Collection includes a letter written by Ann Elizabeth Bogart, Washington, N.C., to "My dear Aunt," January 8, 1865, describing wartime conditions in Washington, N.C., and vicinity, a 2-page partial transcription of the letter, a tintype of a woman (possibly Ann Elizabeth Bogart), and two color images of the gravestone for Ann Bogart and the plot where she is buried in Washington, N.C. Also included are research materials concerning David Nevius Bogart of Washington, N.C., and related to the Bogart, Biggs, O'Cain, Lucas, Bonner, Peyton, and Snoad families of Beaufort County, N.C. Photographs, genealogy notes, Bible records, and correspondence relate to the Smallwood, Williams, and Hassell families of Williamston, N.C. Letters related to brothers Will and Bruce Smallwood discuss Will's travels and death (1918) in Alaska and Bruce's life and death (after 1894) in Mexico.
The first installment of this collection was given by Melody Hines Moen and Kathleen Bogart Hinds Kennedy, great-great nieces of Ann Elizabeth Bogart. "Annie E.," or "Aunt Annie" as she became known, was born September 4, 1830, in Washington, N.C. The eldest of six children born to Gilbert Bogart and Christina Barden Bogart, Annie never married and had no children of her own. She lived with her brother, David Nevius Bogart, his wife, Mary Catherine Morton, and their children, after Gilbert and Christina died. Annie lived in the house that her brother David built, located at 206 East Main Street, Washington, N.C., until her death on November 20, 1906. She is the second cousin twice removed of the actor Humphrey DeForest Bogart. The genealogy of the Bogart family can be found in a privately printed book entitled "The Bogart Family" compiled by John Albert Bogart.
Additional installments were given by Penelope Bogart Rodman, daughter of Robert Courtney Bogart (1886-1959) and wife Penelope Biggs Bogart (1891-1978). Robert Courtney was a son of David Nevius Bogart (1847-1893) of Washington, N.C., and wife Mary Catherine Morton (1848-1910). David Bogart's father, Albert Gilbert Bogart emigrated to North Carolina from New Jersey sometime during the first quarter of the nineteenth century, becoming principal of the then newly opened Washington Academy in Washington, N.C. The Morton family arrived in Washington, N.C., from Maine about 1823 as a result of Mary Catherine Bogart's grandfather, Winslow B. Morton's involvement in shipping interests there. Her father, William Z. Morton, married Melissa A. Darden, daughter of George F. Darden of Virginia.
Penelope Biggs Bogart was the daughter of druggist Samuel Romulus Biggs, Sr. (1849-1909) of Williamston, N.C. and wife Sallie Smallwood Biggs. Biggs was a great grandson of Joseph and Margaret Eastwood Biggs who emigrated from Norfolk, Va., to present Martin County, N.C., around 1755. Sallie Smallwood Biggs (1857-1924) was the daughter of John Walker Smallwood and a great granddaughter of early Beaufort County sheriff Thomas Bonner. The Smallwood and related Bonner families were early prominent residents of the towns of Washington and Bath in Beaufort County, N.C. Sallie's sisters Paulina Bonner Smallwood (1877-1961) and Portia Bonner Smallwood Whitley (1853-1925) married Williamston natives Joseph Daniel Biggs(1869-1928) and George L. Whitley respectively. Joseph Daniel Biggs was a distant cousin of Samuel Romulus Biggs.
The collection in general is heavily defined by the numerous relationships between Beaufort and Martin County, N.C., families in particular and their ancestors from New England and Virginia.
