| COLLECTION DESCRIPTION
M92-1. Call Family and Brevard Family Papers, 1788-1920s.
Quantity: 6 cubic feet
Arrangement: Organized into two series: Call Family Papers
and Brevard Family Papers; within each series, primary arrangement is chronological.
Restrictions: Researchers other than donor's immediate family
must have specific written permission of the donor to use this collection.
This restriction is in force until December 30, 1999.
Biographical Data: Richard Keith Call (1790-1862) was territorial governor
of Florida from 1835-1840 and again from 1841-1844. He was the son
of William and Helen Meade Walker Call and the nephew of Richard Call,
who served with distinction in the Revolutionary War. Call's own
military service began in 1813 in the Creek War, where he met General Andrew
Jackson and subsequently served as Jackson’s aide de camp, beginning a
lifelong friendship. He visited Florida with Jackson in 1814 and
again in 1821 when Jackson established the new American territorial government
there. He practiced law in Pensacola and later served as a member
of the Legislative Council, delegate to Congress, receiver of the West
Florida land office, brigadier general of the West Florida militia, and
territorial governor.
Richard Keith Call married Mary Kirkman (d. 1836) of Nashville, whose
parents were enemies of Jackson and bitterly resisted the marriage.
The Calls had two daughters, Ellen and Mary. Ellen Call married attorney
Medicus Long, and together they had two surviving children, Richard
Call Long and Eleanora K. Long. Three other children died young:
Mary Louisa (“Mina”) at age 8; Ellen Douglass at age 20 months; and son
Hugh. Ellen Call Long was active in many civic organizations and
activities, including Civil War and Confederate memorial efforts and the
Women's Committee of the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia.
Mary Call married Theodore Washington Brevard, Jr., son of Judge Theodorus
W. Brevard and Caroline E. Mays Brevard, and grandson of Alexander Brevard.
Five of their seven children survived childhood and figure prominently
in the Brevard Family Papers, including Caroline Mays Brevard (“Carrie”),
Richard Call Brevard (“Call”), Jane Brevard (“Jennie”), Alice Brevard,
and Ephraim Mays Brevard (“Ephy” or “Eppy”). Jane Brevard, later
Jane Brevard Darby, was the mother of Mary Call Darby Collins, wife
of Thomas LeRoy Collins, Governor of Florida from 1955-1961.
Collection Description: This collection contains correspondence,
writings, and other papers of Richard Keith Call and his family, 1788-1916,
and Theodore Washington Brevard and Mary Call Brevard and their family,
1820-ca. 1920s. Included are personal and business correspondence;
financial records; land records; commissions; speeches; manuscript poems,
articles, books, and other writings; newspaper clippings; and scrapbooks
documenting the personal and public lives of members of the Call and Brevard
families. Together, the Call and Brevard Family Papers offer highly
significant and unique documentation of Florida's territorial, early statehood,
and Civil War history, the development of early Tallahassee, issues and
attitudes concerning slavery and race, and the effects of the Civil War
on the lives of planters of the Old South.
Particularly significant among the Call papers is correspondence between
Richard Keith Call and Andrew Jackson, for whom Call had served as an aide
de camp and with whom he maintained a lifelong friendship. Also notable
are Call's writings regarding slavery and race, secession, the Union, and
the Civil War. Call's civil, diplomatic, and military commissions
are in the collection, including those appointing him territorial governor
of Florida. The collection also documents Call's land speculation
activities in early Florida and his involvement in attempts to settle the
estate of Thomas Kirkman, father of his wife Mary Letitia Kirkman Call.
Call's correspondents included Andrew Jackson and Prince Achille Murat,
nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte and an early Tallahassee settler.
Also included in the Call papers is correspondence between R. K. Call
and other members of the Call family, including his wife Mary and their
daughter Ellen Call, known as the first white child born in Leon County.
Much of this material documents Ellen Call Long's attempts to defend her
father against his critics, and her own experiences as an author and member
of various civic and cultural organizations, including Civil War and Confederate
memorial associations and women's organizations. Most notable of
these materials is a compelling Civil War diary of Ellen Call Long in which
she discusses the progress and conclusion of the war, the assassination
of President Lincoln, and the humiliation of the South. Ellen Call
Long's correspondents included Princess Achille (Catherine) Murat, Octavia
Walton Le Vert, Julia Ward Howe, John Stockton Littell, Henry Flagler,
and Florida Governors Harrison Reed, George F. Drew, and William D. Bloxham.
The Brevard Family Papers document the lives of Mary Call Brevard, younger
daughter of Richard Keith Call and Mary Kirkman Call, Mary's husband Theodore
Washington Brevard, Jr., and their families in North Carolina and Florida.
