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This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held in the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in our reading room, and not digitally available through the World Wide Web. See the Duplication Policy section for more information.
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Collection Overview
| Size | 0.5 feet of linear shelf space (approximately 125 items) |
| Abstract | Chiefly deeds, estate records, and other financial and legal items, including slave bills of sale, relating to Young Allen of Wake County, N.C., and to members of his family. Also included are some correspondence of the Allen family with relatives and others, some of which relates to settling the frontier in Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi in the 1820s and 1830s, and a bawdy poem about a parson and a black woman. |
| Creator | Allen, Young, d. 1835. |
| Curatorial Unit | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library. Southern Historical Collection. |
| Language | English |
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Information For Users
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Processing Information
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Subject Headings
The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.
Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.
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Biographical Information
Young Allen was a farmer and slave owner in Wake County, N.C., active from the 1780s until his death in 1835. He probably also operated a saw mill.
A number of members of Allen's family migrated west into the Mississippi River Valley in the 1820s and 1830s. Apparently, not all of them intended to move permanently. However, one of Allen's sons, Young W. Allen, settled and started a family in western Tennessee.
When Young Allen died in 1835, his son John Allen, also of Wake County, appears to have taken over much of his father's property. John Allen lived at least until the 1840s.
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Scope and Content
Chiefly deeds, estate records, and other financial and legal items, including slave bills of sale, relating to Young Allen of Wake County, N.C., and to members of his family. Also included are some correspondence of the Allen family with relatives and others, some of which relates to settling the frontier in Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi in the 1820s and 1830s, and a bawdy poem about a parson and a black woman.
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Series Quick Links
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Series 1. Correspondence, 1813-1864.
Arrangement: chronological.
Correspondence of the Allen family of Wake County, N.C., and of relatives elsewhere in North Carolina and in Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi.
The earliest item is a letter written in 1813 in Wake County that discusses Senate candidates.
A number of letters were written in Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi between 1822 and 1834. These letters include descriptions of conditions and attitudes of settlers along the Mississippi frontier in the 1820s and 1830s.
There are four letters from 1836 to 1839, all of which were written in Wake County. Two of these letters deal with social functions: one is an invitation to a member of the Allen family, and the other describes a sermon, dinner, and dance. The other two are more personal: one is a pledge to redeem a lady's honor from an unnamed rumor; the other is a marriage proposal.
Finally, there are two letters from the 1860s: an 1862 letter from a member of the Allen family in the Confederate army describes camp conditions, and an 1864 letter describes a smallpox outbreak and efforts to avoid military service.
Undated letters are chiefly of the same sort as the dated Wake County letters and are probably from around 1830. One letter, addressed to "Dear Sister," describes the care given a person dying of typhoid and that person's funeral.
| Folder 1 |
1813-1839 |
| Folder 2 |
1862-1864 and undated |
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Series 2. Legal and Financial Items, 1783-1927.
Arrangement: chronological.
Legal and financial items relating to the families of Young Allen and John Allen, probably father and son, both of Wake County, N.C. Items prior to 1810 are deeds, records of slave sales, and an account sheet, all relating to Young Allen. Material from 1810 to 1859 consists of deeds, receipts, summons, records of slave sales, account sheets, and other items, chiefly of John Allen. Also included are items from 1835 that relate to the estate of Young Allen. Items dated 1860-1879 are chiefly tax records of Anderson H. Allen.
Five deeds of members of the Allen and Arnold families, 1926-1927, also appear. Undated items are chiefly fragments of 19th century deeds, account sheets, and other records.
| Folder 3 |
1783-1809 |
| Folder 4 |
1810-1834 |
| Folder 5 |
1835-1839 |
| Folder 6 |
1840-1859 |
| Folder 7 |
1860-1879 |
| Folder 8 |
1926-1927 |
| Folder 9 |
Undated |
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Series 3. Writings, Before 1865.
A single-page poem, signed on the back "Y.W. Young" (probably Young Allen or his son Young W. Allen). The poem is an obscene, comic poem about a parson and a black woman.
| Folder 10 |
Poem, before 1865 |