This collection contains a handwritten letter (that is partially transcribed) from Ann Elizabeth Bogart of Washington, N.C., and is dated January 8, 1865. It is addressed to "My Dear Aunt" and written to "communicate with my Northern friends." In the letter she describes the Washington, N.C., area during this wartime period commenting that ". . . we are under no rule now either civil or military . . . ." She discusses the fire that destroyed her family home and garden along with the family's personal library and other homes in the area. She mentions that it was the second of two recent devastating fires that destroyed much of Washington. The letter mentions her brothers William and David and their military duties along with her introduction to Confederate General Beauregard and Confederate States of America President Jefferson Davis in Greensboro, N.C., in September 1864. She concludes her letter with a description of how they have had to make homespun clothing and a discussion about people she knew who were imprisoned or who have died. Also included in the collection are a tintype of a woman who may possibly be Ann Bogart and two color images of the Bogart gravestone and Ann Bogart's plot where she is buried in Washington, N.C.
Subsequent additions to the collection center on research materials and genealogy notes related to the life of David Nevius Bogart of Washington, N.C., including his Civil War service and his death during "The James City War" in 1893 (eviction of "James City" squatters by the N.C. State Troops) and more particularly the families allied through the marriage of his son Robert Courtney Bogart to Penelope Biggs Bogart, native of Williamston, N.C. Of principal mention are notes and correspondence relevant but not limited to O'Cain, Lucas, Bonner, Peyton, Morton, Snoad, Darden and Smallwood families of Beaufort County, N.C., Biggs of Martin County, N.C., Farnell of Onslow and Jones Counties, N.C., and Hooker family of Tyrell, Beaufort and Pamlico Counties, N.C.
A fair number of photographs (both originals and copies) are associated for families in the collection. Identified are late nineteenth and early twentieth century images of members of the S.R. Biggs, Sr., family in Williamston, including views of the family home on Smithwick Street, ca. 1914; Bogart Drug Store in Washington, NC; cabinet photo of the sons of David N. Bogart, carte de visite copies of early miniature images of Sally Ann O'Cain, Samuel Lucas and William O'Cain; a copy of a cabinet card image dated July 26, 1895, of the "Sycamores," also known as Smallwood Place near Washington, N.C.; tombstones and portrait images of William Z. Morton and Mary G. Morton; Darden family members along with late 20th century photos of the Morton and Bradford families' ancestral home and areas in Friendship, Maine. Other Biggs images include Sallie Smallwood Biggs, Sallie and daughters on a New Jersey visit, Bob Biggs entering service during WWI, John William (Jack) Biggs, Warren Biggs and wife Lettie, and Joseph D. and Paulina Smallwood Biggs.
Connected to the S.R. Biggs family are images pertaining to Nannie Biggs Pope, John Pope, John Pope, Jr., Charles Smallwood Pope and Warren Pope and 1924 obituary notices for Sallie Smallwood Biggs. Also of interest is a printing of Warren Pope's play "The Creed" in a 1941 publication, "Plays of Courage" for the North Carolina Crippled Children's League.
Related Smallwood photographs and materials include images of Portia Smallwood Whitley, Thomas Bonner Smallwood, Samuel Smaw Smallwood as well as letters (1888-1918) and photographs concerning brothers William Henry Smallwood (died in Alaska in 1918) and John Bruce Smallwood (died in Mexico after 1894). The two letters from William "Bill" H. Smallwood discuss his financial difficulties as a placer miner in Fairbanks and on Indian River in Alaska, and also prices of necessities. Letters from Bill's mining partner describe his death on July 27, 1918, due to a mental breakdown and subsequent drowning caused by large financial debts and lack of success in his present mining proposition. These letters also show why gold miners continue mining even when things are bad rather than returning home.
Also included are newspaper columns by Charles Smallwood ("Hixty Sige- he wants ter know" and "Old Silas and his mule sense"), a 1916 patent held by Smallwood, and a 1965 Washington Daily News article detailing the creation of Smallwood neighborhood subdivision in Washington, N.C.
Further materials of note include an 1823 family Bible with listing of birth marriage and death dates for members of the Williams, Hassell, and Biggs families of Williamston, autograph books for Mrs. Anna/Annie Phifer and Williamston native Emily L. Whitley (the latter offering social commentary and prominent names associated with Williamston during the decade of the 1890s), a small mid-nineteenth century carte de visite image of prominent Williamston citizen and Primitive Baptist leader, Cushing Biggs Hassell. Cabinet photographs of Alice Davis, Annie Lamb and Jennie Biggs with horse and buggy near Williamston in 1907, and of students Warren Biggs, Charles H. Godwin and Albert Cofield at Oak Ridge, N.C., in 1900, and a 1901-02 class photo of students at the Medical College of Virginia including Bob Biggs are also included.
