Assorted manuscript documents from the William Massie family, arranged chronologically. Includes business correspondence regarding crops, trade news, and prices for different commodities like wheat, flour, bacon, apples, tobacco, and rye; some correspondence and news about the Orange and Alexandria Rail Road Company; a Virginia land deed for Massie dated 1854 April 3; land tax lists for Massie from 1855; copies of land assessments for Massie from 1856 and 1857; business and personal correspondence from son Thomas to William Massie, including discussions of the family's land and potential estates; business and personal correspondence from John Jones, often written on printed issues of H.P. Jewett's Merchants' Prices-Current and Shipping-List, 1854. Includes a letter 1854 February 10 from slave trader Charles Jones to Massie about the prices he could expect for an unnamed enslaved girl Massie was looking to sell in Richmond. Includes a list of seven enslaved children - Fanny, Charles, Peter, Edmund, Matilda, Hannah, and Martha, ages ten through one - and their valuation, prepared on 1859 January 24 by H.C. Boyd and R. Whitehead for Thomas Massie, who planned to sell them to his father William Massie. Includes a certificate for Richard Vaughn, "was this day duty registered as a free Negro" and includes a physical description of Vaughn as well as the note "and he was born free," signed by Thomas Massie, clerk of the court, on 1858 June 28.
