Restrictions to Access

No restrictions. Open for research.

Restrictions to Use

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 William G. Dickson Papers #221, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Received from Robert B. Glass of Collettsville, N.C., in October 1931.

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: Patrick Huber, March 1993

Encoded by: ByteManagers Inc., 2008

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.

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.

• Abernethy family.
• Agriculture--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• Bedford County (Tenn.)--History.
• Bedford County (Tenn.)--Social life and customs.
• Caldwell County (N.C.)--History.
• Caldwell County (N.C.)--Social life and customs.
• California--Social life and customs.
• Confederate States of America--Social conditions.
• Confederate States of America. Army--Military life.
• Creek War, 1813-1814.
• Diaries.
• Dickson, Joseph, 1745-1825.
• Dickson, William G., 1775-1855.
• Dixon family.
• Enslaved persons--North Carolina--Employment.
• Family--North Carolina--Social life and customs.
• Family--Tennessee--Social life and customs.
• Family--Virginia--Social life and customs.
• Freedmen--North Carolina.
• Glass family.
• Gold mines and mining--California--History--19th century.
• Iron mines and mining--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• Lawyers--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• North Carolina--Race relations--History--19th century.
• Rutherford County (Tenn.)--History.
• Rutherford County (Tenn.)--Social life and customs.
• Slavery--North Carolina.
• Slavery--Tennessee.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962)--Students--History--19th century.
• Vance, Zebulon Baird, 1830-1894.
• Women--Education--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• Women--North Carolina--Social life and customs.

William G. Dickson was a University of North Carolina alumnus, attorney, and state representative of Burke (now Caldwell) County, N.C.; wife Peggy McDowell Dickson (1783-1854); father General Joseph Dickson (1745-1825); brother James Dickson; and son Robert Moffit Dickson (1820-1855).

Chiefly business and legal papers of William G. Dickson (1775-1855), University of North Carolina alumnus, attorney, and state representative of Burke (now Caldwell) County, N.C., and personal correspondence of the Dickson, Abernethy, and Glass families of North Carolina and Virginia, with five volumes.

Series 1 consists of correspondence and related documents, with early items, 1767-1840, pertaining chiefly to the college, military, and legal career of William G. Dickson. Included are assorted receipts for university tuition and room and board, 1795-1799; a Dialectical Society speech and diploma; a military appointment to the rank of captain; and miscellaneous wills, accounts, state licenses, and other documents. Also included are several letters, 1814-1818 and 1825, from relatives and friends in Bedford and Rutherford counties, Tenn., concerning the poor health of slaves, local members of the militia in the Creek Wars, one man's service with General Andrew Jackson and capture during the War of 1812, land sales, the deaths of Dickson's parents, and other family news. Later items, 1840-1920, are chiefly personal letters of Dickson, Abernethy, and Glass family members, primarily concerning local news of family, neighbors, and friends, with some miscellaneous legal and business materials. Included are a series of letters, 1852-1855, written by Robert M. Dickson and his companions in California while prospecting for gold; letters, 1857-1860, from various family members written while they were students at the Davenport Female College at Lenoir, N.C., the Edgeworth Female Seminary at Greensboro, N.C., and the Rutherford Academy in Burke County, N.C.; and an 1860 letter from Zebulon B. Vance, discussing the proposed state convention and secession from the Union. There is also a rather extensive collection of Civil War era letters from husbands, brothers, and male cousins who were serving in the Confederate Army in North Carolina and Virginia, as well as from sisters and female cousins at home, commenting on military life, wartime social and economic conditions, freed slaves leaving their former masters, hatred for the "Yankee Devils," and the imprisonment of a white man in Morganton, N.C., for shooting a black man.

Series 2 consists of five volumes, 1837-1866, apparently kept by members of the Abernethy family, containing business and financial accounts, legal documents, some original prose and verse, and a few scattered letters. Of particular interest are a journal, probably kept by M. T. Abernethy, recording farming activities and the production output of an iron forge that employed slave labor in Kings Mountain and Lincolnton, N.C., and a court minute docket for Caldwell County, N.C., covering the 1855-1857 terms.