letter from Lewis Stuart posted in Seguin, TX, April 1, 1849, with nice manuscript cancel postmark
Seguin Mar. 12. Stuart writes that he retrieved his horse
from there I started with two dimes in my pocket, but thinks I to myself after three day travel I'll reach the prairie then there plenty of grass for my Horse & with my gun I can make my meat, for bed & bedding take the open air; but better fate awaited me in three days travel I made enough to live upon the fat of the land & plenty left, only had to lay out two nights, upon the whole I had a most delightful tripp the only obsticle I met with was high waters which proved to be no obstrucktions. My horse proved himself a noble swimer in part a clever feller when he seemed to say take care of yourself... The letter continues with an account of crossing the river, the army in Seguin, and more.
Finally, the collection includes a handful of post-war letters along with some interesting oddities, framed by the earliest item in the collection and one of the latest. The earliest is a letter from William Barton notifying John Steuart (of Greenbrier County, VA) that he had been elected to membership in the American Philosophical Society in 1797, apparently at the suggestion of the President of the APS, Thomas Jefferson. Founded by Benjamin Franklin, the APS is the nation's oldest and most prestigious scholarly organization. The latter item is a superb letter from Julia Michel to Charles L. Davis, dated at Charleston, SC, Jan. 6, 1867, discussing the possibility of joining a community of Confederate expatriates in South America:
What is your idea of going to Venezuela and leaving your family? It is true that the best thing to be done is to leave this country for it is impossible to live in it, in the present state of affairs, but what will your family do without you? Are they also going? A broad sweep of southern history, touching on the westward expansion of the 1830s and the Lost Cause, this collection is both highly personal and utterly reflective of a larger culture.
Condition
Expected wear, with some individual items with tears along fold, minor soiling and age toning, but overall good condition.