Administrative Information

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Preferred Citation

Papers of the Noland Family, Accession #6463, -a, -c, -d, Special Collections, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.

Acquisition Information

The Noland papers were given to the Library on several occasions. Accession 6463, 6463-c, and 6463-d were a gift of Mrs. William C. Noland of Richmond, Virginia on November 25, 1960, May 14, and August 26, 1980. Accession 6463-a was a gift of Nelson B. Noland of Birmingham, Michigan on May 18, 1962.

Scope and Content Information

The collection consists of ca. 4,000 items (8 Hollinger boxes, 3.4 cubic feet), 1774 [1813-1899] 1947, chiefly the papers of the Noland family of Airwell, Hanover County, Virginia, particularly Callender St. George Noland [1816- ], his parents William Noland [1775?- ], Catherine (Callender) Noland [1775?-1849], his wife Mary Edmonia (Berkeley) Noland, and their children Nelson B. Noland [1846-1913], Francis Noland [d. 1898], William Churchill Noland, and Margaret B. Noland, and also of the Rev. John Cooke, guardian of Mary E. B. Noland.

The bulk of the collection consists of the correspondence of the family members with friends, acquaintances, and Naval officials. A few originate in other states and countries particularly Madagascar, Mexico, Brazil, Germany, and Peru. Also in the collection are Cooke's guardianship accounts for Mary Berkeley, some letters from him, and two diaries, 1831 and 1854.

Callendar St. George Noland's papers cover his career in the U. S. Navy including an Everglades expedition in 1841 and charges brought against him for flogging two Marine privates, 1842, his life at Airwell and his Civil War service in the artillery at Fort Powhatan and later in the Confederate Naval Department.

The letters of Nelson B. Noland describe life at the Virginia Military Institute during the Civil War including preparations for the battle of New Market, his work on the Peruvian Hydrographic Commission of the Amazon, 1872-1874, and his later efforts to receive payment, his work for the Boston Silver Company, Sts. John Summit County, Colorado and life as a mining engineer in Kokomo, Colorado. Letters of Francis Noland describe teaching at Strawberry Plains, Isle of Wight County, Virginia, Gainesville, Alabama, frontier life in Commanche, Texas, and Kokomo, Colorado, where he worked for the Summit County Times and the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. His letters also describe Indian troubles, claim jumping, a murder and a lynching, and life in Norfolk, Virginia where he worked for the Norfolk Virginian , Norfolk Landmark , and Portsmouth Times before becoming chief of ordnance for the U. S. Navy in 1886. His letters from Norfolk describe local personalities, polities, foreign vessels in port including Russian and British warships, the 1885 bank failure, and his naval duties. Several of his articles and essays are included. William Churchill Noland's letters describe life as a student at Episcopal High, Fairfax County, Virginia, as an architectural student with the firm of Theophilus Chandler, Philadelphia, and as an employee of Edward H. Kendall, New York; drawings and a commonplace book are included. Also in the correspondence are routine naval business letters from George Bancroft, George Campbell Read, James Cochran Dobbin, John Young Mason, Abel P. Upshur, and Levi Woodbury. Other correspondents include Thomas Nelson Page, who offers advice on a Civil War story in 1896, VMI superintendent, Francis Henney Smith, Richmond business man Lewis D. Aylett, Frank Noland's potential business partner Philip Pendleton Cooke, Colorado engineer, George T. McDonald, Amazon expedition president John Randolph Tucker and members F. C. Galt and James H. Rocelle, Boston businessman J. F. Spofford, Virginia Land Company vice-president A. J. Milliken, and Richmond Petersburg Railway Road Company superintendent E. T. D. Myers.

There are also various Berkeley family papers which consist primarily of financial and legal papers and some correspondence. Accounts of Nelson Berkeley and Lewis Berkeley for estate settlements of Thomas N. Berkeley and Carter B. Berkeley and the guardianship of Elizabeth Edmonia Churchill Berkeley, 1817-1835, are present. Related items include slave lists and accounts from Airwell and Dewberry, Hanover County, including a sermon, and a slave insurance policy.

Other items in the collection consist of school essays and exams, diaries, a carpenter's and [builder's?] time and memoranda books, photographs, architectural drawings, Confederate tax records and souvenirs, including reunion ribbons and a piece of a flag from General "Stonewall" Jackson's grave.

Arrangement

The papers of the two families in the collection have been interfiled and arranged chronologically. Correspondence is filed first followed by Financial and Legal Papers, Sermons, Essays and Articles, Miscellaneous Papers, Printed Materials, Photographs, Drawings and Sketches, Bound Volumes, and Oversize. Papers regarding the guardianship account of Mary Edomnia Berkeley were arranged chronologically within a single folder and filed within the financial and legal papers. Loose items from the bound volumes are in inserts which were numbered according to the volumes from which they were removed.