Papers (1863-1961) including correspondence; diary; family histories; recollection; description of prisoners playing games, making furniture, jewelry, beer; reading newspaper, letters, etc.
The Faison family consisted of the descendants of James Faison, a captain in the Revolutionary War, and the descendants of Henry Faison, on whose land the town of Faison was established in 1833 as a depot for the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad. The community, which dates to the pre-Revolutionary War period, lost many of its mansion-size homes to Civil War destruction and dilapidation.
The collection contains a copy of the diary of Lt. J. C. Hines of Faison who was taken as a wounded Confederate prisoner of war in September of 1863. In his diary Hines describes treatment and other soldiers' wounds in Stanton Hospital in Washington, D.C. He was moved to Fort McHenry, "the worst place that [he] had been," then to Baltimore, and to Fort Delaware. Hines waited near Hilton Head, S.C., from August, 1864, until March, 1865, to be exchanged, but was taken back to Fort Delaware where he and other prisoners speculated as to what would happen to them after the Confederates surrendered. Hines's diary describes conditions of extreme heat and cold, lack of rations, and treatment by guards, including a black unit from Massachusetts. He discusses activities of the prisoners like playing games; making furniture, jewelry, and beer; and reading letters and newspapers. The collection also contains a portion of Captain Lewis T. Hicks's memoir in which he recalls the Battle of Gettysburg and the Confederate surrender during which he was taken prisoner of war and kept at Johnson's Island, Lake Erie.
The collection contains descriptions of the antebellum plantations and cemeteries in Duplin and Sampson counties. Virginius Faison Williams describes paintings by his mother of plantation scenes, including freed black men, formerly enslaved, at work and their loyalty as perceived by the Faison family. There is an account of enslaved persons from Faison accompanying their enslavers to Civil War battles in Virginia. Descendants of the Faison family are listed and the Hicks family is traced back to fourteenth-century English ancestors.
Gift of Mrs. Inga Flake
Processed by M. Cherry, March 1988
Encoded by Apex Data Services
Descriptions updated by Ashlyn Racine, May 2023
Literary rights to specific documents are retained by the authors or their descendants in accordance with U.S. copyright law.