Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

Permission for access must be obtained from Mr. Harrison Baird.

Use Restrictions

See the University of Virginia Library’s use policy.

Preferred Citation

Fairfax Harrison Papers, Accession #1843, Special Collections, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.

Acquisition Information

This collection was loaned to the Library by Mrs. Charles Baird, Jr. of Dunnsville, Virginia and Mrs. Gerhard Dicke of Baltimore, Maryland, on January 21, 1944. The collection is now owned by Mr. Harrison Baird of Marshall, Virginia.

Scope and Content Information

The papers of Fairfax Harrison, 1830-1943, and n.d., of ca. 2000 items, include his personal and professional correspondence, 1911-1943, as well as the personal correspondence of the Harrison and Cary families. There are also two folders of correspondence (originals and copies), 1977-1943, of Harrison published in A Selection of the Letters of Fairfax Harrison. There are papers, including biographies, charts, and printed, relating to the genealogy and history of the Cary, Fairfax, and Randolph families as well as various related Northern Neck families. There is information on "Belvoir" on the Potomac, Fairfax County. Research materials include photographs, illustrations, and maps used in Landmarks of Old Prince William; maps and surveys of Virginia lands, probably compiled for Virginia Land Grants, a Study of Conveyancing in Relation to Colonial Politics; and, miscellaneous papers, transcripts of letters, photostats of documents, and printed material, probably compiled for The Virginia Carys: an Essay in Genealogy.

Letters of the Harrison family pertain to family and personal news and contain much genealogical information. Correspondents include Sir William Fairfax, Clement R. Markham, Philip Slaughter, Robley Dunglison Evans, Douglas Southall Freeman, Joseph B. Gilder, James Norris Morgan, William Gordon McCabe, Henry Tiffany Scott, and various members of the Harrison and Cary families. Letters to William Miles Cary include correspondence, 1883, with Joseph E. Johnston concerning an application for membership in the Society of the Army and Navy of the Confederate States.

The correspondence, 1911-1943, of Fairfax Harrison, cover a wide variety of subjects, including Virginiana, genealogy, railroads, the Southern Railway Company, his articles and books, literature and classical scholarship, and some legal matters. He corresponded with educators, historians, librarians, publishers, architects, attorneys, and politicians. Correspondents include William Gordon McCabe, Thomas F. Bayard, John Stewart Bryan, Jennings C. Wise, Arthur Kyle Davis, Robert Baylor Tunstall, Beverley Dandridge Tucker, Edwin Anderson Alderman, Earl G. Swem, James Southall Wilson, Poultney Bigelow, Joseph Dupuy Eggleston, Armistead Churchill Gordon, Jr., Douglas Southall Freeman, and John Cook Wyllie, as well as many other notable persons.