Collections

Accounts of textile and fabric goods sold by the merchants, Richard Warner Jones and Henry A. Wise from 1816-1817. Mary fanntleroy Jones is also listed in the ledger. Locations of recordings include Murfreesboro, NC, Petersburg, VA, and Norfolk, VA.

One page letter in response to President Wise's claim for the college of William and Mary to receive war repararations caused to the property during the Civil War. Butler's response to Wise was that the filed claim was not approved by Congress.

The nucleus of this collection was created from papers given to the Association by Ann Pamela Cunningham around the time of her retirement as Regent. Several other Vice Regents followed her example and later donated their papers as well. These records were referred to as the "Early Records" since the time they were first established as an archival collection. A large portion of this collection is correspondence concerning the founding of the MVLA and the operation of Mount Vernon as a historic site. Other important resources are the appeals written by Ann Pamela Cunningham and the Vice Regents, governing documents, subscription or donation lists, printed material or publications, and bound volumes such as ledgers or scrapbooks. Individual items were added to the collection as they were acquired. The Early Records includes items dated 1852-1951, however the bulk of the material dates from 1858 to around 1880.

Letter from H. A. Wise, House of Representatives, Washington DC, to Robert S. Chilton, New York, in which he talks about dueling.

Three letters (1856-1859) concerning United States politics (especially the 1856 presidential election), and his family; containing his views on religion and liberty; and making an appeal to James Buchanan on behalf of a candidate for appointed office.

This collection contains a letter from Brigadier General Henry A. Wise, Lewisberg [sic], Va. [W. Va.], to Adjutant and Inspector General Samuel Cooper, no place. The dispatch is reporting troop strength at Gauley Bridge and reports on guns and ammunition. He writes that the area is unsound. At a place called Williamsburg [W. Va.?], there is "a violent Yankee partisan, a Dr. Thatcher" who shot at his [HAW] orderly, wounding him in the head. Wise asks that three field officers--Col. J. Lucius Davis, Lt. Col. Jno. H. Richardson, and Major H.W. Fry, Jr., be commissioned and report to him at Gauley Bridge.

The Henry A. Wise letters consist of the incoming and outgoing correspondence (13 items) of Wise, the Governor of Virginia from 1856 to 1860. The letters are dated from November 1859 through March 1861 and concern personal and family matters. Correspondents include Wises' third wife, Mary Lyons Wise, his nephews Tully and John Wise, and his son Obidiah Jennings Wise.