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Size | 0.5 feet of linear shelf space (approximately 150 items) |
Abstract | Nicholas Washington Woodfin, a white lawyer and legislator of Buncombe County, N.C., was married to Eliza G. McDowell Woodfin. His papers, which are chiefly photocopies, include three letters written from Albert McDowell, an enslaved or formerly enslaved person who had gone to California with Samuel McDowell to work in the gold fields; county deeds; indentuaries; estate papers; scattered family, business, and political correspondence, including letters of John W. Holland, including a few dated 1898-1901 when he was serving in the United States Army in the Philippines; American Civil War letters, including an original 1862 letter from Woodfin to Governor Clarke about the defense of eastern Tennessee; clippings; obituaries; family history materials; and speeches on agriculture. Other items include the bill of auction for the Woodfin Mansion House and Grounds in Asheville, N.C., to be sold 13 August 1879; a biographical sketch of Woodfin written by J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton in February 1950; remarks made at a presentation of Woodfin's portrait in Asheville in 1950; and a land warrant from Governor Patrick Henry to William Gibbs (apparently unrelated to the rest of the collection). |
Creator | Woodfin, Nicholas Washington, 1810-1876. |
Curatorial Unit | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library. Southern Historical Collection. |
Language | English |
Processed by: SHC Staff and Amy Johnson, September 2007
Encoded by: Amy Johnson, September 2007
Conscious Editing Work by: Nancy Kaiser, July 2020. Updated abstract, subject headings, scope and content note, and container list.
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Back to TopThe 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.
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Nicholas Washington Woodfin was born in Buncombe County, N.C., on 29 January 1810. In February 1831, he was admitted to practice law in the county courts, and soon after settled in Asheville, N.C. In 1840, Woodfin married Eliza Grace McDowell; the couple had three daughters. For ten years starting in 1844, Woodfin represented Buncombe and Henderson counties in the state senate. He was active on the Asheville school board and in the Episcopal church, and acted as the Buncombe County delegate to the North Carolina Secession Convention. During the Civil War, he was superintendent of the North Carolina Salt Works. Afterwards, he returned to the practice of law and died on 23 May 1876. The town of Woodfin, N.C., in Bumcombe County, is named for him.
(Details from Samuel Ashe's The Biography of North Carolina (volume II, 1905, pages 481-86) and townofwoodfin.org.)
Back to TopNicholas Washington Woodfin, a white lawyer and legislator of Buncombe County, N.C., was married to Eliza G. McDowell Woodfin. His papers, which are chiefly photocopies, include three letters written from Albert McDowell, an enslaved or formerly enslaved person who had gone to California with Samuel McDowell to work in the gold fields; county deeds; indentuaries; estate papers; scattered family, business, and political correspondence, including letters of John W. Holland, including a few dated 1898-1901 when he was serving in the United States Army in the Philippines; American Civil War letters, including an original 1862 letter from Woodfin to Governor Clarke about the defense of eastern Tennessee; clippings; obituaries; family history materials; and speeches on agriculture. Other items include the bill of auction for the Woodfin Mansion House and Grounds in Asheville, N.C., to be sold 13 August 1879; a biographical sketch of Woodfin written by J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton in February 1950; remarks made at a presentation of Woodfin's portrait in Asheville in 1950; and a land warrant from Governor Patrick Henry to William Gibbs (apparently unrelated to the rest of the collection).
Back to TopPhotocopy of the bill of auction for the Woodfin Mansion House and Grounds in Asheville, N.C., to be sold 13 August 1879, for division among Woodfin's three daughters, and a biographical sketch of Woodfin written by J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton in February 1950 to be attached to the portrait of Woodfin hung in the Asheville YMCA. (The portrait was donated to the Southern Historical Collection in November 1949 by Mrs. Oscar Mauldin. As of June 2006, it was hanging in Room 901-H in the Manuscripts Department.)
Folder 1 |
Papers, 1879, 1950 |
Arrangement: chronological.
Processing Note: Additions were merged and arranged chronologically.
Photocopies of three letters, 1853-1855, from enslaved or formerly enslaved people who had gone to California with members of the family to work in the gold fields; American Civil War letters; obituaries; clippings; indenturies; estate papers; family history materials; letters of John W. Holland, including a few dated 1898-1901 when he was serving in the United States Army in the Philippines; county deeds; family and business letters; remarks made at a presentation of Woodfin's portrait in Asheville in 1950; and land warrant from Governor Patrick Henry to William Gibbs (apparently unrelated to the rest of the collection).
Folder 2 |
1795-1839 |
Folder 3 |
1840-1849 |
Folder 4 |
1850-1859Includes three letters from enslaved or formerly enslaved people. |
Folder 5 |
1860-1875 |
Folder 6 |
1875-1899 |
Folder 7a |
1900-1919 |
Folder 7b |
1950, undated and miscellaneous |
Acquisitions Information: Accession 100547
Original letter from Nicholas Washington Woodfin to Governor Clarke about the defense of eastern Tennessee.
Folder 8 |
1862 |
Reel M-1689/1 |
Microfilm |