George Bryan Papers

Collection overview Biographical/historical information Scope and arrangement Administrative information Key terms Container list

Portions of this collection are digitized (2 items)

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1767-1912

Manuscript Collection #55

Portions of this collection are digitized (2 items)

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Creator(s): Bryan, George
Physical description: 0.22 Cubic Feet, 186 items , consisting of correspondence; court order, indenture, will and other legal papers; financial papers, including receipts, accounts, and notes; miscellaneous items, including a militia commission and a family genealogy; and printed material.
Preferred Citation: George Bryan Papers (#55), East Carolina Manuscript Collection, J. Y. Joyner Library, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA.
Repository: ECU Manuscript Collection
Access: No restrictions

Papers (1767-1912) including correspondence, court order, indenture, will and legal papers, financial papers, etc. of Craven County planter and businessmen, Revolutionary War militia leader and his descendants.

Biographical/historical information

The majority of the items in the collection concern George Bryan and his family. Bryan was a Craven County, N.C., planter and businessman whose life as a farmer and member of a Craven County militia company during the Revolutionary War stretched from the latter half of the eighteenth century into the early years of the nineteenth century. The activities of the Bryan family throughout the nineteenth century are revealed in the collection.

Scope and arrangement

Correspondence (1861-1912, undated) contains a number of items relating to the Civil War, including letters of Thomas P. Bryan and James Morris Bryan (1861-1864) of Company I of the 18th N.C. Infantry Regiment describing army life at Fort Caswell (N. C.) and Camp Stephens (S. C.). Of particular interest is a letter (1864) from James Small to Sarah Bryan which relates front line activities during the siege of Richmond. A letter (1865) from Morris Bryan to his father describes conditions at Fort Anderson near Wilmington, N. C.

Legal papers (1818-1851, undated) are concerned primarily with the settlement of the estate of George Bryan. Of interest are the will of George Bryan (1838) and an indenture (1839) between Abraham Taylor and Frederick Bryan.

Financial papers (1767-1868, undated) reflect family and personal expenditures, and agricultural and other activities. Of interest are items relating to the hire of Black people. Included are medical bills, store accounts, tuition receipts, and farm-related items.

Miscellaneous material includes a farm memorandum book for the period 1861-1877, genealogical material, George Bryan's commission as a lieutenant in a Craven County militia company in 1775, and a collection of school exercises, one dated 1848.

Printed matter consists of fragments of the New Bern Journal, July 18, 1882; Harper's Monthly Magazine (undated); the Southern Illustrated News, Richmond, Virginia, Sept. 6, 1862; and a complete Aug. 1, 1891, issue of the National Reformer, a Farm Alliance newspaper published in St. Louis, Missouri. Other printed items include an Internal Revenue stamp for matches (1872) and a handbill for a patent medicine produced in Wilson, N.C., "Southern Hepatic Pills."

Administrative information

Custodial History

March 23, 1968, 150 items; Papers (1767-1912) of Craven County planter George Bryan and other members of the Bryan Family. Material includes correspondence, accounts, receipts, a will, indentures, newspaper fragments, and miscellaneous. Given by Mr. E. Frank Rouse, Kinston, N.C.