Buckingham County Notables: The Bolling Brothers, Part IV

John Bell Henneman, Jr.  Courtesy Charlie Henneman.

John Bell Henneman, Jr., pictured here, was a Medieval historian and, following the death of his father in 1992, continued the work of curating the Hubard papers his family inherited. Today, his son, Charlie Henneman is preparing the collection for donation to the University of Virginia.

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Need to catch up, click here: Buckingham County Notables: The Bolling Brothers, Part I

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Robert T. Hubard prefaced his essay, “Family Notices,” writing: “For the gratification of my children I now write such details as I have been able to obtain, concerning my ancestors and also those of my wife.”

Hubard was about fifty years old when he made his notes, an age when many of us begin to consider leaving a legacy of family history for future generations.

Hubard’s recollections are part of a large collection of Bolling-Hubard papers now being prepared by Bolling-Hubard descendant Charlie Henneman for donation to the University of Virginia’s archives. This “new” cache of Buckingham County gold includes farm ledgers from Chellowe, Rosney, and Whispering; a slave register from 1856; and more than 2,000 letters, dating from the 1890s to the 1950s.

This gift will complement the University of Virginia’s existing collection: “THE HUBARD FAMILY PAPERS 1749-1950.”

The current finding aid describes its contents, in part, as follows:

This ancestry is represented in the collection by ca. 50 pages of genealogical material. Of interest in the correspondence are letters to Hubard from his brothers William Bolling Hubard and Edmund Wilcox Hubard, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1841-1847, touching on political issues of the period, and ca. 30 letters, 1851-1857, from Hubard’s son, James L., relating his experiences as a cadet at Virginia Military Institute. Also included are a letter from Philip St. George Cocke concerning James Linneaus Hubard’s appointment to VMI, an extensive 1840 letter from Buchner Thruston re: Hubard family history and numerous letters concerning plantation business. Other Robert Thruston Hubard I material of note are his plantation journals, 1847-1871, and his lecture notes for Professor Tucker’s economics class at the University of Virginia in 1828.