Good morning,
I figured that it was time to give our loyal readers a progress report on the Poplar Grove Collection. Christian and I have been hard at work completing the scanning portion of this project, and we are within days of finishing. Series 10; the series from which our recent finds have been coming is already completed.
At the moment we are scanning the last two boxes from Series 11, which was found to be only partially complete. This is the series that deals with records relating to farm and plantation administration, and is dominated by documents dealing with horses. Once Series 11 is completed in the next day or two, scanning for the Poplar Grove Collection should be all but complete. Our next step in this project will be to render all of the Poplar Grove documents accessible online through the E-Books format. E-Books, for those that may not know, are electronic books where vast amounts of information can be assembled and made conveniently searchable through links. Our exact timetable for this project is not yet fully known, but we should be starting it in the near future.
Besides finishing up scanning, Christian and I have been also working on the organizational aspect of this collection. We have been doing this by editing the online series descriptions, and in some cases providing descriptions for the specific contents of each folder. This is all found in the Poplar Grove Collection entry at the Maryland State Archives Special Collections website. Also we have made sure our scan counts match up with what we have documented for each box and folder. With any collection, organization is key, and we especially want to make sure this collection is in top organizational shape before it is available online in its entirety.
Lastly, we are in the early stages of brainstorming ideas for a handbook about how to organize and deliver a collection, using the Poplar Grove Collection as a model. We are both very excited to work on E-Books for this project, as well as create a helpful handbook for future projects.
We hope everyone is as excited by the progress being made with this collection as we are; questions, comments and discussions are encouraged. Also don’t forget to return later this afternoon to see Christian’s weekly post.
~Nathan
Friday, October 30, 2009
Friday, October 23, 2009
An Anomalous Receipt
As a relief from the more serious and complex recent posts, I have decided to provide a distinctly brief update this week. The subject is a curious, albeit simple, one. While Poplar Grove Series 10 has provided us with numerous receipts signed by John Tilghman, few if any are as peculiar as the one I will highlight today.
In the midst of the several thousand receipts and accounts, Nathan and I found one paid for in shillings and pence. To those unfamiliar, the shilling is a British monetary value used until 1971, at which point it was phased out. The penny (plural: pence) remains in use today. The receipt was for payment of John Tilghman to one Thomas Kent, with the name Thomas Buchanan written beside the two financially bound parties. The document appears to date from 1820. We know nothing more than this, and any information our readers could provide as to the significance of an otherwise mysterious transaction paid for in foreign currency would be appreciated. I look forward to providing a more detailed post next week, but I hope that this curiosity will keep you satisfied until then.
-Christian
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
V. I. P. Sighting
Good afternoon all,
I hope everyone has enjoyed our posts about Benjamin Chew and the Estate of William Tilghman. That was a topic we felt was very important in Series 10, despite the series’ focus on John Tilghman’s receipts. There is more to Series 10 than William Tilghman’s Estate and John Tilghman business receipts, however, and that is where today’s topic comes into play.
Today I would like to share a few documents that we have come across, dealing with an important
Ezekiel F. Chambers (1788-1867), a person familiar to our readers with a knowledge of 19th Century
The following three documents are letters written by Mr. Chambers. The first two letters were written to John Tilghman. The last letter was written to Lloyd Tilghman, who I believe was the son of John Tilghman.
Our first letter (right) is dated January 31, 1838 at the time that Mr. Chambers was a Maryland Court of Appeals judge. The letter concerned an old judgment Mr. Chambers made that was brought to light again. Mr. Chambers wrote, “On my way through Balto. (
The second letter (front left, back right), from Mr. Chambers to John Tilghman, was written eight days later on February 8, 1838, discussing how the claim was to be settled and payment done. I find these two letters fascinating because they connect a person from Poplar Grove with someone as prominent as E
zekiel Chambers, who could have been John’s lawyer since he was an attorney. Also, one notices a sense of camaraderie between the two while reading the letters, which I recommend, though it may take some practice.
