James D. B. De Bow papers, 1840-1915, bulk 1840-1867

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Summary

Creator:
De Bow, J. D. B. (James Dunwoody Brownson), 1820-1867
Abstract:
Editor, publisher, statistician, and pro-secessionist residing in New Orleans, Louisiana. Collection comprises business and personal correspondence, diary, and other papers. Much of the material relates to "De Bow's Review," an agricultural and economic newspaper and pro-secession, pro-slavery publication which he founded and edited from 1846-1867, and to De Bow's position as agent for the Confederacy's cotton and produce loan, with many letters to and from Christopher G. Memminger and George A. Trenholm concerning details of the loan. Includes early items apparently collected in connection with De Bow's statistical work, essays written while a student at Charleston College, lectures on temperance, and a scrapbook of accounts of Civil War campaigns. Correspondents include John W. Daniel, Charles E. Fenner, George Fitzhugh, Charles Gayarré, Alexander D. Von Humboldt, Freeman Hunt, Edmund Ruffin, William Gilmore Simms, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Maunsel White.
Extent:
4.1 Linear Feet (7 boxes and 1 volume)
Approx. 1,618 Items
Language:
Material in English
Collection ID:
RL.00301

Background

Scope and content:

Business and personal papers of an editor and agricultural and commercial reformer, including copies of historical documents apparently collected by De Bow in connection with his statistical work for the state of Louisiana and the U.S. Census Bureau; a diary, 1836-1842; essays written while a student at College of Charleston, 1840-1843; two temperance lectures delivered during a tour of New England, 1844; letters from Maunsell White concerning White's backing of De Bow's Review; correspondence with the Review's agents and subscribers; the journal's bills and accounts; records, including correspondence with Christopher Gustavus Memminger and George Alfred Trenholm, relating to the Confederacy's cotton and produce loan; postwar letters concerning proposed railroads between the South and the West, especially the Tennessee and Pacific Railroad; letters to De Bow's wife, Martha E. (Johns) De Bow, from her girlhood friends and from De Bow; and De Bow's history of the Civil War, written for his children.

Other correspondents include Charles Gayarré, George Fitzhugh, Edmund Ruffin, William Gilmore Simms, Charles E. Penner, Freeman Hunt, John W. Daniel, Eugene F. Falconnet, Charles Frederick Holmes, John McRae, Oliver Otis Howard, Reverdy Johnson, Robert E. Barnwell, and William W. Boyce. The collection is rounded out by a one-volume scrapbook containing accounts of Civil War campaigns collected by De Bow.

Biographical / historical:

Southern publisher, statistician, and agricultural reformer residing in New Orleans. De Bow founded his agricultural and economic magazine, De Bow's Review, in 1846, and served as its editor until his death in 1867 of peritonitis. He was also head of the U.S. Census from 1853-1857, and president of the proposed Tennessee-Pacific Railroad, a project which he never lived to see accomplished. Arguing for Southern agricultural reform to build up Southern independence from the Northern States, De Bow became a strong influence for the pro-slavery, pro-secession movement in the 1850s and 1860s.

Acquisition information:
The James D. B. De Bow Papers were acquired by the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book Manuscript Library from 1935-1949.
Processing information:

Processed by Rubenstein Library staff, September 2011

Encoded by Matthew Warren and Paula Jeannet, April 2012

Accession(s) described in this finding aid: 35-708 and all subsequent additions.

The dates of the collection were updated in February 2024 to reflect that documents dated 1779-1810 were handwritten copies produced at a later date.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Contents

Using These Materials

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Using These Materials

Restrictions:

Collection is open for research.

Terms of access:

The copyright interests in this collection have not been transferred to Duke University. For more information, consult the copyright section of the Regulations and Procedures of the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

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Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], James D. B. De Bow Papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.

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