Restrictions to Access

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 George Washington Sargent Papers #4025, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Special Collections Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Alternate Form of Material

Available on microfilm from University Publications of America as part of the Records of ante-bellum southern plantations from the Revolution through the Civil War , Series J.

Acquisitions Information

Purchased from R. A. Van Telligen of Chicago, Ill., in April 1978.

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: E. Neal and Erik D. France, 1978; 1991

Encoded by: Roslyn Holdzkom, October 2007

Updated by Rebecca Stubbs and Laura Smith, January 2022

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.

• Account books.
• Estates (Law)--Mississippi.
• Family--Mississippi--Social life and customs.
• Louisiana--Economic conditions.
• Mississippi--Economic conditions.
• Natchez (Miss.)--Social life and customs.
• Ohio--Economic conditions.
• Philadelphia (Pa.)--Social life and customs.
• Plantation management--Louisiana.
• Plantation management--Mississippi.
• Plantation management--Ohio.
• Plantation owners--Louisiana.
• Plantation owners--Mississippi.
• Plantation owners--Ohio.
• Plantations--Louisiana.
• Plantations--Mississippi.
• Plantations--Ohio.
• Real property--Louisiana--History--19th century.
• Real property--Mississippi--History--19th century.
• Real property--Ohio--History--19th century.
• Sargent family.
• Sargent, George Washington, d. 1864.
• Sargent, Margaret Percy.
• Sargent, Mary McIntosh Williams.
• Sargent, Winthrop, 1753-1820.
• Slavery--Louisiana.
• Slavery--Mississippi.

• Winthrop Sargent Papers, Historical Society of Pennsylvania
• Winthrop Sargent Papers, Ohio Historical Society
• Winthrop Sargent Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society

George Washington Sargent (d. 1864), the son of Winthrop Sargent (1753 1820) and his second wife Mary McIntosh Williams, was born in Mississippi, where his father served as first territorial governor. He lived in Philadelphia, Pa., and, with his wife Margaret (Meg) Percy Sargent, in Natchez, Mississippi. They had at least four children: Winthrop Sargent (1825 1870), who married Sarah Ellery Gray in 1851; George Sargent; Jane Sargent Duncan, who married W. D. Duncan; and Robert P. Sargent. Jane C. Williams was George Washington Sargent's half sister.

There are biographical sketches of both Winthrop and George Sargent in Dictionary of American Biography, XVI: 368 370, where it is noted that George Washington Sargent "was brutally murdered in 1864" at Natchez, Miss.

The collection includes ten letter books and letterpress copybooks, 1840-1862, primarily containing copies of business correspondence related to the management of George Washington Sargent's extensive property in Ohio and Mississippi, including detailed letters, 1851-1862, on plantation management, the collection of notes and mortgages, the sale of crops, and other financial matters. Also included are copies of letters from Sargent to his wife, Margaret Percy Sargent, and other members of his family. There are also an account book, 1842-1846, relating to the estate of George Washington Sargent's mother, Mary McIntosh Williams Sargent, including her land holdings in Mississippi and Louisiana, and another account book that is pasted over with political newspaper clippings, 1862-1900.