Plantations
This guide describes manuscript collections documenting plantation society and economy in the Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collections (LLMVC) at LSU. The plantation records and personal papers of planters, factors, merchants, and others whose livelihood came from plantations provide a wealth of documentation supporting research in plantation economy, slavery, and the social history of Southern landholding elites.
The collections described below touch upon all facets of plantation life. They include the papers of tutors, preachers, lawyers, and doctors who provided services to planters. They include the letters of Northerners who visited plantations in the antebellum period and wrote home about them, and those of Union soldiers who marched past plantations and sometimes plundered them. While the majority of collections are from the prewar years, there are substantial holdings on postbellum plantations as well. The sugar and cotton plantation records in LLMVC are among its most noteworthy and famed collections, and among the earliest collections that LSU acquired.
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Dart, Elisabeth K. (Elizabeth Kilbourne). Collection, 1774-2005. 5.5 linear feet. Location: 121:8-10, OS:D, Vault:5. Resident and local historian in St. Francisville, West Feliciana Parish, Louisiana. Wrote about West Feliciana subjects including the Railroad, biographies of notable figures, and tours for Grace Cemetery. Collection contains manuscript and research materials used for exhibits, lectures, tours, and writing on West Feliciana Parish. Manuscripts include deeds, correspondence, accounting records, legal papers, court cases, and receipts. Other records include published materials, copies of original materials, scrapbooks, photographs, notes, and exhibit text. Mss. 5023. Referenced in Guides: Spanish, Plantations, Women, Business, Baton Rouge, African Americans, French, Medicine, Jewish Community
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Davis, Joseph M., Jr., interviewee. Oral history interview, 1993. 1 sound cassette (45 minutes), Index (4 pages). Location: L:4700.232. Resident of Four Corners, a community south of Franklin, St. Mary Parish, Louisiana, who owned a trucking company and was a police juror for 20 years. Davis describes working as a child; his college career; involvement in his family trucking business, and challenges of breaking into the white dominated trucking industry; federal programs for minorities; his political involvement; and his family values. Davis also discusses the history of South Coast Plantation and his parents' employment there; plantation life in the 1950s and 1960s; and sugarcane. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 4700.221. |
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Dawkins, Guilford. Petition, 1853 January 6. 1 item (2 leaves). Location: Misc:D. Plantation overseer of Madison Parish, Louisiana. Petition to the 10th Judicial District Court, Madison Parish, for redress regarding an injury inflicted on Dawkins by Dudley, a slave. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 4515. Referenced in Guides: Plantations, African Americans
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Dawson and Pipkin. Receipts, 1847-1850. 21 items. Location: MISC:D. Cotton planters. Receipts from New Orleans merchants reflect cotton sales and purchases of plantation supplies. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 2950. Referenced in Guides: Plantations, New Orleans to 1861
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Day of Jubelo Carte cartoon, 1865.1 printed item. Location: E:69. Carte-sized cartoon drawn by E. B. Bensell and printed in Philadelphia depicting emancipated slaves celebrating freedom in their former master's house. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 2918. |
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De Bordes Family Papers, 1765-1822. 106 items. Location: B:13, OS:D,Mss. Mf.:D Papers relating to land holdings and the operation of sugar and coffee plantations in Haiti and Santo Domingo; slave insurrections and the life of refugees from them in New Orleans; and decisions and decrees relating to trade, commerce, and emigration. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 2246. |
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de Caro Francis A. and Rosan A. Jordan. Collection. 1956-2009, undated (bulk 1966-2003). 13 linear ft. Location: 11:19, 15:15-21. De Caro and Jordan were folklorists, authors, and Louisiana State University (Baton Rouge, La.) professors. The collection includes personal and professional correspondence, writings, exhibitions, photographs, printed items consisting of brochures, handbills, newspapers, and posters; and topical files that document de Caro's folklore class at LSU, his work with the Louisiana Folklife Commission, and Jordan's work with the women's movement. Writings as well as exhibitions comprise material primarily related to folklore within Louisiana and British colonial life in India. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 3197, 4089, 4164. Referenced in Guides: Religion, Plantations, Performing arts, Women, New Orleans 1866-, Education, Baton Rouge, Acadiana, African Americans, LSU, Literature
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De La Vergne family. Papers, 1751-1972. 1 ft. and 1 reel of microfilm. Location: 77:21, O:22, Mss. Mf.:D Family of lawyers, planters, and businessmen of New Orleans. Correspondence, military papers, genealogical material, and other papers include material on banking and finance, the Consolidated Association of the Planters of Louisiana, defense of New Orleans during the War of 1812, and Jefferson College. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 2642. |
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de Trujeda, Bernardino, Declaration, 1799. 1 volume (88 pages). Location: 111:1. Certified copy of declartion regarding financial condition of sugar plantation and mill at Hacienda Senora Santa Ana Tepoxtepec, owned by the Regidor Perpetuo of Cordova, Mexico, Bernardino de Trujeda. The declaration is dated October 23, 1789, but the certified copy was signed January 25, 1799 by public notary Mariano Francisco Zambrano at Puebla de los Angeles. The document is bound and contains petitions, claims, and wills, some signed by various church officials. It also includes an inventory, appraisal, and description of slaves and other property. For further information see online catalog. Mss. 4998. |
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DeClouet, Alexandre (Alexandre Etienne) and Family. Papers, 1787-1905 (bulk 1855-1888). 1.2 linear ft. Location: U:181, J:5. Sugar planter, Confederate congressman, and state senator from St. Martin Parish, Louisiana. Beginning in the 1860s, DeClouet was active in the White League, an organization opposed to rights for freedmen. Collection includes financial papers, legal documents, political papers, and correspondence. Financial records of Alexandre DeClouet and his son Paul document plantation management and labor issues. Political papers include White League materials. Some items in French. Available on microfilm 6061: University Publications of America Records of Southern Plantations from Emancipation to the Great Migration, Series B, Part 3, Reels 5-6. For further information, see online catalog. Mss. 74, 258, 461, 756. |