Our third letter (left) dates from March 5, 1858; it was between Mr. Chambers and Lloyd Tilghman. In this letter Mr. Chambers 
thanked Lloyd for his, “very acceptable favor,” which was, “covering a check for $140.11 in part of my fee in the case of the late Col. N. Goldsborough against General Tench Tilghman.” This letter again suggests that the Tilghman’s, or at least John and Lloyd Tilghman, not only dealt with Ezekiel Chambers professionally, but were friends as well.
I hope you have enjoyed today’s post concerning Ezekiel F. Chambers. Comments and discussions are welcome and questions are encouraged. Keep a look out for Christian’s weekly post on Friday.
~Nathan
* Information is from the Archives of Maryland, Biographical Series, Ezekiel F. Chambers biography page at the Maryland State Archives.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Some Final Notes on the Struggle Over the Estate of William Tilghman
Good afternoon,
Perhaps spending one more post on William Tilghman's Estate may seem excessive, but I cannot help feeling as though further details require discussion. In approaching the legal battle between John Tilghman and William Tilghman a second time, I uncovered biographical material about both William Tilghman and Benjamin Chew, the executor of his estate.
Nathan and I had both been wondering what connection exactly drew John Tilghman and William Tilghman together, as their closest family relation was that their
fathers were cousins. In fact, the reason why so much of this correspondence bears the name of John Tilghman, and indeed the reason why we are privy to so many of the documents, is that John was the agent of Benjamin Chew in Maryland. This is indicated by the document to the left. Chew was a Pennsylvania resident, and therefore John agreed to help dispose of William Tilghman's Estate in Maryland, with the provision that all funds raised went to Benjamin Chew.
With that mystery solved, I turned to speculating upon why William Tilghman had left so much money to Benjamin Chew's son, and why John Tilghman was suing Benjamin Chew within months of Chew's appointment as executor. The reply to John and Ann Tilghman's claim (provided in my post on October 9) laid out the reasons why William Tilghman's death and the subsequent sale of his estate were so contentious; an intriguing family drama played out from there.
John and Ann Tilghman claimed that they should be inheriting "one fifth part" of William Tilghman's Estate, as described in his will. They argued that his funeral expenses and debts could be fully paid for, still leaving them with their allotted fifth part. In his rebuttal, which begins in the image to the left, Benjamin Chew did not disagree that Ann Tilghman was named in the will as an inheritor of one fifth of the Estate. He did dispute their claim, however, on other grounds. His explanation took ten pages, and in this post I have selected several of those pages to highlight the issues raised.
The primary reason for the appropriation of funds raised by sale of William's Estate, as stated on the above page, was that William owed a heavy debt at the time of his death in 1827. He had married his daughter, Elizabeth Margeret, to Benjamin Chew, in 1816. This had come with a price, however, as it seems that the Chews were of a higher social rank than was William Tilghman. William, therefore, offered to sell a piece of land in his daughter's name in order to raise money towards the $20,000 he promised Benjamin Chew as a dowry.
Unfortunately, however, he did not pay anything more than $2500 to Benjamin Chew. The land remained in his hands, and he refused to sell it prior to his daughter coming of age; once she had come of age and been married to Benjamin Chew, William Tilghman continued to hold the land, going against the contract as stated in the image to the left.
It would seem that, according to Benjamin Chew's defense at the right, William Tilghman actually sold a large amount of real estate that was in his daughter's name throughout the early 1800s. The money went into his own possession, rather than to his daughter, who was left with little upon reaching maturity.
By 1817, Elizabeth Margaret Tilghman, who had become Elizabeth Margaret Chew through her marriage to Benjamin, had died. This did not free William Tilghman from his debt to Benjamin Chew, however. Chew did not press charges, ostensibly because he was so affectionate toward his father-in-law, but the rebuttal maintained that he never relinquished his claims to the $20,000, which had eventually ballooned to $27,500. William told him, when pressed throughout the 1820s, that to "pay the debt, he would have to sell the house over his head" (see left). This may have seemed true at the time, but the vast inventory William left behind at his death suggests otherwise.