There is a significant amount of correspondence between family members
during and after the Civil War, particularly among Mary Call Brevard, T.W.
Brevard, their children Carrie (Caroline Mays), Call (Richard Call), and
Jennie (Jane), and Mary Call Brevard's older sister Ellen Call Long.
Included are many poignant letters from T. W. Brevard written from Confederate
camps and the battlefield during the War, one describing the death of his
younger brother Mays. The collection also contains Caroline Mays
Brevard's original writings as an author and educator, including some portions
of her histories of North Carolina and Florida as well as children's stories
with Old South themes.
Ownership and Custodial History: The Call Family Papers and Brevard
Family Papers were loaned to the University of North Carolina Southern
Historical Collection in 1940 and maintained as two separate collections,
#2293 (Call) and #2294 (Brevard). Selected documents from both collections
were microfilmed (see Box 14). The owners removed the papers from
the Southern Historical Collection in 1992 and donated them to the Florida
State Archives with the request that they be maintained as a single collection.
CALL FAMILY AND BREVARD FAMILY PAPERS
Collection M92-1
CONTAINER LIST for selected items that appear on the Online Classroom.
Box 1 Folder 6
Item 2
Letter, July 5, 1858, Dr. John Jenkins, Hamilton, Canada, to Richard
K. Call, 3 pp., thanking him for his "kind and benevolent treatment to
my Daughter. . ." and asking "what will be your price, as low as you can
grant it to a Father" for the freedom of Mary, Jenkins' daughter and Call's
slave: "Through the mysterious darkness that threw a veil between
myself and children for many years -- Thanks be to the Great Father.
It has pleased God of late to shed Light upon my path and open the way
to hear from them, and also give a lenient heart to the owners of Martha
to place her in my power to obtain her, for which they have my sincere
thanks, and I feel anxious learn from your own pen, your mind and your
price, if you will be so kind as to give me an answer."
Box 1 Folder 6
Item 3
Letter, August 5, 1858, John Jenkins, Hamilton, Canada, to Richard
K. Call, 3 pp.: "It is with the deepest emotions of gratitude Sir
I acknowledge the receipt of your letter, giving your consent to let me
have my Daughter Mary [and for] the moderation of your price. . . Please
let me know by letter when you are ready and what day she will leave Tallahassee.
. . Please give my respects to Mary, tell her, her friends are awaiting
her arrival with great anxiety, thinking it almost an impossibility that
the two Sisters should ever again be reunited on Earth."
Box 1 Folder 6
Item 5
Letter, May 17, 1860, Mary Jane Higgins, Hamilton, to "Dear Husband"
(apparently a slave of Richard Call at Lake Jackson), 2 pp.: "I received
a letter from Master some time since in which he informs me that you are
well. . . I hope you will still look up to god as your supporter and your
friend and I try to do the same and. . . altho' separated in person I trust
we will be present in spirit. You will give my love to Master
and to miss Ellen and miss Mary. I dare say Master is lonesome since
his house has become so quiet but I am certain he has one Friend who will
cheer him . . . give my love to all my acquaintances and friends . . .
My Father and mother sister Martha and brother Jefferson join me in love
to Master and you. I hope to hear from you soon and beleive me to
be your faithful and devoted wife . . . P.S. I have sent along with this
a few lines from my own pen of my first writing as I thought it would please
Master and you to see I am trying to learn something."
Box 1 Folder 6
Item 7
Draft of Letter, November 1, 1860, Richard K. Call, Lake Jackson, to
Mr. Hart (editor, Tallahassee Sentinel newspaper), 12 pp., explicating
at length his unionist, pro-slavery views in response to "your remarks
on the speech delivered by me . . . on the 29th. . . I did not advocate
resistance to the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln. . . a measure which, if
adopted, must precipitate our country in to civil war. . . for which the
South is . . . unprepared. . . If Mr. Lincoln should be elected, it will
not be by a majority of the American people. It will be the result
of fortuitous circumstances . . . from the unhappy division of the Nation
in to four contending parties, of which his may chance to be the
most numerous. And although I shall regard him as a usurper
. . . I hold the peace and safety of the country too dear, and the preservation
of our glorious union too sacred, to place it in jeopardy, by one rash
and precipitate action . . . the principles of popular government,
and the cause of civil and religious liberty throughout the world, all
depend on the result of our deliberation, our decision and our action.
