Manuscripts Department
Library of the University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill
SOUTHERN HISTORICAL COLLECTION
#3291
BENJAMIN FITZPATRICK PAPERS
Inventory
Abstract: Benjamin Fitzpatrick politician, lawyer, and
cotton planter of the Oak Grove Plantation, Wetumpka,
Autauga (now Elmore) County, Ala.
Chiefly papers of Benjamin Fitzpatrick, along with
some papers of his son, Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr.
(1854-1892). Papers of the elder Fitzpatrick consist
of documents relating to his legal practice;
plantations records, including receipts and bills of
sale for slaves; material from his political career as
governor of Alabama, 1841-1844, as U.S. senator and
representative from Alabama, 1848-1860, and as nominee
for the Democratic vice-presidential candidacy in
1860; and personal correspondence, including letters
from political allies, such as Dixon Hall Lewis, and
from Fitzpatrick to his wife and son. There are also
letters from other members of the Fitzpatrick family,
including one describing West Texas in the 1840s. The
papers of Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr., 1854-1892,
consist of school compositions and essays he wrote
while a student at the Greene Springs School, run by
Henry Tutwiler, in Hale County, Ala.; letters to and
from his mother, Aurelia Blassingame Fitzpatrick, and
other family members; and financial and legal
documents relating to his law career.
Online Catalog Terms:
Alabama--Politics and government--To 1865.
Autauga County (Ala.)--Social life and customs--19th century.
Democratic National Convention (1860 : Baltimore, Md.).
Democratic Party (Ala.)--History--19th century.
Democratic Party (U.S.)--History--19th century.
Elections--United States--History--19th century.
Elmore County (Ala.)--History--19th century.
Fitzpatrick, Aurelia Blassingame, fl. 1840s-1870s.
Fitzpatrick, Benjamin, 1802-1869.
Fitzpatrick, Benjamin, 1854-1892.
Fitzpatrick family.
Governors--Alabama--History--19th century.
Greene Springs School (Hale County, Ala.).
Lawyers--Alabama--History--19th century.
Lewis, Dixon Hall, 1802-1848.
Mothers and sons--Alabama--History--19th century.
Oak Grove Plantation (Wetumpka, Ala.).
Plantations--Alabama--Autauga County.
Political conventions--United States--History--19th century.
Politicians--Alabama--History--19th century.
Presidents--United States--Election--1860.
School prose, American--Alabama--History--19th century.
Slave bills of sale--Alabama.
Slavery--Alabama.
Texas--Description and travel--19th century.
Tutwiler, Henry, 1807-1884.
United States. Congress--History--19th century.
Size: 208 items (0.5 linear feet).
Provenance: Received from Benjamin Fitzpatrick of Jasmine
Hill, Wetumpka, Ala. in 1957.
Access: No restrictions.
Processing Note: 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.
Copyright: Retained by the authors of items in these papers, or
their descendants, as stipulated by United States
copyright law.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Biographical Note
Collection Overview
Series Descriptions
Series 1. Benjamin Fitzpatrick
Series 2. Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr.
Shelf List
INTRODUCTION
Biographical Note
Benjamin Fitzpatrick, son of William and Anne Phillips
Fitzpatrick, was born 30 June 1802 in Greene County, Ga. In
1816, he moved to Alabama, where he studied law and was admitted
to the bar in 1823. He retired from the practice of law in 1827
due to ill health and became a successful planter on his estate
"Oak Grove" in Autauga (now Elmore) County, a few miles from
Montgomery. In 1827, he married Sarah Terry Elmore (1807-1837),
member of a prominent Alabama family, and became a brother-in-law
by marriage to Dixon Hall Lewis (1802-1848), a powerful
states-rights advocate in Congress from 1829 to 1848. In 1840,
Fitzpatrick campaigned for Martin Van Buren, and was awarded with
the Democratic Party's nomination for the governorship of
Alabama. He was elected in 1841, and served two terms. In 1844,
he retired once again to his Oak Grove plantation, but reentered
politics when called upon to fill the U.S. Senate seat of Dixon
Lewis, who died in 1848. In 1853, he was once again appointed to
fill a U.S. Senate seat, this time that of William Rufus DuVane
King, and he was elected for a full term in 1855. In 1860, he
was nominated by the National Democratic Convention in Baltimore
for vice-president on the Douglas ticket. He refused this
nomination. He opposed secession, but supported the Confederate
cause. After the outbreak of the Civil War, he retired once more
to Oak Grove, where he died on 21 November 1869.