According to Benjamin Chew's defense, it was an unwillingness to pay rather than an inability. William Tilghman took responsibility for the estates of his daughter and grandson, worth roughly $50,000, and refused to use any of this property to pay off the marriage contract. This is explained in the document to the right. It was for these reasons that Benjamin Chew thought it fair to appropriate funds raised from the sale of William Tilghman's property to pay off the outstanding debt owed him. Sadly we do not know the outcome of this court case, but Benjamin Chew's detailed ten-page rebuttal, if not fabricated, certainly made a strong case for his position. Despite William Tilghman's intent that parts of his Estate go to his grandson, William Tilghman Chew (son of Elizabeth Margaret and Benjamin), Benjamin Chew was still owed a significant debt that had existed before the will was made in 1819. Perhaps the first document presented here offers a clue: John Tilghman was Benjamin Chew's agent in 1833. Whatever the outcome of the court case, it seems to have been a somewhat amicable one.
I hope this lengthy interpretation of the evidence has shone a light onto a somewhat bizarre legal struggle of 1830. Some of the questions raised in our last two posts (i.e. Why was John Tilghman involved? What was the perceived wrongdoing committed by Benjamin Chew?) have been answered sufficiently, and we will be moving on to other topics next week. Undoubtedly William Tilghman, Benjamin Chew, and John Tilghman will reappear in this blog, but next week we will be presenting some other people who figured prominently in the papers of Series 10. Thank you for reading, and feel free to comment in the space below. After all, if you have a particular interest in this collection and you would like it addressed, we would be happy to oblige.
-Christian
Perhaps spending one more post on William Tilghman's Estate may seem excessive, but I cannot help feeling as though further details require discussion. In approaching the legal battle between John Tilghman and William Tilghman a second time, I uncovered biographical material about both William Tilghman and Benjamin Chew, the executor of his estate.
Nathan and I had both been wondering what connection exactly drew John Tilghman and William Tilghman together, as their closest family relation was that their
fathers were cousins. In fact, the reason why so much of this correspondence bears the name of John Tilghman, and indeed the reason why we are privy to so many of the documents, is that John was the agent of Benjamin Chew in Maryland. This is indicated by the document to the left. Chew was a Pennsylvania resident, and therefore John agreed to help dispose of William Tilghman's Estate in Maryland, with the provision that all funds raised went to Benjamin Chew.With that mystery solved, I turned to speculating upon why William Tilghman had left so much money to Benjamin Chew's son, and why John Tilghman was suing Benjamin Chew within months of Chew's appointment as executor. The reply to John and Ann Tilghman's claim (provided in my post on October 9) laid out the reasons why William Tilghman's death and the subsequent sale of his estate were so contentious; an intriguing family drama played out from there.
John and Ann Tilghman claimed that they should be inheriting "one fifth part" of William Tilghman's Estate, as described in his will. They argued that his funeral expenses and debts could be fully paid for, still leaving them with their allotted fifth part. In his rebuttal, which begins in the image to the left, Benjamin Chew did not disagree that Ann Tilghman was named in the will as an inheritor of one fifth of the Estate. He did dispute their claim, however, on other grounds. His explanation took ten pages, and in this post I have selected several of those pages to highlight the issues raised.
The primary reason for the appropriation of funds raised by sale of William's Estate, as stated on the above page, was that William owed a heavy debt at the time of his death in 1827. He had married his daughter, Elizabeth Margeret, to Benjamin Chew, in 1816. This had come with a price, however, as it seems that the Chews were of a higher social rank than was William Tilghman. William, therefore, offered to sell a piece of land in his daughter's name in order to raise money towards the $20,000 he promised Benjamin Chew as a dowry.
