Sales book, 1800-1856 Digital

Volume containing records of two separate enterprises, the Charleston commission business of Peter Ayrault and Peace Dale Manufacturing Company. The first part of the book comprises sales of goods consigned to Ayrault and accounts of slave trade, dated 1800-1816. The second part of the volume consists of Peace Dale Manufacturing Co. cotton orders and baling book entries, dated 1837-1856. Ayrault acted as an agent for Joseph Lee of Philadelphia, Eleazer Shearman of Newport, Brown Benson & Ives of Providence, Captain John Gorham of Boston, Sweet & Williams of Savannah, Georgia, Jeremiah Condy, William R. Robinson, Esaias Monefeldt (1772-1860), and Jose Garcia Alvarez, among others. The volume also contains his accounts in company with fellow Charleston merchant Richard Lord and with his partners Hazard and Robinson, as well as a joint account of iron bought and sold with New York merchants Thomas and Daniel Walden. Accounts for each shipment to Ayrault were labeled with a sales number, and itemized the amount of goods sold, prices, purchasers, his commission and other expenses, and net proceeds. There is an index to names and numbered accounts at the end of the volume. Commodities sold included cider, candles, rum, soap, pork, whale oil, cigars, opium, coffee and molasses from Aux Cayes, Haiti, green chairs, salt, logwood, hides, brown sugar from Havana, Cuba, tobacco from Savannah, cotton from Georgetown, North Carolina, oranges and orange juice, whiskey, and cut nails. “Sales No. 92” is an account of Russian duck received from Cato Thurston and sold on his behalf in 1805-1806. “Sales No. 137” is an account of the sale of the schooner Friendship, received in Charleston from Captain Isaac Edes, for owners Knapp & Thurlow of Newburyport, Massachusetts. Sales of enslaved people brokered by Ayrault are dated from 1805-1810, and accounts contain varying levels of detail about the captives and vessels carrying them; most include names of individuals or factors who were buyers, and charges for advertising slaves for sale in local newspapers and providing clothing and food. Captain Daniel Edes, Jr. and George A. Cushing of Boston sold 22 men, nine women, six boys, and three girls they transported on the brig Louisiana in 1805. Additional accounts of Daniel Edes contain the sale of thirty African people (23 men, seven women) brought on the schooner Concord in 1807, and two boys and two girls in 1808. In 1806, Peter Vaton and Martin Benson’s account reflects the sale of 26 African people from the brig Polly; and Clark Cook sold one man and five boys he brought to Charleston on the brig Neptune. An 1808 account of sixteen African people sold for John R. Palmer of Pennsylvania notes that two people had died, and one person was “very sick” and sold at auction. Ayrault partnered with Joseph S. Barker in 1809 to sell six African people (one man, five boys). William Greenwood’s 1810 account contains some names of the persons he sold into slavery and the buyers: John was purchased by Tunno & Cox; Grace and Quam, Friday, and Jerry are listed adjacent to three cash payments; Molly, her daughter, and grandchild were bought by Patrick Cassin; James, Jack and Betty, and Monday and his wife and two children were sold to William Drayton; Tom was bought by Greenwood himself; and Jack, Bob and his wife and two children, and Camper and his wife and two children were “delivered” to James Gadsen. Interspersed throughout some pages of Ayrault’s accounts are orders to Peace Dale Manufacturing Co. in 1838-1839 for slave clothing from merchants and planters in the South, among them Alabama Governor John Murphy (1786-1841) and Colonel William W. Pugh (1811-1906), owner of the Woodlawn Plantation in Assumption Parish, Louisiana.