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Papers relating to the Wilson, Lewis, and Ruffner families of Prince Edward County, Virginia, Kanawha County, [West] Virginia, St. Charles County, Missouri, and Fairfield County, Ohio. Correspondence between Nathaniel V. Wilson and Dr. Goodridge Wilson, concerning land purchases, preparation for the settlement of the family, care of livestock, employment of slaves, salt making and marketing, and the market price of salt. Other members of the family migrated to St. Charles County, Missouri, and to Fairfield County, Ohio, and land prices, suitable crops, settlement and railroad building in Missouri comprise much of their correspondence. A third generation member of the family, Virgy Wilson Hall and her husband, John G. Hall, were missionaries in Matamoras, Mexico, and Colombia, South America, and her correspondence with her mother comments on living conditions, progress of the missionary work, revolution in Colombia, and health and living conditions of the residents of the Barranquilla area. In addition there is a will of Col. Charles Lewis, a series of letters between two doctors concerning health problems and treatment of various illnesses, and two diaries by Mrs. Daniel Ruffner, 1846, and Elizabeth Ruffner Wilson, 1871-1872, commenting on family life and community activities in Fairfield County, Ohio, and Kanawha County, [West] Virginia. All are photocopies. Material covers the years 1774-1942.

Two volumes of statistics of Presbyterian churches in the Winchester Presbytery, 1719-1946; and a notebook of correspondence, 1942-1952, of Robert B. Woodworth and John G. Bishop concerning the genealogy of the Poage and allied families and Woodworth's revision of THE CAPTIVES OF ABB'S VALLEY (Staunton, Virginia, 1942).

Letter and account books, clipping scrapbooks, and miscellaneous family papers of a pioneer, Ohio Valley, general merchandise firm founded by Dudley Woodbridge, Sr., at Marietta, Ohio, and operating under various names for a period of more than sixty years. The collection also includes the account books of Daniel, Richard, and John Greene, 1808-1844; account books of F.B. Loomis, 1842-1844; a medicinal formulary book; the estate records of John Brody; records of a pension and bounty land claims agency operated by George M. Woodbridge, 1861-1864; and justice of the peace accounts, 1832-1863. Subjects include the development of river markets, transportation, and the livestock industry in the early Ohio Valley; fur trade and commerce with England and Europe; the Marietta and Susquehanna Trading Company; Kanawha and Sciota salt works; Ohio Company lands; Woodbridge-Harman Blennerhassett partnership; ginseng trade; Wheeling Cotton Manufacturing Company; ropewalk and shipbuilding in Marietta; military land warrants; estate of George Morgan; career of William Woodbridge, United States senator and governor of Michigan; pioneer education; Meadville Seminary; Ohio University; Miami University; Marietta Collegiate Institute; Belpre, Ohio; American Catholic missions; early history of Marietta; the American Colonization Society; Washington County Colonization Society; churches; Washington County Tract Society; recruiting in Marietta during the Civil War; impact of the War of 1812 on westward migration and labor; and Woodbridge family affairs. Letters are addressed to merchants in London, France, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Charleston (West Virginia), Lexington and Louisville (Kentucky), Cincinnati, St. Louis, New Orleans, Washington, Detroit, and Baltimore. Correspondents include Lewis Cass, Philip Doddridge, and Benjamin Reeder.