Unfortunately, however, he did not pay anything more than $2500 to Benjamin Chew. The land remained in his hands, and he refused to sell it prior to his daughter coming of age; once she had come of age and been married to Benjamin Chew, William Tilghman continued to hold the land, going against the contract as stated in the image to the left.
It would seem that, according to Benjamin Chew's defense at the right, William Tilghman actually sold a large amount of real estate that was in his daughter's name throughout the early 1800s. The money went into his own possession, rather than to his daughter, who was left with little upon reaching maturity.
By 1817, Elizabeth Margaret Tilghman, who had become Elizabeth Margaret Chew through her marriage to Benjamin, had died. This did not free William Tilghman from his debt to Benjamin Chew, however. Chew did not press charges, ostensibly because he was so affectionate toward his father-in-law, but the rebuttal maintained that he never relinquished his claims to the $20,000, which had eventually ballooned to $27,500. William told him, when pressed throughout the 1820s, that to "pay the debt, he would have to sell the house over his head" (see left). This may have seemed true at the time, but the vast inventory William left behind at his death suggests otherwise.
According to Benjamin Chew's defense, it was an unwillingness to pay rather than an inability. William Tilghman took responsibility for the estates of his daughter and grandson, worth roughly $50,000, and refused to use any of this property to pay off the marriage contract. This is explained in the document to the right. It was for these reasons that Benjamin Chew thought it fair to appropriate funds raised from the sale of William Tilghman's property to pay off the outstanding debt owed him. Sadly we do not know the outcome of this court case, but Benjamin Chew's detailed ten-page rebuttal, if not fabricated, certainly made a strong case for his position. Despite William Tilghman's intent that parts of his Estate go to his grandson, William Tilghman Chew (son of Elizabeth Margaret and Benjamin), Benjamin Chew was still owed a significant debt that had existed before the will was made in 1819. Perhaps the first document presented here offers a clue: John Tilghman was Benjamin Chew's agent in 1833. Whatever the outcome of the court case, it seems to have been a somewhat amicable one.I hope this lengthy interpretation of the evidence has shone a light onto a somewhat bizarre legal struggle of 1830. Some of the questions raised in our last two posts (i.e. Why was John Tilghman involved? What was the perceived wrongdoing committed by Benjamin Chew?) have been answered sufficiently, and we will be moving on to other topics next week. Undoubtedly William Tilghman, Benjamin Chew, and John Tilghman will reappear in this blog, but next week we will be presenting some other people who figured prominently in the papers of Series 10. Thank you for reading, and feel free to comment in the space below. After all, if you have a particular interest in this collection and you would like it addressed, we would be happy to oblige.
-Christian
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Penal bonds concerning the Estate of William Tilghman
Hello again readers,
I, like my colleague Christian, am determined to spread the word about the kind of historically important and interesting finds we come across while working with the Poplar Grove Collection. For this reason, we will both post regularly and encourage comments and discussions about this collection. We both feel that this collection deserves attention since it is rich with Maryland history.
Today, I would like to share with you some penal bonds that relate to Christian’s post about the estate of William Tilghman.
As a note for those unfamiliar with the concept of a penal bond, this was a bond made to secure a fine payment as penalty if an obligation or promise is not upheld; ideally this ensured that the deal would not be broken.
The next penal bond (front side left, back side right) was between 
Chew and Jacob Raymond of Delaware on March 17, 1830; the penal sum was one thousand dollars if either of the two slaves bought, Abraham for 13 years and Charlotte for 15 years, were removed from Delaware.
I hope you have enjoyed this quick glimpse into one of the many subjects that the Poplar Grove Collection holds. More posts are to come, until then…
~Nathan
* See previous post for more details.
I, like my colleague Christian, am determined to spread the word about the kind of historically important and interesting finds we come across while working with the Poplar Grove Collection. For this reason, we will both post regularly and encourage comments and discussions about this collection. We both feel that this collection deserves attention since it is rich with Maryland history.
