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Preferred Citation

Hairston-Wilson-James Family Papers, 1764-1937. Accession 41196. Personal papers collection, The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

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Biographical Information

George Hairston was born in Bedford County, Virginia on 20 September 1750. He was the son of Robert Hairston and Ruth Stovall. He married Elizabeth Perkins Letcher (1759-1818) on 1 January 1781. Hairston served as a colonel in the Revolutionary War and fought at the Battle of Guilford Court House and at the siege of Yorktown. Following the war, Col. Hairston resided at his Henry County plantation "Beaver Creek." He also served as a brigadier general in the War of 1812, and commanded a brigade consisting of the 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th Virginia militia regiments and the North Carolina 23rd. He died on 5 March 1827.

His son Marshall Hairston was born on 4 March 1802. He married his cousin Ann Hairston (1802-1888) on 12 March 1829. They lived at "Beaver Creek" and had nine children. Marshall Hairston died on 20 January 1882.

Their daughter Ruth Stovall Hairston was born on 4 December 1837, with her twin sister Ann Marshall Hairston (1837-1907). Ruth married Robert A. Wilson (ca. 1825-1892) of "Dan's Hill" in Pittsylvania County. They had one daughter, Ann Marshall Wilson (1869-1938). Ruth Stovall Wilson died in 1886.

Ann Marshall Wilson married Rorer Anderson James (1859-1921) on 12 October 1892. He was an attorney and owner of the Danville Register and Danville Bee newspapers, member of the Virginia House of Delegates and Virginia Senate, and member of the United States House of Representatives. He died on 6 August 1921. Ann Marshall James died on 27 March 1938. They are both buried in Green Hill Cemetery in Danville.

Scope and Content

Papers, 1764-1937, of the Hairston, Wilson, and James family of Henry and Pittsylvania Counties, Danville, and Martinsville, Virginia, and Mississippi, namely Col. George Hairston (1750-1825), Ann Hairston (1802-1888), Ann Marshall Hairston (1837-1907), Col. Robert Wilson (1789-1873), Robert A. Wilson (ca. 1825-1892), Ruth Stovall (Hairston) Wilson (1837-1886), Rorer A. James (1859-1921), and Ann Marshall (Wilson) James (1869-1938). The collection includes accounts and receipts, agreements, catalogs and price lists, correspondence, invitations and announcements, ledgers of John S. Townes (1854-1900), photographs, rent ledgers, scrapbook, and logs detailing work performed at the Wilson properties "Hickory Forest" and "Dan's Hill."

The earliest letters in the collection are written to Col George Hairston and concern legal and financial matters, post office duties, the death of his son Nicholas Perkins Hairston (1791-1822), and the administration of the estate of another son Henry Hairston (1793-1825) in Mississippi. There are letters written to Col. Robert Wilson from his son William Wilson while he was attending Emory and Henry College in 1856, and a letter from his son Robert A. Wilson while he was stationed with troops at the fairgrounds in Richmond in 1861. There are numerous letters written by Ann Hairston to her granddaughter Ann Marshall Wilson covering the period 1877 to 1884, and there are also letters written by Ruth Hairston Early (1849-1928) that include numerous references to her uncle Jubal A. Early (1816-1894). The collection also includes correspondence from Ruth Stovall Wilson and Annie Marshall Wilson to Robert A. Wilson while they were attending the World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition in New Orleans in 1885.

Other items of note in the collection include agreements, or labor contracts, between Robert A. Wilson and various individuals. Most are from the 1880's. There is a bank book of Robert Wilson with the Farmers Bank of Virginia, covering the period 1848 to 1861, an 1850-1851 catalog from the Patapsco Female Institute, Richmond and Danville Railroad Company stock receipts, 1848-1850, and a scrapbook of Rorer A. James that includes a letter from Woodrow Wilson.