Singleton Family papers

Chiefly correspondence, business records, and estate papers of Richard Singleton (1776-1852), including letter, 10 April 1823, from "Parson" Mason Locke Weems (Charleston, S.C.) to Richard Singleton (High Hills, Sumter District, S.C.), re mention of a box of books that Singleton had ordered, writing that he "took the liberty to place a little pamphlet of my own scribbling, just reprinted here a day or two ago. It is popular and Judge Waties who sat on the bench when the Heroine of this tragedy was call[e]d to the bar, says it is an 'excellent Moral Romance, & may do good.'". Topics discussed include the purchase, training, breeding and racing of horses in S.C.; business and farming records related to cultivation, harvest and sales of cotton; conditions in local and foreign cotton markets; events and social life in Charleston (S.C.); land papers and business files of John Singleton (1754-1820); and letters from Richard Singleton's daughter, Angelica, wife of Abram Van Buren, the son of President Martin Van Buren, re family news, political developments and travels, 1854, in Europe. Correspondence of 1820s-1830s relating to Richard Singleton's horses include receipts for horse breeding, several newspaper advertisements for horses for sale and for stud, and a list of unsettled transactions from John Singleton's wife, Rebecca, to Richard Singleton, 1 Jan. 1821-10 June 1830. Much correspondence focuses on Singleton's famed stud horse Kosciusko; other horses frequently mentioned include Lottery, Crusader, Godolpin, and the imported Nonplus. Papers (circa 1840s-1850s) document difficulties of daughter Marion Videau Singleton, her disasterous marriage to Rev. Augustus Lawrence Converse, an alcoholic, and her efforts to escape his domestic abuse and regain her name before marriage and her rights to her property at a time when divorce remained illeagal in S.C. Plantation account book (1866, 1873, and 1880-1885), details farming operations during Reconstruction and later 19th century at two Singleton family properties: Deer Pond (in Richland County, S.C.), and Melrose (in Sumter County, S.C.) This volume identifies names of many African-American residents employed and farming on these properties. Collection includes papers and information related to the Elmore, Taylor and Whetstone families. Correspondents include various Charleston factors and other businessmen; Wade Hampton I (1752-1835), George McDuffie, James L. Petigru, Joel Roberts Poinsett, B.F. Taylor, William Taylor, and Beaufort T. Watts. Places represented include South Carolina (Acton, Charleston, Columbia, Manchester, and Sumter); North Carolina (Flat Rock); [West] Virginia (a resort at White Sulphur Springs in Greenbrier County, W.Va.); and New York. Some land papers, maps and plats enhanced with watercolors.