Relevant to Washington, N.C. is a photo of a sketch of the Fowle family home at the corner of Pierce and Main Streets in Washington, a photocopy of a handwritten biography of Edmond Hoyt Harding by Katherine "Kack" Hodges (n.d.), a photocopy of the publication "Salmagundi" by Katherine Blount Harding (n.d.), a loose binding of materials denoted as a collection of talks given from 1990-1991 for the "Fifty-Five Plus Club" of St. Peter's Parish (Washington, N.C.) prepared by Rena Davenport and a photocopy of a page dated April 23, 1987, with wording for the "Washington high School Alma Mater and Fight Song" with notation that words and music for this are credited to Edmond Harding and Carl Gourch.
Pertaining to Bogart and related family materials is publication by John A. Bogart entitled "The Bogart Family: Tunis Gysbert Bogaert and His Descendants" (1959), photographs of siblings Robert, Alice and Kathleen Bogart, Mary Wilhelmina Bogart, Col. David N. Bogart's home in Washington, N.C., Robert Courtney Bogart and tombstones for Penelope Biggs Bogart, Sarah Frances Nell, Gilbert Bogart, Christina Bogart, Mary Catherine Morton Bogart and D.N. Bogart. Also within this group is correspondence for Penelope Bogart Rodman (1971, 2001), an article on the career of Penny Biggs Bogart, A DAR registration form for Penelope O'Cain Bogart and a Society of Mayflower Descendants application for Brandon Stuart Critcher, images of Penelope Bogart Rodman (ca. 1940-1956), Penelope Rodman's personal photographs of a visit to Friendship Maine including Bradford Farm and Garrison Island (ca. 2000) and copies of portraits for Gilbert Bogart (1804-1867) and William S. Bogart (1819-1892), obituaries for Sally Bogart Owen and Buddy Owen, Jr. (Sally Owen was connected to the Washington North Carolina Field Museum or "Bug House" during her youth) and Sally Owen's letter and chart detailing the families of two sisters, Sallie and Paulina Smallwood, who married men from the Biggs family in Williamston, N.C.
Among generally miscellaneous materials in the collection is a land deed from A.P. Johnson in Bertie County, N.C. to William Walton (1867), a list of fines imposed by Washington County, N.C., Superior Court in 1834, a shipping or sales record between Capt. Levin Bozman and Samuel Jackson (1810), a partial unidentified accounts ledger (1830), several issues of Frank Leslie's Boys and Girls Weekly dated July 1872, an 1856 edition of Mitchell's Intermediate or Secondary Geography, issues of a serial publication entitled "Lesson Paper International Texts" for April – May, 1878, undated cyphering books, early twentieth century Valentine cards, and a "Sterling Cinnamon Gum" ad from ca. 1916.
Oversize material includes the August 17, 1904, issue of The Gazette-Messenger newspaper for Washington, Beaufort Co., N.C.; family charts for Bonner, Smallwood, Snode, and Biggs families; accounts (1816-1817) of sales of goods that were received by Samuel Jackson from the Schooner General Brown captained by Capt. Bosman; photocopies of The North Carolina Society of the Colonial Dames of America pedigree papers for Mrs. Kathleen Bogart Searight and Mrs. Alice Bogart Rollins; and a photocopy of an old map of the Island of Barbadoes.
Gift of Melody Hinds Moen and Kathleen Bogart Hinds Kennedy
Gift of Penelope Bogart Rodman
Processed by D. Zeltmann, September 2012
Additions processed by Fred Harrison, March 27, 2017
Literary rights to specific documents are retained by the authors or their descendants in accordance with U.S. copyright law.