. . If the conservative elements will all combine, if the three defeated
factions will all unite in the holy cause of their country, if they will
cease . . . to make war on each other, and unite in opposition to the Black
Republican Administration it will be powerless. . . the principle of any
southern man is favorable to the institution of African Slavery. . . the
Black Republican party [has] perverted our Declaration of Independence,
they have willfully . . . misinterpreted our Constitution. They have
applied the Declaration of Independence to the African race; they have
sought to make the Constitution . . . yield to their false theory. . .
while the Constitution . . . recognizes our property in African slaves.
. . they assert through the principles of the Declaration of Independence
that our slaves are born free, that they are equals. . . Can any one doubt
this design in this perversion of the Declaration of Independence, which
was intended by our fathers to apply only to the white man, to our own
Anglo Saxon race? . . . I am for trying
every honorable expedient to save the Union. . . but in the mean time I
am for making every preparation for war. War in the field if it must
be, war at the Ballot Boxes. . . manifest our firm determination to maintain
our Constitutional government in all its purity or perish with it. . .
I would suspend all social and commercial intercourse between Florida and
the North during the Administration of Mr. Lincoln. . . Let the people
of Florida will it, and it can be done. And if they do not will it,
let them cease to complain of the tribute they pay to the North. . . the
institution of African Slavery has become the great agency of civilization
. . . it is feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and administering to
the wants and necessities of the whole civilized world. . . it is sending
commerce and civilization to barbarous tribes and . . . carrying Christianity
into heathen lands. . ."
Box1 Folder 6
Item 9
Letter, December 22, 1860, Richard K. Call, Lake Jackson, to Mr. Hart
(editor, Tallahassee Sentinel newspaper), printed as a 1-page
broadside: ". . . never at any time, or on any occasion within the
last ten years, have I seen so much unanimity, so much enthusiasm, in the
support of the glorious American Union, as on this day, appointed for its
destruction by political leaders. . . There are no men in your State, sir,
who will resent an insult, or avenge a wrong to Florida, with more . .
. spirit and pride than they. There are none who will resist the
Black Republicans with more firmness and energy -- none who will take up
arms sooner -- none who will fight more bravely, under the stars and the
stripes of the Union; but they will not be led like slaves -- they will
not be lead, or driven, into revolution, rebellion and treason against
their country . . . I doubt not, sir, that [their voice] is the voice of
nine-tenths of the working men of Florida. . . They will never yield any
constitutional guarantee of African slavery -- but they will "submit" to
the law while it is constitutional, and they will maintain the Union while
it is constitutional . . ." Following this is a postscript dated
December 23 in which Call announces a "Glorious anniversary of a glorious
night, Jackson's first victory on the banks of the Mississippi. The
8th day of January 1861 will be celebrated at the Lake Jackson Church.
. . a day of thanksgiving to God -- a day of honor and gratitude to the
memory of the great Chief. A Portrait of General Jackson taken
35 years ago will be displaed under a banner bearing a Star for every State
of the Union, which has not "nullified" the Fugitive Slave law and denied
the Supreme jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States. . ."
Box 1 Folder 7
Item 2
Letter, January 26, 1861, E. R. Lea, Philadelphia, to "My dear Countess
of Tallahassee" [Ellen Call Long], 4 pp.: "Your Father's
views are what I expected from the friend of General Jackson; and his name
will endure as one who tried to stem the tide of a fanatical and ill-judged
revolution, when those who have inaugurated the Disunion of their Country
will have sunk to the oblivion they deserve . . . I cannot help believing
that it would be difficult for you to approve altogether of the step into
which the Gulf States have been urged by South Carolina. At any rate
let your sentiments on these matters be what they may. . . I hope you will
come up to see us next summer. I will guarrantee that you shall say
and do just what you please without the risk of having your head shaved,
and a robe of Tar and Feathers here, Cotton not being so plentiful. . .tell
me how you all are: 'Sister Mary,' the baby, None, Vance and all.
. .although I expect to adhere as long as I live to the old stars and stripes,
and you have decided to sail under another flag . . . believe me to be
your sincere friend."
Box 1 Folder 7
Item 3
Letter, February 15, 1861, E. R. Lea, Philadelphia, to "My dear Friend
[Ellen Call Long?], 8 pp.: "I am glad you have such good accounts
from Richard in whose welfare I feel much interested, as well as in dear
little Nonie too. . . I grieve sincerely for you, and those who think like
you, that the Gulf states have not acted wisely in thus rushing into Secession.