Today, I would like to share with you some penal bonds that relate to Christian’s post about the estate of William Tilghman.
As a note for those unfamiliar with the concept of a penal bond, this was a bond made to secure a fine payment as penalty if an obligation or promise is not upheld; ideally this ensured that the deal would not be broken.
While processing Series 10 of the Poplar Grove collection, three penal bonds were found concerning slaves from William Tilghman’s estate. Our first penal bond 
was between Benjamin Chew, the primary executor of William Tilghman’s Estate, and Joseph Hoffecker. The other two penal bonds dealt with business between Chew and Jacob Raymond.
was between Benjamin Chew, the primary executor of William Tilghman’s Estate, and Joseph Hoffecker. The other two penal bonds dealt with business between Chew and Jacob Raymond.Benjamin Chew, was in charge of selling William’s property, which included his slaves.* Chew sold Hoffecker a slave named Samuel for two years of service. The penal bond (on right) stated "Samuel shall not be removed from the state of Delaware during his time of service, than this obligation shall be null and void." Hoffecker would then have to pay a one thousand dollar penal sum, which was mentioned at the beginning of this document. Penal bonds made against transporting slaves from one state to another, like this one, were probably used as one way to control and track the slave trade.
The next penal bond (front side left, back side right) was between 
Chew and Jacob Raymond of Delaware on March 17, 1830; the penal sum was one thousand dollars if either of the two slaves bought, Abraham for 13 years and Charlotte for 15 years, were removed from Delaware.Along with this bond was a letter( on left), which is the last document that I am going to share with you. This letter was written by Jacob Raymond concerning his problems with the above penal bond, and was written to John Tilghman. John was most likely contacted because had contact with Benjamin Chew and was familiar with the court system. Raymond, in the letter, complained a
bout the penal bond that Benjamin Chew made, as well as the stiff 500 dollar fine and imprisonment penalty that. Delaware enforced for selling a slave outside of the state. Raymond wrote,"Had I been appraised of this previous to my having brought my two blacks home they might have remained in Maryland, the laws in our own state inflict a very severe penalty for selling blacks out of it." In other words, Raymond was not happy that the penal bond did not allow him to move his slaves out of Delaware, and that if he did move them he would face punishment by both the penal bond and the state of Delaware. I found it both interesting and informative to find a man’s penal bond and a letter expressing his problems with it.
bout the penal bond that Benjamin Chew made, as well as the stiff 500 dollar fine and imprisonment penalty that. Delaware enforced for selling a slave outside of the state. Raymond wrote,"Had I been appraised of this previous to my having brought my two blacks home they might have remained in Maryland, the laws in our own state inflict a very severe penalty for selling blacks out of it." In other words, Raymond was not happy that the penal bond did not allow him to move his slaves out of Delaware, and that if he did move them he would face punishment by both the penal bond and the state of Delaware. I found it both interesting and informative to find a man’s penal bond and a letter expressing his problems with it.I hope you have enjoyed this quick glimpse into one of the many subjects that the Poplar Grove Collection holds. More posts are to come, until then…
~Nathan
* See previous post for more details.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Struggles Over the Estate of William Tilghman
Hello again,
It has been a week since my previous post, and I am happy to have, for the moment, made good on my promise of a weekly update. Let us hope this good fortune continues.
The topic of this week's discussion is one that I find both quite interesting and also somewhat baffling. In some ways, I am putting out a challenge to my readers, which will be made explicit at the end of this post. I will be offering a selection of documents pertaining to the battle over William Tilghman, the "Late Chief Justice of the State of Pennsylvania." At the moment, my biographical details on this figure are admittedly slim. I hope to have more time to delve into his story in coming weeks, but I have been somewhat caught up in a variety of other tasks. The important details for our discussion are to be found in a selection of papers from Poplar Grove, Series 10.
