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No restrictions. Open for research.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Comer Family Papers #167-z, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Alternate Form of Material

All or part of this collection is available on microfilm from University Publications of America as part of Southern women and their families in the 19th century, Series A.

Acquisitions Information

Received from Mrs. Mills B. Lane of Savannah, Ga., before 1940.

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Elizabeth Pauk, August 1991

Encoded by: ByteManagers Inc., 2008

Revised by: Kathryn Michaelis, December 2009

This collection was rehoused under the sponsorship of a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Office of Preservation, Washington, D.C., 1990-1992.

Conscious Editing Work by: Nancy Kaiser, May 2020. Updated abstract, subject headings, scope and content note, and container list.

Since August 2017, we have added ethnic and racial identities for individuals and families represented in collections. To determine identity, we rely on self-identification; other information supplied to the repository by collection creators or sources; public records, press accounts, and secondary sources; and contextual information in the collection materials. Omissions of ethnic and racial identities in finding aids created or updated after August 2017 are an indication of insufficient information to make an educated guess or an individual's preference for identity information to be excluded from description. When we have misidentified, please let us know at wilsonlibrary@unc.edu.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Alabama--Social life and customs.
• Barbour County (Ala.)--Economic conditions.
• Barbour County (Ala.)--Social life and customs.
• Comer Family Plantation (Ala.)
• Comer family.
• Comer, Catherine Lucinda, 1823-1898.
• Comer, Hugh Moss, 1842-1900.
• Comer, John Wallace, 1845-1919.
• Confederate States of America Army of Tennessee.
• Confederate States of America Army--Military life.
• Enslaved persons--Photographs.
• Families--Alabama.
• Lumber trade--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Mothers and sons--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Plantations--Alabama--Barbour County.
• Slavery--Alabama.
• Slavery--United States--History--19th century--Sources.
• Soldiers--Confederate States of America--Photographs.
• Students--Georgia--History--19th century.
• Widows--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Women--Alabama--Social life and customs.

• Braxton Bragg Comer Papers (#168)
• John Fletcher Comer Journal (#1714-z)
• Laura Beecher Comer Papers (#169-z)

John Fletcher Comer (1811-1858) was a cotton planter and owner of a lumberyard and corn mill in Barbour County, Ala. He married Catharine Lucinda Drewry (d. 1898) in 1841, and they had six sons: Hugh Moss Comer (1842-1900); John Wallace Comer (1845-1919); St. George Legare Comer (1847-1870); U.S. senator and Alabama governor Braxton Bragg Comer (1848-1919); John Fletcher Comer, Jr. (1854-1927); and Edward Trippe Comer (1856-1927). There was also at least one daughter in the family. Following John Fletcher Comer's death in 1858, the family continued farming and operating the corn mill and lumberyard. During the Civil War, John Wallace Comer served in the reserves of the Army of Tennessee.

The Comer family, white cotton planters, lumber yard owners, and enslavers of Barbour County, Ala., included Catherine Lucinda Comer (d. 1898), who, widowed in 1858, continued to farm cotton and to operate the family's corn mill and lumber yard, and her six sons: Hugh Moss Comer (1842-1900); John Wallace Comer (1845-1919); St. George Legare Comer (b. 1847); U.S. senator and Alabama governor Braxton Bragg Comer (1848-1927); John Fletcher Comer, Jr. (1854-1927); and Edward Trippe Comer (1856-1927). People enslaved by the Comers included Burrell, who was a personal assitant to John Wallace Comer during the Civil War.

The collection includes nineteen letters, 1860-1864 and undated, to and from various members of the Comer family, chiefly about family and business matters. The earliest letters are from Catherine Lucinda Comer in Barbour County, Ala., to Hugh Moss Comer at school in Warrior Stand, Ala., describing family and neighborhood life and giving details of the family businesses and finances and news of the farm and of the people enslaved by the family. In 1861, Hugh Moss Comer received a letter from schoolmaster J. A. Arnold describing his new school's rates, living arrangements, and course of study. Hugh Moss Comer then enrolled in Arnold's school in Polk County, Ga., where he continued to received letters from his mother and his brothers, keeping him informed about the family and neighborhood, and mentioning the advent of the Civil War.

During the Civil War, Catharine Lucinda Comer received two undated letters from her brother P. A. Drewry, who listed the wounded soldiers in the regiment from their neighborhood and kept her informed about the condition of her son, John Wallace Comer, also a Confederate soldier. John Wallace Comer wrote several letters to his mother and his sister, describing the death of his corps commander, Leonidas Polk, at Pine Mountain, Ga.; his own wound and recovery; and the heavy fighting during the New Hope Church campaign in Georgia in 1864. A family friend also wrote to the Comer family in 1862, describing the plight of the Army of Tennessee and criticizing General Braxton Bragg's Kentucky campaign ("I don't think that ole Brag ever ought to have control of anything withought it was som ole woman chickens. This was mor mens lives lost by that retreat than if we had fought the yankes").

Undated items include a poem about a faithless sweetheart and a letter from Hugh Moss Comer to Catharine Lucinda Comer about having shoes made for him. There is also a photograph of Burrell and John Wallace Comer in his Civil War uniform.

• P-167/1