JAMES MCDOWELL PAPERS, #459, 1770-1915
Correspondence, papers, and writings of James McDowell of Rockbridge County, Virginia,
state legislator, governor, and U.S. Representative. Correspondence covers topics such as
McDowell's involvement with colonization societies (1820-1851) and views on slavery in the
territories (1831-1851). Financial and legal materials contain an inventory of McDowell's
slaves and an emancipation contract stipulating the freed slave's emigration to Liberia (ca.
1831). McDowell's writings contain several speeches and articles
on slavery in the territories, colonization of Africa by slaves; the "Great Slavery Debate"
in the Virginia General Assembly, 1831-1832; and miscellaneous notes on slavery.