| Abstract |
The bulk of the collection is family-centered correspondence. Civil War correspondence relates primarily to family matters, but also comments on religious, social, economic, and military aspects of the South during and after the war. Military matters concern camp life at Norfolk, Yorktown, and Fort Caswell; troop morale; supplies; Confederate retreat from New Bern; an eyewitness account of the Monitor-Merrimack Battle; hospital conditions; and the war in Florida, including the use of African American troops. Other correspondence describes religious ideas on Methodist Protestantism and personal religious beliefs; economic activities of the two families, including the conditions of area farms, labor, and the prices of equipment from northern equipment manufacturers; 1886 earthquake; attendance at a Temperance Meeting; and visiting Occoneechee Farm. |
| Access restriction | Joyner- No access restrictions. |
| Cite as |
Hunter-Wills Family Papers (#237), Special Collections Department, J. Y. Joyner Library, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA. |
| Reproduction note | Joyner- Photocopy. Greenville, N.C. : East Carolina University, 1973. |
| Terms of use | Joyner- Literary rights to specific documents are retained by the authors or their descendants in accordance with U.S. copyright law. |
| Acquisitions source |
Joyner- Loaned by Mrs. C. E. Skillman. |
| Biographical note | The Hunter and Wills families of Halifax and Warren Counties were related through the marriage of James E. Hunter and Lucy Wills in 1869. The Wills family of Brinkleyville played a prominent role in the Methodist Protestant Church from its beginning in 1828 throughout the nineteenth century. William H. Wills, a clergyman and educator in North Carolina, participated in the North Carolina Annual conferences of the Methodist Protestant Church. He and Rev. Jesse Hayes Page opened the Halifax Male Academy and Elba Female Seminary. His son, Rev. Richard Henry Wills, was also a minister of the Methodist Protestant Church. Another son, George, served as a lieutenant in the Confederate army and was killed in battle. |
