296

Papers of James H. Reid and the Orange & Alexandria Railroad.

Various places, 1827-1885 (bulk 1837-1868)
Approximately 400 manuscript items (approximately 160 letters
addressed to James H. Reid, 30 retained drafts of his outgoing letters, and 210
legal and financial documents), plus 22 printed items (0.6 linear feet); mostly sleeved in two binders, condition generally strong. 

  • Notes: James H. Reid (1804-1869) was a prominent businessman of Brentsville and Alexandria, VA. He was a longtime secretary and treasurer in the Orange & Alexandria Railroad (established in 1848). After the occupation of Alexandria, he served from Lynchburg through the Civil War years. The railroad cut diagonally across Virginia from Alexandria to Lynchburg, and played an important role for the Confederacy. While the papers offer good insight into the railroad's formation and antebellum operations, the war-date portion is of particular interest. 

    Most notable is an important memorandum which was sent to Reid in the days following the fall of Richmond, relaying the wishes of President Lincoln that the Confederate legislature meet to wind down the affairs of the Confederacy: "JHR. I have rec'd the following from undoubted authority & send it in event of its failure to reach Lynchburg: Memorandum of facts stated by Judge Campbell in regard to his conference with Lincoln. With the concurrence of Genl. Wetzel he agreed not to require oath of allegiance from citizens. Authorized Genl. Wetzel to give a safe conduct to the Governor, Legislature & public men to visit Richmond & deliberate on the state of the country, all parties to be free from arrest in going there . . . if the legislature agree to administer the laws under the U.S. Constitution. No other government for Va. Will be established or maintained. In regard to slavery he will not recede(?) from his proclamations, messages &c on the subject, but must let them go for what they are worth. . . . All forfeitures will be released if the state promptly acknowledges the authority of the United States." This conference between Lincoln and Confederate official John Archibald Campbell is noted in "Lincoln Day by Day" on 4 and 5 April 1865, but we do not find this text elsewhere.

    The railroad's longtime president John S. Barbour Jr. (1820-1892) was a frequent correspondent; he was later a United States Senator for Virginia, and an influential conservative Democrat. An 18 April 1861 telegram from Barbour reacts to the Battle of Fort Sumter: "Telegraph Gov. Letcher on receipt of this all the items known at Alexandria in connection with movements of last night. Answer will be secure from exposure at Washington. Say to Vandergraft, all spare equipment must be sent up the line for safety." Union troops occupied Alexandria the next month. His 22 March 1862 letter from Culpeper Court House suggests moving the railroad's records from Charlottesville to Lynchburg, as "our troops would hold this point for probably ten days longer." A 17 July 1865 letter from Barbour describes how the control of the line has been "usurped" by Francis Harrison Pierpont, the Union governor of Virginia: "There are no means of resistance in our hands, no courts to refer to for redress, and in a contest with Pierpont before the military authorities, of course, it would not be difficult to tell who would win."  

    A report by the railroad's general superintendent dated 1 October 1863 notes that the company's records prior to 1859 "were left in Alexandria" under Union occupation. In a series of charts, it shows the extent to which the railroad's passenger service had originated in northern cities prior to the war.

    4 letters are from longtime Virginia political leader William Cabell Rives (1793-1868), dated 1854-1860. 

    Official railroad documents include an 1860 contract with the Virginia Screw Steamship Company to build and operate a steamship running from Alexandria to New York, 1 June 1860; a list of the company's station agents and conductors and money due them, 31 May 1860; and a subscription list for stock purchases, 1853. An 1855 pass written by one Henry Dangerfield states: "permit my servant Richard to pass to Springfield and back to Alexandria on the Orange cars." 

    Printed railroad material includes the printed proceedings of the annual stockholder meetings of the Orange & Alexandria Railroad, dated 1849 (the first), 1851 (with a large folding map), 1857, and 1867; a broadside, "Attention Voters!", 9½ x 12 inches, protesting the proposed Alexandria and Washington Railroad on the streets of Alexandria, circa 1855 (none in OCLC); "Report of the Engineer of the Louisa Railroad Company" circa 1848 (none in OCLC); a broadside "Report of the Chief Engineer of the Alexandria, Loudoun & Hampshire Rail Road Company," 1853 (not in OCLC); a circular titled "Orange & Alexandria Rail Road: Its Condition and Present Connections, Cost, Extension to Lynchburg, Completion, Revenue &c.," June 1853 (not in OCLC); and the pamphlet "Orange & Alexandria Railroad and Francis H. Peirpoint" attacking the management of the railroad, January 1866 (not in OCLC). Also one non-railroad book: George Ironside's "Epitome Historiae Sacrae," Philadelphia, 1845, with ownership inscriptions by son L. Wilber Reid (1833-1908). 
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