Benjamin Fitzpatrick had several children with Sarah Elmore:
Elmore Joseph, Phillips (1830-1901), Morris, James Madison, and
John Archer. In 1837, Sarah died, and, in 1846, Fitzpatrick
married Aurelia Rachel Blassingame. Their only surviving child
was Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr. (1854-1892).
Collection Overview
This collection consists chiefly of the business, political,
and personal papers of Benjamin Fitzpatrick from 1819 to 1869,
including legal and financial documents, letters from his
political allies, and other material relating to his political
career; and the papers of his son Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr.,
consisting of school compositions and speeches, letters from his
mother, Aurelia Blassingame Fitzgerald, and other relatives,
1868-1871, and legal and financial documents, 1873-1892. There
are also newspaper clippings on Benjamin Fitzpatrick's role in
the Baltimore Convention of 1860 and obituaries on his death in
1869, as well a copy of his 1841 inaugural address as governor of
Alabama.
The arrangement scheme is as follows:
Series 1. Benjamin Fitzpatrick (116 items)
Subseries 1.1. Business, Financial, Personal, and
Political Papers, 1819-1869
Subseries 1.2. Newspaper Clippings and Miscellaneous
Items, undated
Series 2. Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr. (92 items)
Subseries 2.1. School Compositions and Correspondence,
ca. 1868-1872
Subseries 2.2. Financial and Legal Papers, 1873-1892
SERIES DESCRIPTIONS
Series 1. Benjamin Fitzpatrick
Business, financial, political, and personal papers of
Benjamin Fitzpatrick, 1819-1869, as well as newspaper clippings
on his life and reminiscences by members of his family.
Subseries 1.1. Business, Financial, Personal, and Political
Papers
1819-1869. 101 items.
Arrangement: chronological.
Business, financial, personal, and political papers consisting
of receipts for the purchase of slaves by his nephews, David and
William Baldwin; Fitzpatrick's commission as a member of the
Alabama state militia in 1823; receipts for the purchase of
slaves and land, and for the sale of cotton; documents and
correspondence relating to Fitzpatrick's legal practice; a letter
dated 1831 from R. Safford regarding Andrew Jackson's election
and Cabinet, and the upcoming gubernatorial race in Alabama; and
letters to and from various family members, including a letter
dated 1849 from A. Fitzpatrick in Arenoso near Texana, Texas, a
brother of Benjamin Fitzpatrick, to his nephew Phillips
Fitzpatrick, comparing the states of Louisiana and Texas in terms
of quality of life and agricultural value, and describing methods
of conducting business and setting up a plantation in West Texas.
Fitzpatrick's political papers include a letter from Dixon H.
Lewis, 1841, on the state of the Democratic Party in Alabama,
Lewis's opinions on abolitionists, various political figures in
Washington, the disarray of the Whig Party, and his observations
regarding Clement Comer Clay (1789-1866), fellow U.S. Senator
from Alabama. There is also a printed copy of Fitzpatrick's
inaugural address in 1841, and an original copy and a typed
transcription of his second inaugural address in 1843.
For Benjamin Fitzpatrick's U.S. Senate career, there are
documents relating to the purchase of a share of the steamboat
"Watumpka" in Cincinnati; a letter, presumably by Benjamin
Fitzpatrick to a constituent, describing the events leading up
the the admission of Kansas to the Union; and a letter from
Benjamin Fitzpatrick to Colonel Albert James Pickett (1810-1858)
in Autaugaville, Ala., regarding a claim before Congress on
behalf of the Creek Indian tribe, asking for his testimony.
