Research Guides: Armed Conflicts & the Military in the Special Collections Research Center: Barbary Wars

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Special Collections Research Center Access Tools: There are a variety of tools available to guide you in finding materials in the Special Collections Research Center (SCRC). Don't forget that you also may come into the SCRC in person. Please email spcoll@wm.edu to make an appointment.

Barbary War Sources in the Special Collections Research Center

James Barron Papers (I) 1766-1899
Correspondence and papers of Commodore James Barron relating to his career in the United States Navy, and especially relating to The Chesapeake-Leopard Affair in 1807 and to his duel with Stephen Decatur. Collection includes photocopies of patents issued to Barron for his inventions and a typescript of William Oliver Stevens' An Affair of Honor, a biography of Barron. Correspondents include John Adams, Jesse Duncan Elliott, Andrew Jackson, Thomas Jefferson, Amos Kendall, Duff Green and Abel P. Upshur. Includes correspondence of 1803 to 1805 that covers the period from Barron's first commission through his command of the U.S. Frigates New Yorkand President in the Mediterranean Squadron during the war with Tripoli.
Conway Whittle Papers
Papers of Conway Whittle II of Norfolk, Va. and of his two sisters, Mary Eliza Whittle Neale and Frances Munford Whittle Lewis. There are items concerning the earlier generation of the family, represented by Conway Whittle I and his brother Fortescue Whittle, Norfolk merchants. The collection is particularly strong in the subject areas of social history and naval history (including personal and official correspondence of William Lewis [1781-1815] and several letters of his namesake William Lewis Herndon who served in the Navy and went down in the sinking of the ship Central America in 1857). There are letters written by and concerning Matthew Fontaine Maury. The collection also covers the following subject areas: life in Philadelphia, life in Norfolk, the Whittle family in Mecklenburg County, Va., war with Tripoli (Barbary pirates), Confederate exiles in Nova Scotia, U. S. Civil War, U. S. Customs Service, Dismal Swamp Canal Company, politics, trips to the springs and marriage.
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The collection also covers the subject areas of courtship, the Protestant Episcopal Church, and slavery. Prominent correspondents in the collection include Charles Jared Ingersoll, Marquis de Lafayette, Tobias Lear, Dolley Madison, James Madison, Margaret Mercer, James Monroe, Edward Preble, John Randolph of Roanoke, and John Tyler.

Barron Family Papers

Papers and correspondence of three generations of Samuel Barrons, all of whom were involved in naval affairs. Papers, 1793-1809, of Samuel Barron (1765-1810), commander of one of the Mediterranean squadrons sent to defeat Tripoli. Papers concern naval business and the War with Tripoli. Includes correspondence with his brother James Barron, Stephen Decatur, William Eaton (concerning his controversy with Tobias Lear over the Tripolitan peace settlement), Tobias Lear, Edward Preble, John Rodgers, Robert Smith (Secretary of the Navy), and Thomas Truxton. Includes letters written by Preble and Rodgers on board the USS Constitution and letters concerning the capture of William Bainbridge and the seamen of the USS Philadelphia.