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This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held in the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in our reading room, and not digitally available through the World Wide Web. See the Duplication Policy section for more information.
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Collection Overview
| Size | 2.5 feet of linear shelf space (approximately 750 items) |
| Abstract | Papers of lawyer, North Carolina state legislator, congressman, and Democratic Party politician, Benjamin Hickman Bunn (1844-1907) include political correspondence, legal documents, financial materials, and some items related to the Bunn family of Nash County, N.C. Political correspondence chiefly concerns congressional elections and North Carolina Democratic Party conventions in the 1880s and 1890s and contains frequent references to the North Carolina Farmers' Alliance. Other political materials are speeches, petitions to the North Carolina General Assembly and to U.S. Representative Bunn who represented North Carolina's fourth congressional district. Slight family correspondence is primarily with Bunn's daughters. Legal documents include deeds, indentures, contracts, a will, and court documents, such as summons for relief, depositions, and reports of referees. Of note are court documents for Hilliard v. Rowland which originated in Nash County, N.C., and was heard by the State Supreme Court of North Carolina in 1873. Financial materials are chiefly receipts and account balance sheets. Other items include an essay on "Bootlicking" (circa 1855) by Bunn's brother William, a University of North Carolina student, notebooks with remedies and pharmaceutical uses for various substances, certificates of membership to masonic temples, a wedding invitation, and a genealogical file compiled by descendants. |
| Creator | Bunn, Benjamin Hickman, 1844-1907. |
| Language | English |
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Information For Users
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Subject Headings
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.
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Biographical Information
Lawyer, legislator, and Democratic Party politician, Benjamin Hickman Bunn (1844-1907) served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1889 to 1895 for North Carolina's fourth congressional district. He chaired the Committee on Claims. Prior to his election to Congress, Bunn practiced law in Nash County, N.C., as the county attorney and the attorney for the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad. Following the incorporation of Rocky Mount, N.C., in 1867, Bunn became the town's first mayor. He was elected to North Carolina's constitutional convention in 1875 and was a delegate to the 1880 Democratic National Convention. In 1882, he was elected to the North Carolina General Assembly and chaired a joint committee on the code. Following his congressional service, Bunn was postmaster for Rocky Mount and had a brief term as head of Rocky Mount Mills.
Bunn was born 19 October 1844 to Redmond Bunn and Mary Hickman Bryan Bunn of Nash County, N.C., and was educated at Rocky Mount Academy. Prior to his matriculation at The University of North Carolina, the American Civil War started, and Bunn enlisted in the Confederate States of America Army, serving as a lieutenant in the 47th North Carolina Regiment and later as captain for a company of sharpshooters with the Army of Northern Virginia. He was wounded at the battles of Gettysburg and Petersburg. His two brothers, William Henry Bunn and Elias Bunn, died in the war. After the war, he read law in Goldsboro, N.C., and received his license to practice in 1866.
Bunn married Harriet Philips of Edgecombe County, N.C. in 1871, and the couple had nine children James, Mary, Benjamin, Jr., Annie Lee, Laura-Maude, Catherine, Hattie, Bessie, and Redmond. Bunn died on 25 August 1907 at his home, Benevenue, near Rocky Mount.
For more biographical information, see Claiborne T. Smith, Jr.'s 1979 article in the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, edited by William S. Powell. Copyright 1979-1996 by the University of North Carolina Press.
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Scope and Content
Papers of lawyer, North Carolina state legislator, congressman, and Democratic Party politician, Benjamin Hickman Bunn (1844-1907) include correspondence, legal documents, financial materials, and some items related to the Bunn family of Nash County, N.C. Political correspondence chiefly concerns congressional elections and North Carolina Democratic Party conventions in the 1880s and 1890s and contains frequent references to the North Carolina Farmers' Alliance.
Slight family correspondence is primarily with Bunn's daughters.
Legal documents include deeds, indentures, contracts, a will, and court documents, such as summons for relief, depositions, and reports of referees, for superior courts in Nash, Edgecomber, and Wilson counties. Of note are court documents for Hilliard v. Rowland which originated in Nash County, N.C., Superior Court and was heard by the State Supreme Court of North Carolina in 1873.
Political materials are speeches, petitions to the North Carolina General Assembly and to U.S. Representative Bunn who represented North Carolina's fourth congressional district.
Financial materials are chiefly receipts and account balance sheets.
Other items include an essay on "Bootlicking" (circa 1855) by Bunn's brother William Henry Bunn, a University of North Carolina student, notebooks with remedies and pharmaceutical uses for various substances, certificates of membership to masonic temples, a wedding invitation, and a genealogical file compiled by descendants.
