Back to TopDescriptive Summary
- Repository
-
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library. Southern Historical Collection.
- Creator
-
Oaksmith, Appleton, ca. 1825-1887.
- Title
- Appleton Oaksmith Papers, 1825-1888
- Call Number
- 2193-z
- Language of Materials
- Materials in
English
- Extent
-
- Items: About 110.
- Linear Feet: 0
Abstract
Appleton Oaksmith, North Carolina state legislator from Carteret County, N.C., was the son of Seba Smith (1792-1868), Maine
and New York political humorist, and Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith (1806-1893), author, lecturer,and reformer, who used the
name Ernest Helfenstein.
This collection contains scattered papers, consisting chiefly of postwar legal papers and letters concerning the Carolina
City Land Company of Carteret County and Oaksmith's detailed diary of an unsuccessful shipping venture in 1855 in which his
ship was seized near Mobile, Ala., apparently while carrying arms to Cuba. Other papers include a dozen letters, 1874-1877,
written by Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith from North Carolina to William J. Spence, Long Island, N.Y., concerning race relations
and the temperance movement. Also included is a broadside, 1825, advertising for the return of runaway slaves in Maryland.
Back to TopAdministrative Information
- Restrictions to Access
- No restrictions.
- Usage Restrictions
- No restrictions
- Alternate Form of Material
- Microfilm copy available.
Reel 1: Entire collection
- Acquisitions Information
- Received from Geraldine Oaksmith, of Brooklyn, N.Y., in April 1953, and purchased from Charles Hamilton, Autographs, Inc.,
in December 1959.
- Processing Information
- Processed by: Suzanne Ruffing, August 1996
- Encoded by: Russell Michalak, May 2006
- This collection was processed with support from the Randleigh Foundation Trust.
- Preferred Citation
- [Identification of item], in the Appleton Oaksmith Papers #2193-z, Southern Historical Collection, The 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.
Back to TopOnline Catalog Headings
These and related materials may be found under the following headings in online catalogs.
- Carolina City Land Company (Carteret County, N.C.)
- Diaries.
- Fugitive slaves--Maryland.
- Land companies--North Carolina--History--19th century.
- Oaksmith, Appleton, ca. 1825-1887.
- Race relations--North Carolina--History --19th century.
- Seizure of vessels and cargoes--History--19th century.
- Shipping --United States--History--19th century.
- Smith, Elizabeth Oakes Prince, 1806-1893.
- Temperance--North Carolina--History--19th century.
Back to TopBiographical Note
Appleton Oaksmith (ca. 1825-1887) of Carteret County, N.C., was the son of Seba Smith and Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith. Elizabeth
Oakes Prince Smith (1806-1893) was a Northern abolitionist who came to the South in the pre-Civil War period to make speeches
and engaged in temperance and religious missionary work in the South after the war. She was a writer whose articles were published
in monthly magazines in the North. Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith served as pastor of the Independent Church, Canastota, Madison
County, N.Y., in 1887. Seba Smith was a journalist, owner of the Courier, and was the author of "Major Jack Downing's Letters," which, according to a clipping in the collection, were "very pungent and amusing productions that were a great hit in the times of Andrew Jackson's administration." He was chief editor of the Great Republic Monthly.
Appleton Oaksmith was a representative of Carteret County in the North Carolina legislature in 1874. He was connected with
the Carolina City Company (also known as the Carolina City Land Company), being appointed its agent in Carteret County in
1884 and its receiver when it was dissolved in 1886. He and his wife, Augusta, had at least four daughters, Elizabeth, Corine,
Mildred, and Pauline, who drowned 4 July 1879.
(For further information, see Selections from the Autobiography of Elizabeth Oakes Smith, edited by Mary Alice Wyman (Columbia University Press: New York, 1924), and Two American Pioneers, Seba Smith and Elizabeth Oakes Smith (Columbia University Press: New York, 1927).
Back to TopCollection Overview
The collection of Appleton Oaksmith of Carteret County, N.C., contains scattered papers, consisting chiefly of postwar legal papers and letters concerning the Carolina City Land Company of Carteret County and Oaksmith's detailed diary of an unsuccessful shipping venture in 1855 in which his ship was seized near Mobile, Ala., apparently while carrying arms to Cuba. Other papers include a dozen letters, 1874-1877, written by Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith from North Carolina to William J. Spence, Long Island, N.Y., concerning race relations and the temperance movement. Also included is a broadside, 1825, advertising for the return of runaway slaves in Maryland.
Back to TopArrangement of Collection
1. Correspondence and Related Material
2. Volumes
3. Pictures
Back to TopItems Separated
Photographs (P-2193/1-2; SF-P-2193/3-4)
Back to TopDetailed Description of the Collection
1. Correspondences and Related Material, 1825-1888 and undated.
About 100 items.
Arrangement: chronological.