. . I hope something may yet occur to prevent civil war. . . you will scarcely
be surprised to hear that northern men cannot easily sit down and fold
their hands, while the best and most prosperous government the world has
ever seen is being torn to pieces. . . The mass of the people [have] no
desire to exact improper concessions from the South. . . If by Black Republicans
you mean Abolitionists, do understand that they as a party are small and
without any influence. The Republican Party, "par excellence," is
composed of Old Whigs, moderate Democrats, and Americans and . . . have
no intention, as they have no power, to interfere with slavery where it
now exists. . . I think there is no feeling of animosity here towards any
of the seceded states but South Carolina. . . Kiss Nonie for me,
and give my respects to your Father, whose pamphlet I read with great interest.
. ."
Box 3 Folder 24
Jane Brevard Darby scrapbook: News clipping, 1861, 1 p., entitled
"The Secession of Florida," regarding
passage of the Ordinance of Secession.
Box 6 Folder 1
Item 13
Letter, August 23, 1864, T. W. Brevard, "Near Petersburg, Va"
to "My Dear Brother" Surgeon Ephraim Brevard, 2 pp.: "Your letter
to Mays of the 10th inst. has just been received and opened by myself.
Our beloved brother was killed two days ago (21st) in the engagement near
the Weldon Road, four miles from Petersburg. He was shot through the head
and died without a struggle. Our troops were repulsed and his body
was left in the hands of the enemy. This circumstance is inexpressibly
painful to me. . .I would rather have died myself, than have left his unburried
body on the field. . ."
Box 12 Folder 1
Ellen Call Long diary, fragments, 1864-1865, 60 pp., reflecting on
progress of the war, race relations, and family matters: "The idea
set forth is that the Caucasian race (which we have always been taught
is the most perfect of men) is exhausted . . . and in order to restore
it to its pristine excellence or superiority, there needs to be a cross
with the African - can any thing be more revolting . . . May 1st 1864 .
. . The Yankees have left only a brigade of negroes in Jacksonville . .
. Genl Grant (Yankee) is preparing to march on to Richmond again . . .
May 8th. More carnage, more widows, more orphans - The long expected and
dreaded battle has commenced in Virginia . . . we are said to have lost
four Generals - Longstreet is thought mortally wounded and shot accidentally
as General Stonewall Jackson was by our men. . . 31st. Is it possible
- my little Nonie went off to Lake City this morning . . . to make
a visit of two weeks - she has never left me before. She was
all excitement . . . She is such a perfect little lady. . . Her brother
is retained with General Anderson . . . Today is the second anniversary
of the battle of 'Seven Pines,' near Richmond, on which field my cousin
George Call fell. . . August 23 . . . The new Brigadier General (John K.
Jackson) visited our town last week - spent an evening with me - seems
disposed to take things quietly - although the Yanks are carrying everything
before them in East Florida. Captain Dickinson . . . met them with
a hundred men near Gainesville . . . and is said to have taken 150 prisoners
. . . August 28th, 1864. I had letter from son Richard yesterday, he says
Capt. Dickinsons little affair with the enemy was quite a brilliant one
. . . Several females stood in the doors and fired at the enemy .
. . Our enemies will find it difficult to subdue a people with such women
among them. . . September 11th. Well Atlanta has fallen . . . we have 40
or 50 thousand Yankee prisoners at a little town in Ga (Andersonville)
- it will be unfortunate if the Federal Army makes its way there and liberates
them. A great deal has been said both North and South with regard
to these prisoners who are represented as suffering every thing so many
crowded into a stockade of a few acres must necessarily suffer - seventy
five or one hundred are said to die daily . . . September 14th, 1864.
Today is the second anniversary of my dear Fathers death. How I used
to dislike the idea of his growing old . . . Son Richard is home on sick
leave. . . September 16th. I was pained to learn today through letter that
my sister had lost her little infant, 'Ellen Kirkman' - poor Mary,
it is her first heartfelt grief. . . The Enemy very much to the surprise
entered Marianna (West Florida) on the morning of the 26th inst.
A fight took place in the street and several persons were killed . . .
Nov 15th. There is no doubt but Abe Lincoln is again elected . . .
my heart sunk within me with the news. I see now nothing before me
but subjugation utter utter ruin. . . Nov. __ Sherman who has been in Atlanta
for some months has astonished the south by being reinforced . . . April
2nd 1865. The Governor of our State (Milton) committed suicide last
night. By nature an animated and kind man . . . The present condition
of the country . . . seems enough to drive all mad who had aught
to do in producing this state of affairs. . . I do get out of patience
with that class who in answer to all argument cry out, 'we must succeed
for Providence is on our side' - the slightest evidence of which I have
never seen. . . I am inclined to think Providence has nothing to do with
this diabolical war. . . The Confederate Congress . . . passed a
bill authorizing the enlistment or rather the conscripting of negro troops.
