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 Edith M. Dabbs Collection of Papers Relating to Saint Helena Island, S.C. #4285, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Alternate Form of Material

Photocopy of transcription of Laura M. Towne diary available on microfilm.

Acquisitions Information

Received from Edith M. Dabbs of Mayesville, S.C., in 1963, 1965, 1967, and 1975; and from the Guilford College Library in December 2018 (Acc. 103507).

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: Roslyn Holdzkom, February 1988

Encoded by: Roslyn Holdzkom, July 2007

Updated by: Kathryn Michaelis, October 2009; Nancy Kaiser, January 2019

Material in this collection was removed from the James McBride Dabbs Papers (#3816) in July 1981.

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.

• African Americans--Education--South Carolina--History.
• African Americans--South Carolina--History.
• African Americans--South Carolina--Social life and customs.
• Buildings--South Carolina--Saint Helena Island.
• Capers, Abigail.
• Confederate States of America--Social conditions.
• Dabbs, Edith M.
• Diaries.
• Education--South Carolina--History.
• Freedmen--South Carolina.
• Laurell Hill Plantation (Saint Helena Island, S.C.)
• Penn School (Saint Helena Island, S.C.)
• Plantations--South Carolina--History--18th century.
• Port Royal (S.C.)--History.
• Saint Helena Island (S.C.)--History.
• Saint Helena Island (S.C.)--Social life and customs.
• Sea Islands--Pictorial works.
• Sea Islands--Social conditions.
• Sea Islands--Social life and customs.
• South Carolina--History--1865-.
• South Carolina--History--Civil War, 1861-1865.
• Towne, Laura Matilda, 1825-1901.
• United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--African Americans.
• United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Occupied territories.

• James McBride Dabbs Papers (#3816)
• Penn School Papers (#3615)
• Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007), interview with Edith M. Dabbs (G-0022)

Edith Mitchell Dabbs, a white author, was born in 1906 in Dalzell, Sumter County, S.C. She married James McBride Dabbs in 1935, and, in 1937, settled at Rip Raps Plantation, the Dabbs family home just outside Sumter. She was active in documenting the history of Saint Helena Island, S.C., an interest stemming from her knowledge of Penn School, a school for African Americans that functioned on the Island between 1862 and 1948, with which both she and her husband were involved.

The collection assembled by Edith M. Dabbs, a white author, includes a handwritten transcription of a letter, 1791, from Abigail Capers, Saint Helena Island, S.C., describing her life at Laurell Hill, an indigo plantation; a photocopy of a transcription of parts of a diary, 1862-1864, of Penn School founder Laura M. Towne (1825-1901), with discussions of African Americans on Saint Helena Island, the work of members of the Port Royal Experiment there, Union troops in the area during the Civil War, and other matters; photographs of drawings, probably 1860s, of buildings on Saint Helena Island; other items relating to Penn School and to life on Saint Helena Island; and drafts of "Walking Tall".

• Pictures (P-4285/1-14)
• Microfilm (M-4285/1)