Collection consists of a two volumes titled "Journal of a Cruise from Norfolk, Virginia to the Pacific Ocean in the United States Frigate United States, Isaac Hull, Esq'r, Commander" kept by Philadelphian midshipman Lawrence Penington from 4 December 1823, through 22 April 1827. United States was one of six frigates authorized to be constructed by the Naval Act of 1794 and it served as the flagship for Commodore Hull who was head of the American naval squadron on the Pacific Coast of South America. Penington documents navigation statistics, weather reports and daily ship life, along with the larger issues of interaction between the American naval squadron and British, Spanish, Chilean, Colombian and Peruvian naval and military counterparts.
Papers of U.S. Navy enlisted man (1863-1864) aboard the US sloop of War Powhatan, including a private log book (Nov. 1863 - Aug. 1864), correspondence, a manuscript entitled " The Attack on Charleston," and a daguerreotype of a Civil War sailor (presumably Thomas).
Papers (1826-1887, undated) including correspondence, journals, leaflets, diaries, verse, printed material, a drawing and miscellany.
Papers (1935-1966) including correspondence, diaries, logs, progress reports, clippings, programs, publications, official orders, biographical information, photographs, etc.
Papers (1830 – 2010, undated) [Bulk: 1940-1970] documenting the life of Robert Lee Humber, Jr., who was born 30 May 1898 – and died 10 November 1970, in Greenville, North Carolina; after attending local schools he earned a BA from Wake Forest College, 1921; he then attended Oxford University in the United Kingdom as a Rhodes Scholar, 1921-1923; he then earned a MA from Harvard University in 1936; he moved to Paris, France, in 1926, where he married and served as an American Field Service fellow, 1926-1928, and subsequently earned a fortune as an international lawyer, art dealer, and businessman, 1930-1940, until the Fall of France, in 1940, when he, his wife, and their two sons, John and Marcel, fled the German invasion - his infant daughter Eileen died during their escape - and he returned to North Carolina, where he purchased a farm on Davis Island, established a legal career, and devoted himself to public service and to a wide range of philanthropic causes, as an educator, civic, cultural, political and religious leader; beginning in 1940, he became well-known nationally and internationally for establishing and leading the World Federation movement as a way to promote lasting world peace through international law; statewide for persuading the General Assembly and the Kress Foundation of New York to fund and establish the North Carolina Museum which opened in 1956; also as an art collector and patron of local and regional volunteer organizations; as a Democratic state senator from Pitt County, 1958-1964; as an educator who led the effort to create Pitt Technical Institute (later Pitt Community College); as a leader in the Southern Baptist denomination becoming a member of the Board of Trustees of Wake Forest College and other Baptist institutions; and as an attorney and business leader and developer; additionally, the collection includes historical files documenting the history of the World Federation in the United States, compiled by his son, John Leslie Humber.