We know that William Tilghman
died in 1827, as is apparent in a Bill of Complaint filed by John Tilghman and his wife Ann found to the right. We also know that he drafted a will in 1819. Unfortunately, that will had apparently not been updated since 1819, and this caused some tension between those who expected to inherit some of his wealth (see the image to the upper-left). Clearly, John and Ann Tilghman were among those who wanted a piece of the pie, so to speak.
Perhaps the greatest issue causing contention over inheritance, however, was a sad event that had transpired in the decade between the writing and the execution of William Tilghman's will. According to the image to the left, he had intended to leave virtually all of his estate to his grandson, William Tilghman Chew. We learn from the same document that the grandson predeceased William Tilghman. This left the issue of inheritance in a nebulous area, without a clear heir. Clouding the issue was the fact that William's grandson was the son of Benjamin Chew, a prominent lawyer, who seems to have gone completely unmentioned in the will (which we do not posess). Benjamin became one of two executors of William Tilghman's estate upon the latter's death, and it is not hard to see why other family members may have seen Benjamin's involvement as somewhat dubious.
Two final pieces of information make this case even more bizarre. The first is that William Tilghman resided in Philadelphia at the time of his death, and had lived there for some time. The previous document to the upper left reveals this fact, and refers to the troublesome legal status of William Tilghman's large Maryland land-holdings. Much of the land was sold to a Mr. Cummins for a large sum, but this matter of the legal nuances of inter-state real estate surely complicated an already complicated subject. My final document of the day, however, makes obvious one of the especially troubling aspects of this situation. There were, in 1827, a large body of slaves owned by William Tilghman, living on the said Maryland property. These are referred to by name in the inventory to the right. In 1830, when Benjamin Chew and various members of the Tilghman family were muddling through this legal battle, Maryland was still a slave state. There were distinct abolitionist sympathies in the states on Maryland's northern border, and informed parties were almost certainly concerned about what would become of slaves caught in the awkward legal position of living in Maryland on a property owned by a deceased master residing in Pennsylvania.
One can certainly understand why William Tilghman's Estate is of interest to me; I hope it is of similar interest to the readers of this blog. There is much more information to be scanned and discovered in the William Tilghman file, and I hope to present that information in the coming weeks. Look for a post in the near future by my colleague Nathan discussing several penal bonds we found that were also tied to Benjamin Chew and reveal in more depth the situation facing these slaves following the death of William Tilghman. Please continue to check in weekly, and expect another post by next Friday as we further explore Series 10 of the Poplar Grove Collection. Until then, feel free to post comments and even start a discussion on this subject. I would love to read what you have to say regarding the somewhat confusing estate of William Tilghman.
-Christian
It has been a week since my previous post, and I am happy to have, for the moment, made good on my promise of a weekly update. Let us hope this good fortune continues.
The topic of this week's discussion is one that I find both quite interesting and also somewhat baffling. In some ways, I am putting out a challenge to my readers, which will be made explicit at the end of this post. I will be offering a selection of documents pertaining to the battle over William Tilghman, the "Late Chief Justice of the State of Pennsylvania." At the moment, my biographical details on this figure are admittedly slim. I hope to have more time to delve into his story in coming weeks, but I have been somewhat caught up in a variety of other tasks. The important details for our discussion are to be found in a selection of papers from Poplar Grove, Series 10.
We know that William Tilghman
died in 1827, as is apparent in a Bill of Complaint filed by John Tilghman and his wife Ann found to the right. We also know that he drafted a will in 1819. Unfortunately, that will had apparently not been updated since 1819, and this caused some tension between those who expected to inherit some of his wealth (see the image to the upper-left). Clearly, John and Ann Tilghman were among those who wanted a piece of the pie, so to speak.