I am so satisfied that the institution of slavery is gone, that I set no
value upon them as property. . . but I do not believe negros can
bear the hardships of a southern soldiers life . . . April 6th. The long
expected event has come at last . . . Richmond has fallen. . . I
feel most anxious about Col. Brevard who was in the fight
before Petersburg - his wife is at her plantation. I will keep the
news of the battle from her if possible until I hear more. . . April 21st.
Well I believe the war is over - our suffering may not have yet begun however.
. . I cannot but think Davis has acted selfishly in persisting in
the war. . . April 23d 1865. We are all electrified by an official
order . . . which says, 'Hostilities will be suspended pending negotiations
for peace between the two governments.' April 26th. We had the most
astounding and startling news last night coming through the lines at Jacksonville
which is that Lincoln has been assassinated . . . I am sorry - this man
most probably has been murdered while considering the best act of his life
. . . a concilliatory course on his part toward the South - while his death
puts a much worse man in his place . . . May 10th. I was suddenly interrupted
this morning in my usual occupation by our little 'Black Boy' running
in screaming out, 'Yankees! Miss Ellen, Yankees' and I found myself
running with the rest of the children to see the 'Yankees' who were just
entering the town by my house. . . General McCook had not been in Tallahassee
a half hour before he was invited to lodge at the house of one of our most
influential men - which has created great indignation among many - certainly
none of our own Generals were met with such prompt attention. . . if they
. . . practice kind treatment I think we should show some appreciation
of it - it is time the southern people recognized their folly - and the
truth of having sold their birth right for a mess of pottage. Andrew
Johnson has issued a proclamation offering a $100, reward for the
arrest of Jeff Davis and others whom he pretends to implicate in the murder
of Lincoln and Seward. Poor Davis, where is he? . . the commandant
of the stockade at Andersonville . . . has been arrested . . . he is said
even by our own authorities to have been unusually cruel. . . Sunday May
14th. I find our pastors remarks last Sunday have created a great
furore among some of the parishioners - many declare they will not return
. . . how unfair and uncharitable to the man who has sympathized
with them in all their fanatical madness for four years . . . The negros
around the country are behaving badly as it was feared they would do -
many plantations are entirely deserted. . . I have told my negros that
I expect that they will be freed - but in any case they have got to work,
and it is only a question whether they will work for me or somebody else
. . . they will catch the popular feeling soon that they are free - which
with a negro means to sleep all day under the shade of a tree and when
night comes catch a possum or two . . . May 16th. Sad sad is the news brought
us today. Jeff Davis has been arrested . . . Davis was really opposed
to secession and did his utmost for awhile to stop its progress, but when
the current became too strong for him he yielded to it. . . May 21st. On
Yesterday the 'Stars and Stripes' were thrown to the breeze once more over
our Capitol. . . I thought four years ago . . . that it would give me great
pleasure, but not so. The humility of the south, her utterly
crushed condition makes my heart ache . . . Freedom was declared to the
negros, so today has been a great Saturnalia with them . . . May 23rd.
The negros at last will be the sufferers, for there is not one in a hundred
that knows how to make a living and many must starve and die for the need
of the fostering care of their masters. When we pass through this
crisis, this state of transition, I have no doubt we shall work our plantations
to greater advantage than ever instead of having 1 to work and 5 to feed
we will only feed those that work. . . . . I read a full account of the
obsequies of the dead President - I do not think that there was ever anything
like it in the world. From Washington City to his place of interment
in Illinois might be called one funereal procession. In every city
through which his body passed there was every demonstration of grief set
forth in every emblem of woe. . . So the Rail splitting, union splitting,
joking President is now called a Martyr . . . July 28th. We must be in
Russia - one of our citizens in a private conversation remarked to a Yankee
official that the south never would have surrendered if we could have anticipated
such treatment as we are receiving . . . he reported him, and the General
had him arrested . . . July 4th, 1865. This is the first 4th observance
here for five years, and no southern white people take part . . .
it is a negro jubilee entirely . . . we shall hate the United States ever
with a hatred that cannot be measured . . . . . I intend to leave home
next Tuesday - what the consequences will be I do not know - whether I
ever get back or not, I don't know . . . if it were not for our family
Grave Yard, I think I could easily part with it forever, but that attaches
me to it. . . Farewell my home - my heart will often turn in sadness to
you . . . God grant that those that remain of us may in time gather again
around thy heart, under bright auspices than now shade our domestic and
political condition." At the end is a copy of General Orders No.
18, April 27, 1865, giving the terms of surrender of Confederate troops
under General Joseph E. Johnston to General Sherman.
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