There is a great deal of material dealing with the Baltimore
Convention of 1860 and Fitzpatrick's nomination for
vice-president on the Douglas ticket by the National Democratic
Convention, including an official letter from the Convention
informing him of the nomination; telegrams urging him to accept
or reject the offer; and letters to friends explaining his
decision to decline and views on the upcoming election.
There are documents from the Civil War years about the
embrasure of mules by the Confederate Army, a Confederate bond,
records of tax payments for agricultural products, and receipts
for the sale of corn to the Confederate Army. There is a typed
transcription of a letter Fitzpatrick wrote his son Elmore in
Mobile in which he informed his son of prominent northern
statesmen who would aid him if captured by the Union Army, and a
letter of acknowledgment from the U.S. State Department regarding
Fitzpatrick's presidential pardon in 1865. There are also
several letters dated 1868 and 1869 to his son Benjamin
Fitzpatrick, Jr. and his wife Aurelia giving family news.
Letters to his son include fatherly advice and news from home
while Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr., was studying under the care of
his uncle Albert in Mobile. There are other letters from this
period in Series 2.1.
Folder 1 1819-1825
2 1826-1829
3 1830-1838
4 1840-1843
5 1844-1857
6 1858-1869
Subseries 1.2. Newspaper Clippings and Miscellaneous Items
Undated. 15 items.
Newspaper clippings relating to Benjamin Fitzpatrick's
nomination as vice-president during the National Democratic
Convention in Baltimore in 1860, obituaries, and other clippings
about him; a typed transcription of a reminiscence of
Fitzpatrick's Oak Grove plantation by his niece Mary Glenn
Brickell; and the lyrics to a song by Fitzpatrick's nephew
William O. Baldwin called "Wait for the Wagon," on his decision
to leave politics and not to run for a seat in the Confederate
Congress.
Folder 7 Undated material about Benjamin Fitzpatrick
8 Newspaper clippings about Benjamin Fitzpatrick
Series 2. Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr.
Personal, financial, and legal papers of Benjamin Fitzpatrick,
Jr., 1868-1892 including school compositions, letters to and from
members of his family, and legal and financial documents.
Subseries 2.1. School Compositions and Correspondence and
Related Items.
ca. 1868-1872 and undated. 81 items.
Arrangement: roughly chronological.
Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr.'s school compositions while
attending the Greene Springs School near Havana, Hale County,
Alabama. This schools was directed by Henry Tutwiler and his
daughters. Included are essays, course of readings, speeches,
Bible lessons, and a translation from Virgil; a handwritten copy
of a song or poem entitled "Little Breeches" by John Hay and
copies of two debating society speeches from 1872; a number of
letters written to Benjamin, Jr., while at the Greene Springs
School and in Mobile, mostly undated, from Fitzpatrick's mother
Aurelia Blassingame Fitzpatrick, detailing family and
neighborhood activities; and several letters from Benjamin
Fitzpatrick, Jr. to and from his cousins at home and to his
mother. Note that there are letters from this period in Series
1.1.
Folders 9 Compositions and speeches, 1872 and undated
10 Correspondence, 1870-1872
11 Correspondence, undated (ca. 1868-1872)
Subseries 2.2. Financial and Legal Papers
1873-1892. 11 items.
Arrangement: chronological.
Will of Aurelia Blassingame Fitzpatrick, mother of Benjamin
Fitzpatrick, Jr.; several promissory notes to various individuals
from Benjamin Fitzpatrick, Jr.; legal documents relating to his
law career; and a list of his solicitor's fees for 1890; a bill
for the court costs relating to his will, 1892.
Folder 12 1873-1892
SHELF LIST
Box 1 (only)