The Newport Historical Society's Library Special Collections consists of more than 1,500 linear feet of manuscript materials, including merchants= records from the 18th to the 20th century, church records for fourteen congregations, log books for dozens of ships, family papers for hundreds of Newporters, an extensive African-American history collection, town and city records, and a unique collection of diaries and journals. The materials encompass the full range of social and cultural diversity that makes Newport County unique.

The major categories of Library Special Collections at the Newport Historical Society are as follows:

The Society also has a strong collection of records from Newport=s colonial craftsmen. Of particular interest are the volumes pertaining to the town=s 18th century furniture makers. Included are records for three generations of the Townsend family (1750-1817); and the account books of lesser-known cabinetmakers such as Benjamin Baker (1761-1792); John Cahoone (1749-1760); James Taylor (1767-1802); and Benjamin Pierce (1835-1842). Clock and watch makers are represented, including Stephen Gould (accounts and letter books, 1807-1828; diaries, 1803-1836) and David Williams (letters, 1802-1822). The John Stevens Shop, which produced some of the finest examples of stone carving in early America, is represented by copies of their account books from 1705-1758.

A significant portion of this collection, including the Aaron Lopez Papers, has been microfilmed and is available for purchase by universities and libraries. Please visit www.lexis-nexis.com/cispubs for more information.

Church Records

Newport=s founders had been expelled from Massachusetts Bay by the rigid Puritan leaders of that colony. Labeled AAntinomians,@ which means Aagainst the law,@ these early settlers arrived in Newport in 1639 and set up a system of government based upon the principle of religious toleration. This philosophy attracted dissident religious groups from all over the world, and more than twenty denominations eventually flourished in Newport. The Newport Historical Society has records kept by fourteen of these congregations.

The following is a list of the religious denominations for which the Society has records, followed by the inclusive dates of each collection: First Baptist Church (1644-1864); Six Principles Baptist Church, also known as the Second Baptist Church (1736-1886); Seventh Day Baptist Church, also known as the Third Baptist Church (1708-1872); Fourth Baptist Church (1809-1859); Central Baptist Church (1906); First Congregational Church (1729-1833); Second Congregational Church (1725-1857); Union Congregational Church (1787-1946); United Congregational Church (1769-1899); Emmanuel Episcopal Church (1848-1860); Trinity Episcopal Church (1709-1991); Zion Episcopal Church (1833-1932); First Methodist Episcopal Church (1806-1922); and the Society of Friends (1676-1977).

In addition, the Society has documents relating to the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Channing Memorial Unitarian Church, the Moravian Church, and the Newport Jewish community.

Family Papers

Hundreds of Newport families are represented by the Library Special Collections of the Newport Historical Society. The collection includes letters and memorabilia from Newport=s merchant elite, as well as tradesmen, shopkeepers, and farmers.

The family papers collection at the Newport Historical Society includes two especially important compilations generated by Quaker families. One of these families, the Robinsons, was wealthy and prominent; the other family, the Williamses, was composed of saddle makers and craftsmen.

The Robinson Papers contains 25 linear shelf feet of letters, diaries, personal memorabilia, and business records from one of Newport=s--and the country=s--most influential Quaker families. The Robinson family included branches in Philadelphia (Whartons, Fishers, Mortons, and Smiths) and New Bedford (Rotches and Rodmans). The former branch was involved in the formation of the political underpinnings of our new nation after the Revolution, and many letters were written in the 19th century from Newport to family members in Philadelphia who later took up residence in Newport and Jamestown as summer colonists. The latter branch helped build New Bedford=s profitable whaling industry. As the patriarch of the Newport Branch, AQuaker Tom@ Robinson compiled a vast collection of business and personal papers, including ledgers from his trade with the West Indies and coastal ports in North America, and documents that show his involvement with the ASpermaceti Trust,@ which elevated candles to Newport=s leading export by 1765. The Robinson Papers also offers a view of nearly 300 years of the Quaker experience in America, and illuminates their feelings about religion, death, politics, and war.

TheWilliams Collection tells the story of a Acommon@ Quaker family, whose patriarch was Obadiah Williams, a saddle maker transplanted to Newport from New Bedford at the time of the Revolution. Because of the close familial ties characteristic of 18th century Quakers, the Williamses and the Robinsons shared many common relatives, including Rotches and Rodmans from New Bedford. Through his second marriage, Obadiah became linked with the Brown and Almy families of Providence. Obadiah=s brothers included David, a respected Newport clock maker, and Nicholas, a would-be merchant who suffered greatly from Newport=s post-Revolution economic depression and from the restrictions on trade in the years leading to the War of 1812. Late in 1812, with the threat of an attack looming over Newport, Obadiah transplanted his family to the farmlands of New York, where they fought to maintain their conception of the Quaker faith amidst the schisms that occurred in the Society of Friends during the 1830s and 1840s. The Williams Collection is comprised of 245 letters detailing the private and professional lives of members of this widely spread family, and illuminates their response to the stresses of life during America=s early national period.

Other notable collections are the papers of the Hunter family of Newport, which included prominent merchants and politicians in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the Mabel Norman Cerio collection, which includes correspondence, business records, and memorabilia of the Norman and Cerio families from about 1850 to 1950. Mrs. Cerio was an artist and philanthropist and played an important role in the creation of the Norman Bird Sanctuary in Middletown.

A significant portion of this collection, including the Robinson Papers and the Williams Collection, has been microfilmed and is available for purchase by universities and libraries.
Please visit www.lexis-nexis.com/cispubs for more information.

Documents in the collection of the Newport Historical Society that illustrate the workings of slavery, the slave trade, and the post-slavery period include church records, bills of sale for slaves, correspondence, orders for the purchase of slaves in Africa and the West Indies, manifests and inventories listing slaves or accouterments used in the trade, and the business records of merchants and tradesmen that illustrate the conditions of forced servitude in Newport. For example, in 1747, William Engs recorded in his account book that he gave a slave to John Banister as a Christmas gift.

The Society=s collection of Quaker records is a valuable resource in the study of African-American history. The Society of Friends was one of the first religious congregations in colonial America to speak out against slavery, and eventually forbade their members to own or trade slaves. Minutes of meetings, testimonies, and theological epistles record the evolution of Quaker ideology and actions regarding slavery.

Quaker manumission, 1775, NHS Collections

Beginning in 1773, Newport Quakers began to free, or Amanumit,@ their slaves en masse. Former slaves were provided with a certificate attesting to their freedom, in case they should ever be questioned. Slaves younger than eighteen years of age were pledged their freedom upon reaching adulthood, an indication that masters felt a responsibility toward their captives to ensure their safety and well-being, even after granting them freedom.

One volume in the Society=s collection contains copies of over fifty of these manumissions, which recorded the freed slave=s name and age, and the name of the master. These records are an invaluable resource to descendants of Newport=s African slaves in reconstructing their family history.

As early as the 1770s, Newport=s African-American population had begun to form their own institutions and associations, which helped preserve their culture and aid in their prosperity upon attaining freedom. In 1780, the African Union Society was founded, making it the first such cultural organization in America. Offshoots of this organization were the African Humane Society, the African Benevolent Society, the Female African Benevolent Society, and the Union Congregational Church, founded in 1824. The Newport Historical Society has records for these organizations, including minutes of meetings, membership lists, and account books, from 1787 to 1946.

A significant portion of this collection, including papers relating to the African slave trade, has been microfilmed and is available for purchase by universities and libraries.
Please visit www.lexis-nexis.com/cispubs for more information.