Items before 1884 include an advertisement for two runaway slaves, 26 September 1825, by Benjamin Chambers, Baltimore (noted
missing, May 1995); a letter, 1855, between two Oaksmith brothers; a list, 1859, by Seba Smith of the authors, among whom
were E. Oakes Smith, Edward Oaksmith, and Appleton Oaksmith, of articles appearing in the January and February 1859, editions
of the Great Republic Monthly; a letter, 1860, from Mary Livingstone Thomsin(?) in Paris to Oaksmith about a land transaction; a letter, 1875, to Philip
Ripley from Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith asking if he were the same Colonel Riplay stationed at Newport, N.C., during the
Civil War and if he would raise money for a destitute widow, Mrs. Yorke; a letter, 1880, written from the United States Consulate
in Nagasaki, Japan, concerning the appearance of Japan and trade possibilities in the Orient; a letter, 1881, to Appleton
Oaksmith from John Rumley, clerk in the office of the Board of County Commissioners, Beaufort, N.C., inviting him to attend
a meeting to discuss the railroad debt of Carteret County; two extracts from the minutes of the Board of Commissioners of
Carteret County, 1883, where Oaksmith was appointed as a committee of one to arrange with the Atlantic and North Carolina
Railroad Company for the establishment of stations in that county; and two letters, 1883, concerning a personal financial
arrangement of Oaksmith with the National Bank of New Bern, N.C.
There are ten letters of Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith, 1874-1877, to William J. Spence and his wife at Blue Point, Long Island,
N.Y., who shared her interest in the temperance movement and belonged to a "Division" that she had been associated with when she was living with her son Alvin at Blue Point. The letters contain a description
of her life in the wilderness of Carteret County where she lived with her son Appleton; comments on current politics, race
relations, and economic conditions in North Carolina; her desire to work for the cause of temperance and to organize local
groups and the factors that prevented this activity; the politics and activities of her son Appleton; articles she sent for
publication in the Advance; lectures, 1876; and messages to the Division in New York.
Legal papers and letters concerning the Carolina City Land Company begin in 1884 and include Oaksmith's appointment as agent
in Carteret County, 1884; material relating to the case of Ellen Mason v. the Carolina City Land Company; correspondence about Oaksmith's efforts to get the charter of the company extended and dealings with the Atlantic and North
Carolina Railroad Company, 1885; and papers about Oaksmith's role as receiver of the company, 1886.
Other papers include a letter from Oaksmith to his mother, 1885; letters, 1887-1888, addressed to Mrs. Appleton Oaksmith,
mainly expressing sympathy at his death, with some material about the Carolina City Company; and one letter, 1887, to Elizabeth
Oakes Prince Smith requesting an article on her personal reminiscences of eminent men.
Related papers include two unsigned poems; sketches of Carteret County and General Collier C. Hornsby; a paper relating to
the Carolina City Land Company; and clippings, 1856-1887 and undated. These clippings include poems by Bessie, Corinne, and
Appleton Oaksmith; articles on political, legal, and economic affairs; a letter to the editor of the New York World by Elizabeth Oakes Prince Smith and several articles commenting on this letter; and an article containing tongue-twisters
and attributing them to a Richmond Normal School class of elocution.
Folder
1
1825-1884
Folder
2
1885-1887
Folder
3
1888 and undated
Back to Top
2 items.
Arrangement: chronological.
Folder
4
Volume 1
Diary of Appleton Oaksmith in Mobile, Ala. The first twenty pages are a narrative intended to bring members of Oaksmith's
family up to date on his business ventures, described in some detail, and to exonerate himself from wrongdoing. The rest of
the diary describes the trial in Mobile. Oaksmith went to Washington and back to Mobile before the diary ended on 15 October.
The diary is primarily the account of legal problems Oaksmith had in Mobile when a Revenue Cutter seized Oaksmith's merchant
vessel, the Magnolia, outside of Mobile Bay on charges of violation of the neutrality act. The vessel was destined for either Venezuela or Cuba,
but its cargo, which consisted of guns, ammunition, and stores, was seized by the United States government. Another of his
vessels, the Amelia, was threatened with seizure as well, due to its similar destination and cargo. Oaksmith then traveled from Savannah, where
he had been conducting business, to Mobile to confer with the district attorney and port officials. The government decided
to prosecute Oaksmith, who hired an attorney, a Mr. Bailey, to defend his interests. The trial opened on 16 July 1855 in Mobile
and, on July 19, the day before the verdict was to be handed down, Oaksmith, with his brother Sidney and other unnamed men,
hired a vessel and went to sea to intercept the Amelia. After finding the Amelia on 8 August and transacting business with the captain, Oaksmith returned to Mobile to learn that the case of the Magnolia had been decided in his favor. The government appealed and later seized the cargo in spite of the verdict.
Folder
5
Volume 2, September 1875
Log of the schooner "Minnie" on voyage from Patchogue, N.Y., to Hollywood, N.C., kept by Appleton Oaksmith.
Back to Top
4 items.
Image
P-2193/1
Photograph of Colonel Roy F. Lenister, Adjutant General of North Carolina, undated
Image
P-2193/2
Photograph of Joseph F. Armfield, Adjutant General of North Carolina, undated
Special Format Image
SF-P-2193/3
Stereoptican view of the Senate in the North Carolina legislature, 1874
Special Format Image
SF-P-2193/4
Stereoptican view of the House of Representatives in the North Carolina legislature, 1874
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