Perhaps the greatest issue causing contention over inheritance, however, was a sad event that had transpired in the decade between the writing and the execution of William Tilghman's will. According to the image to the left, he had intended to leave virtually all of his estate to his grandson, William Tilghman Chew. We learn from the same document that the grandson predeceased William Tilghman. This left the issue of inheritance in a nebulous area, without a clear heir. Clouding the issue was the fact that William's grandson was the son of Benjamin Chew, a prominent lawyer, who seems to have gone completely unmentioned in the will (which we do not posess). Benjamin became one of two executors of William Tilghman's estate upon the latter's death, and it is not hard to see why other family members may have seen Benjamin's involvement as somewhat dubious.
Two final pieces of information make this case even more bizarre. The first is that William Tilghman resided in Philadelphia at the time of his death, and had lived there for some time. The previous document to the upper left reveals this fact, and refers to the troublesome legal status of William Tilghman's large Maryland land-holdings. Much of the land was sold to a Mr. Cummins for a large sum, but this matter of the legal nuances of inter-state real estate surely complicated an already complicated subject. My final document of the day, however, makes obvious one of the especially troubling aspects of this situation. There were, in 1827, a large body of slaves owned by William Tilghman, living on the said Maryland property. These are referred to by name in the inventory to the right. In 1830, when Benjamin Chew and various members of the Tilghman family were muddling through this legal battle, Maryland was still a slave state. There were distinct abolitionist sympathies in the states on Maryland's northern border, and informed parties were almost certainly concerned about what would become of slaves caught in the awkward legal position of living in Maryland on a property owned by a deceased master residing in Pennsylvania.
One can certainly understand why William Tilghman's Estate is of interest to me; I hope it is of similar interest to the readers of this blog. There is much more information to be scanned and discovered in the William Tilghman file, and I hope to present that information in the coming weeks. Look for a post in the near future by my colleague Nathan discussing several penal bonds we found that were also tied to Benjamin Chew and reveal in more depth the situation facing these slaves following the death of William Tilghman. Please continue to check in weekly, and expect another post by next Friday as we further explore Series 10 of the Poplar Grove Collection. Until then, feel free to post comments and even start a discussion on this subject. I would love to read what you have to say regarding the somewhat confusing estate of William Tilghman.
-Christian
Thursday, October 1, 2009
A New Contributor
Hello readers,
I am the newest member of the Poplar Grove team, and consider it a privilege to begin adding my contributions and observations to this blog. I hope the time that has passed since the original discovery of this material has not diminished interest in the project; many of the most intriguing finds are still going on, and I hope to make this apparent throughout my work with the Poplar Grove Collection this Fall.
First, however, I should provide some information about myself. I am Christian Skipper, a recent graduate of St. Mary's College of Maryland. I graduated with honors, majoring in English and History; this program culminated in a lengthy Senior Project that took me a year to complete. I am no stranger to long-term projects, and I think this will serve me well in my time working with the Poplar Grove papers.
I came to the Maryland State Archives in June, 2009 as an intern, and, after taking part in an extensive project to enhance the accessibility of the Brown Books,* I was assigned to assist my coworker Nathan scan several series of the Poplar Grove collection. This has proven a very fruitful task, as I hope to reveal in my upcoming blog postings.
Nathan and I have been given the responsibility of scanning Series 17 and 10, two of the most damaged and disorganized collections. We have built on the foundation created by previous Poplar Grove workers, and in the case of Series 10 extensively organized ten boxes full of material. Much of this material, of course, is of interest primarily to those concerned with financial transactions carried out in the nineteenth century. Receipts abound, for goods as innocuous as empty bottles and transactions as high-profile as land exchanges. We have found documents discussing Tilghman Island in the Chesapeake, as well as the sale of several farms on the Eastern Shore. These could prove very helpful to the large body of historians interested in the development of Maryland's landowning culture. The receipts also shed light on any number of businesses operating in Maryland throughout the 1800s, especially in the Baltimore area. Several receipts suggest the buildup of the Poplar Grove Stock Farm (an important location in the 1890s, as we know from E. B. Emory's high level of financial correspondence during that decade).**
Perhaps most bizarre, though, is the Estate of William Tilghman. We intend to highlight this as one of the prizes of the series, as a lengthy legal and social drama played out around William Tilghman's death. His failure to leave a will necessitated the hire of a third party to negotiate the legal quagmire brought on by residing in Pennsylvania but owning a large amount of land and slaves in Maryland. Social historians should take note of this battle, as the documents that pertain to it dovetail significantly with a body of slave-related papers found in this series. The apparent miscellany and largely financial quality of Series 10 fell away to reveal a bevy of intriguing sources concerning the period immediately preceding the American Civil War.
