Williams family papers

The Williams family papers concern the business and personal affairs of prominent Delaware politician and landowner James Williams (1825-1899), and his son Nathaniel J. Williams (1857-1943), who was also a prominent politician and landowner. In addition, the collection contains documents relating to the business of Parvis & Williams, a Middletown-based fertilizer manufacturing company that was headed by James Williams once he joined John Parvis in 1885. The collection consists of correspondence, college exercise books and notebooks, account books, ledgers, canceled checks, tax forms, stock and real-estate transactions, legal business, bills, and ephemera.

The collection is divided into three main series: I. Papers regarding the personal and business affairs of James Williams; II. Business of the Parvis & Williams Company; and III. Papers regarding the personal affairs of Nathaniel J. Williams as well as the management of his estates.

The first series spans the years 1861-1894 and includes various account books of James Williams in the management of his estates, as well as personal letters and a journal recording the bills passed in the Delaware Senate in early 1869.The second series deals with the business of the fertilizer manufacturing company, Parvis & Williams, and spans the period 1884-1898. Included are order books, correspondence, ledgers, check books, and business transacted with two collection agencies for delinquent accounts. The third series spans the period 1887-1947, and includes items used during his studies at the University of Virginia; family items, including a photograph, books, and a scrapbook; personal correspondence; correspondence between his daughter and the National Cyclopedia of American Biography (1943-1947); correspondence with tenants; envelopes; ledgers; stock statements and tax forms; bills; and legal business.

The collection provides an extensive, though undoubtedly incomplete, record of the family land holdings, as well as location, business done on the farms, tenants, and the economic vitality of each. It can be difficult to keep track of the farms, however. The farms are named after the tenants who hold them, and when a new tenant comes along the name of the farm changes as well. An example of this is the Luthringer Farm, which was held in tenancy by William Luthringer until 1925, when it was taken over by Rothwell R. Price. Thereafter it was known as the Price Farm. In any case, the collection provides a great deal of information about the financial status of the family estates throughout the late ninteenth and the first half of the twentieth centuries.

The correspondence between Nathaniel Williams and his tenants shows in some detail the relationships between the two, and what responsibilities were expected from each. It is clear that he had a very large number of tenants, though the business-like nature of the letters does not indicate what they may have thought of him. It is clear from the requests for money that at least a few of them frequently relied upon Williams for financial support, the result perhaps of hard economic times, and were not particularly well off. These economic conditions are detailed more clearly in the records maintained in the ledgers. The letters are also interesting in that many describe the work that is being done on the farms, and this helps provide a picture of the duties required of a farmer and the intricate network of business contacts for the buying and selling of goods which arise from this. In addition, the collection documents the financial and business activities of the family company Parvis & Williams, which was run by both father and son from 1885.

Though the collection does not provide much information on the family's interest in stocks, it is clear that Nathaniel purchased stocks, perhaps many, after the market crash of October 1929, suggesting that he viewed the drop as a temporary setback and an opportunity to acquire cheap purchases. It is interesting to witness the fortunes of these stocks in the wake of the Depression; in some cases he lost quite a lot of money because of the steady decline of stock prices during the 1930s. In terms of actual numbers and diversity, however, the collection is unclear.

Overall, the collection contains mostly business-related material and does not offer much in terms of the family's personal life. Nevertheless, there are a few disparate items that are of some interest. Nathaniel's personal correspondence and material from the University of Virginia offer a very small glimpse into his work and personal relationships in college, and can serve as a means of gauging the level of education which he received along the way. The paucity of letters, especially from home, is interesting, and may reflect the fact that his father's term in Congress coincided exactly with Nathaniel's years at Virginia, while the letters of Willard Saulsbury betray the existence of a close circle of friends to which Williams belonged. In addition, the books which belong to Francine [Clayton] Williams and the scrapbook of Martha E. Clayton (perhaps the mother of Francine], may be useful in suggesting the type of leisure activities and interests in which well-to-do women of the late nineteenth century were engaged, and the type of libraries they may have kept.