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Series Quick Links
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Series 1. Correspondence
| Folder 1 |
1882-1883 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 1Of interest is a letter dated 12 February 1883 addressed to the United States House of Representatives and the Senate from the "one armed and one legged soldiers of North Carolina." The letter's authors decry the appropriations for free schools, "which the many journals of the state seem to howl over as the greatest blessing or the savior of the next generation" and the lack of aid given to "the claims of the most miserable and destitute class of people of the state- the negro children or the white children not excepted for they are able to work." Other letters pertain to pension claims and taxes for building a jail. |
| Folder 2 |
1886-1888 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 2Includes a letter dated 4 January 1888 from a member of the Nash County, N.C., Commissioners pertaining to the county jail which had burned down. Other letters concern elections and Bunn's political rivals. |
| Folder 3 |
1889 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 3Of interest is a letter dated 20 June 1889 from Charles N. Hunter editor of the The Progressive Educator to the Superintendent of the Census. Hunter writes that the "results of Negro emancipation in the United States as evidence in the material, moral and intellectual advancement of the race during the past twenty-five years, is a subject of deepest interest to all the people of the Republic." He seeks census information including figures for farm land, town lots, horses, mules, stocks, churches, and schools owned by African Americans, cash in hand, invested, and saved by African Americans, and the amount of "taxes realized" from said property and "Negro Polls." |
| Folder 4 |
January-February 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 4Of interest is a circular letter dated 28 February 1890 to "the Working People of North Carolina" from the Knights of Labor pertaining to the shared demands--including abolition of the national bank and coinage of silver--of the Knights of Labor and the National Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Union. |
| Folder 5 |
March-April 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 5Topics addressed include congressional nominations, political support, the Farmers' Alliance, and the national cemetery. |
| Folder 6-7 |
May 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 6-7Of interest is a letter dated 4 May 1890 from Josephus Daniels editor of The State Chronicle about a letter he reluctantly published from a "prominent [Farmers'] Alliance man of this county." |
| Folder 8 |
June 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 8Chiefly letters concerning the North Carolina Farmers' State Alliance. |
| Folder 9-10 |
July 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 9-10Chiefly letters concerning candidates and the political convention. |
| Folder 11 |
August-September 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 11Includes a circular letter dated 16 September 1890 to the voters of the fourth congressional district in North Carolina from George L. Tonnoffski running as an independent for Congress. |
| Folder 12 |
November-December 1890 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 12Includes a letter of congratulations dated 7 November 1890 for Benjamin Bunn's electoral victory. |
| Folder 13 |
1891 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 13
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| Folder 14 |
January-February 1892 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 14Chiefly concerning the North Carolina Farmers' State Alliance. |
| Folder 15 |
March 1892 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 15Chiefly letters concerning political topics. Includes a letter dated 18 March 1892 warning that "Unless the Democratic convention incorporates into its platform measures of radical financial reform sufficient to satisfy the urgent demands of the masses there is no use for it to nominate a ticket." |
| Folder 16-19 |
June 1892 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 16-19Chiefly letters concerning the political convention and nominations. |
| Folder 20 |
July-November 1892 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 20Chiefly letters concerning politic topics including post office appointments. |
| Folder 21 |
February-March 1894 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 21Includes a family letter dated 4 February 1894 from Bessie to Hattie. |
| Folder 22-25 |
May 1894 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 22-25Chiefly letters concerning the political convention and nominations. |
| Folder 26-30 |
June 1894 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 26-30Chiefly letters concerning the political convention and nominations. |
| Folder 31-32 |
July 1894 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 31-32Chiefly letters concerning the political convention and nominations. |
| Folder 33 |
August-December 1894 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 33
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| Folder 34 |
1895 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 34Includes a family letter dated 3 February 1895 from Mary to Hattie. |
| Folder 35 |
1896 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 35
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| Folder 36 |
1897 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 36Includes a family letter dated 24 October 1897 to Bessie from her mother "H.N. Bunn." |
| Folder 37 |
1898-1900 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 37Chiefly family letters to and from women. |
| Folder 38 |
1901 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 38Chiefly family letters to and from women. |
| Folder 39 |
1902-1906 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 39Chiefly family letters to and from women. |
| Folder 40 |
1907-1908 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 40Includes a letter dated 4 May 1907 concerning Locke Craig as a possible North Carolina gubernatorial candidate and seeking Benjamin Bunn's opinion of him. |
| Folder 41 |
1909-1910 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 41Chiefly family letters to and from women. |
| Folder 42 |
1916-1918 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 42Chiefly family letters to and from women. |
| Folder 43 |
1919-1921 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 43Chiefly family letters to and from women. |
| Folder 44 |
Undated letters, circa 1880-1930 #05677, Series: "1. Correspondence " Folder 44Chiefly family correspondence. |
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Series 2. Legal and Political Materials
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Series 3. Financial Materials
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Series 4. Other Materials
Processed by: Laura Hart, March 2016
Encoded by: Laura Hart, March 2016
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