Please return to this blog regularly; I intend to post updates as I am able, and ideally will provide new looks into our work once a week. This may be naive, given the large amount of work that we have yet to do on Series 10, and the following task of making these documents accessible to the wider public in a digital format. Even so, I hope to provide you with new insights into the remarkable Poplar Grove Collection quite frequently.
-Christian Skipper
* a collection of important Revolutionary-era documents compiled on microfilm in the 1940s.
** this correspondence forms the majority of items in Series 17.
I am the newest member of the Poplar Grove team, and consider it a privilege to begin adding my contributions and observations to this blog. I hope the time that has passed since the original discovery of this material has not diminished interest in the project; many of the most intriguing finds are still going on, and I hope to make this apparent throughout my work with the Poplar Grove Collection this Fall.
First, however, I should provide some information about myself. I am Christian Skipper, a recent graduate of St. Mary's College of Maryland. I graduated with honors, majoring in English and History; this program culminated in a lengthy Senior Project that took me a year to complete. I am no stranger to long-term projects, and I think this will serve me well in my time working with the Poplar Grove papers.
I came to the Maryland State Archives in June, 2009 as an intern, and, after taking part in an extensive project to enhance the accessibility of the Brown Books,* I was assigned to assist my coworker Nathan scan several series of the Poplar Grove collection. This has proven a very fruitful task, as I hope to reveal in my upcoming blog postings.
Nathan and I have been given the responsibility of scanning Series 17 and 10, two of the most damaged and disorganized collections. We have built on the foundation created by previous Poplar Grove workers, and in the case of Series 10 extensively organized ten boxes full of material. Much of this material, of course, is of interest primarily to those concerned with financial transactions carried out in the nineteenth century. Receipts abound, for goods as innocuous as empty bottles and transactions as high-profile as land exchanges. We have found documents discussing Tilghman Island in the Chesapeake, as well as the sale of several farms on the Eastern Shore. These could prove very helpful to the large body of historians interested in the development of Maryland's landowning culture. The receipts also shed light on any number of businesses operating in Maryland throughout the 1800s, especially in the Baltimore area. Several receipts suggest the buildup of the Poplar Grove Stock Farm (an important location in the 1890s, as we know from E. B. Emory's high level of financial correspondence during that decade).**
Perhaps most bizarre, though, is the Estate of William Tilghman. We intend to highlight this as one of the prizes of the series, as a lengthy legal and social drama played out around William Tilghman's death. His failure to leave a will necessitated the hire of a third party to negotiate the legal quagmire brought on by residing in Pennsylvania but owning a large amount of land and slaves in Maryland. Social historians should take note of this battle, as the documents that pertain to it dovetail significantly with a body of slave-related papers found in this series. The apparent miscellany and largely financial quality of Series 10 fell away to reveal a bevy of intriguing sources concerning the period immediately preceding the American Civil War.
Please return to this blog regularly; I intend to post updates as I am able, and ideally will provide new looks into our work once a week. This may be naive, given the large amount of work that we have yet to do on Series 10, and the following task of making these documents accessible to the wider public in a digital format. Even so, I hope to provide you with new insights into the remarkable Poplar Grove Collection quite frequently.
-Christian Skipper
* a collection of important Revolutionary-era documents compiled on microfilm in the 1940s.
** this correspondence forms the majority of items in Series 17.
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