Robert Jemison, Jr. Papers

Collection

Identifier: MSS-0753

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Robert Jemison, Jr. papers

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Scope and Contents note

The Robert Jemison, Jr. Papers span the period from 1797 to 1960 and include both the personal and business papers of Robert Jemison Jr., along with papers of Robert Jemison (grandfather), William Jemison (father), Priscilla Jemison (wife), Cherokee Jemison Hargrove (daughter), and Andrew Coleman Hargrove (son in law), and Robert Jemison Jr. of Birmingham (1878 1973).

The papers reflect the varied business and political interest of Robert Jemison, Jr. and his family as well as their personal and family life. Included are the records of his grist and lumber mills, plantations, stage line, the Tuskaloosa Plank Road, toll bridges, ferries, postal contracts, and the North East and South West Railroad. His political activities are documented as well, including his anti secession stand at the Secession Convention in Montgomery, Alabama in 1861.

The bulk of the material was passed down from Robert Jemison, Jr (1802-1871) and his wife Priscilla Cherokee Jemison to their daughter Cherokee Mims Jemison who married Andrew Coleman Hargrove and from them to their daughter Minnie Cherokee Hargrove who married Adrian S. Van de Graaff.

Dates

Creation: 1797 - 1973

Creator

Jemison, Robert, Jr. (Person)

Restrictions

None

Biographical/Historical note

Robert Jemison, Jr., was a planter, lawyer, business man, state representative and senator, member of the Alabama Secession Convention, and Confederate States Senator. He was born September 17, 1802, in Lincoln County, Georgia, near Augusta, and died October 17, 1871 at Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He was the son of William and Sarah (Mims) Jemison. He was educated by Professor N. S. S. Beaman, the stepfather of William Lowndes Yancey, and attended the University of Georgia. Among his classmates were Dixon Hall Lewis and W. T. Colquitt. He studied law under Eli Shorter.

About 1826, he moved with his father's family to Pickens County, Alabama, where he remained as a planter until 1836; he then moved to Tuscaloosa. In addition to his plantation operations, he owned or had interests in a saw mill, a grist mill, a toll bridge, a toll (plank) road, a cotton mill, a stage coach line, and a railroad.

He served in the Alabama state legislature from 1840-1850 and in the state senate from 1851-1863. He was instrumental in the creation of a state hospital for the insane and for its location in Tuscaloosa. In 1861, he represented Tuscaloosa County in the convention that took Alabama out of the Union, and although he strongly opposed Secession, he gave his full support to the State of Alabama and later to the Confederate States of America. In 1863, he was elected to the Confederate States Senate to fill the term vacated by the death of William Lowndes Yancey and served until the end of the war.

He married Priscilla Cherokee Taylor and had one child, Cherokee Mims, who married Andrew Coleman Hargrove of Tuscaloosa.