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Samuel Pannill Wilson Papers, 1847-1938, Accession #10721, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.
This collection was given to the Library by Mrs. Joseph M. Whitehead of Chatham, Virginia, through Mr. Herman Melton, on May 27, 1987.
These papers consist of ca. 765 items, 1847-(1860-1899)-1938, and reflect the varied financial and legal activities of Samuel Pannill Wilson of Pittsylvania County, Virginia. It includes indentures, accounts, letters, receipts, promissory notes, tax receipts, and other related papers concerning Wilson's plantation and his personal and financial obligations. The majority of his dealings took place in Danville (Pittsylvania County) and other Virginia locales including Patrick, Henry, and Rockingham counties and the cities of Martinsville and Richmond, and in North Carolina.
There are several items pertaining to blacks: bill for a medical visit to a sick slave girl, February 1861; list of Negroes treated by Dr. Robert A. Read, October 6, 1858 and by Dr. J. O'Leary, November 4, 1862; list of wages paid to blacks (sharecroppers?), May 1867; taxes paid on slaves; receipts for slaves (Cornelius, Charles, Peter, Harrison, and Gil Bass) who had been impressed to work on Confederate fortifications, 1863-1864; and Freedman's Bureau indenture for the apprenticeship of two brothers, Farrel and Edmond Wilson, in order to learn farming skills, December 1, 1865. A blank Bureau contract form, ca. 1865, is also present.
Items of special interest include materials regarding the expenses of Ruth Wilson as a student at the Roanoke Female and Thomasville(?) Female colleges, 1870-1878 & 1880; a receipt for taxes paid on two gold watches, May 26, 1869; various tax payments to Confederate authorities, 1863-1865; a right-of-way agreement and a list of damages to Wilson's plantation by the Danville & New River Railroad Company, November 10, 1880 and May 16, 1881; and wages paid to an overseer, William R. Winn, March 22, 1862. Also of interest are items pertaining to building material purchases, tobacco transactions, Danville banks, grist mills, Southern Express Company invoices, a 1909 survey of a house tract, and an undated receipt showing Wilson's payment of three bushels of corn for a suit of clothes.