Inventory of the Green Nicholson Cipher Book and Receipt, 1820s-1850s
Collection Number 5221-z
Manuscripts Department, Library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- Contact Information:
- Manuscripts Department
- CB#3926, Wilson Library
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- Chapel Hill, NC 27514-8890
- Phone: 919/962-1345
- Fax: 919/962-3594
- Email: mss@email.unc.edu
- URL: http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/
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Descriptive Summary
- Repository
- Southern Historical Collection
- Creator
- Nicholson, Green, 1811-1880.
- Title
- Green Nicholson Cipher Book and Receipt, 1820s-1850s
- Call Number
- 5221-z
- Language of Materials
- Materials in English
- Extent
-
- Items: 2
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Administrative Information
- Acquisitions Information
- Received from James Haverson Bradley of Elizabethtown, N.C., in June 2005 (Acc. 100104).
- Preferred Citation
- [Identification of item], in the Green Nicholson Cipher Book and Receipt #5221-z, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
- Copyright Notice
- Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.
Online Catalog Headings
These and related materials may be found under the following headings in online catalogs.
- Mathematics--Problems, exercises, etc.--History--19th century.
- Nicholson, Green, 1811-1880.
- Orange County (N.C.)--History.
- Teachers--North Carolina--History--19th century.
Biographical Note
Green Nicholson was born on 24 November 1811 and appears to have been a traveling school teacher in Orange County, N.C., during the late 1820s and early 1830s. He married Mary Sharp on 4 October 1832, and they had four children before she died on 15 April 1841. His second marriage was to Mary Phillips on 16 November 1842, and they had six children. Nicholson's second wife died on 18 November 1873, and he died on 20 November 1880.
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The collection consists of a cipher book produced by Green Nicholson and containing rules for various mathematical operations, examples of the use of these rules, and scattered genealogical notes. The mathematical content of the book appears to have been written around 1829 to 1832. The genealogical notes were added at various times through the 1850s and record the births, marriages, or deaths of Nicholson's first wife, Mary Sharp, and many of his children. These notes also include the birth dates of five Payne children born between 1821 and 1832 and of uncertain relation to Green Nicholson. The collection also contains a receipt, 13 January 1832, from Benjamin Sharp to Green Nicholson for farm labor.
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Detailed Description of the Collection
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