Sarah de St. Julien Walker Goodwyn Papers
Collection
Identifier: Mss-0407
The bulk of the material in the Papers are letters from P. W. Goodwyn to Sarah de St. Julien Walker during the period April 1864 to January 1865. The letters document Goodwyn’s attempt to woo Walker and detail his service in the Sixth South Carolina Cavalry during the siege of Petersburg, VA, with the battles of Boydton Plank Road, the Crater, Ream’s Station, and Trevilian Station specifically mentioned. Almost all of these letters are transcribed in the 1993 Masters of History thesis by Heather L. Strasburger that is a part of the collection. There are also letters to Sarah de St. Julien Walker Goodwyn from family and friends in the postwar period and two 1891 letters from P. W. Goodwyn to an unidentified daughter.
The Papers are arranged alphabetically by folder title, with the title reflecting the format of the material within the folder. The collection covers the period 1861-1993, with most of the material dating from 1864-1865. The collection can be used for research on courtship in the nineteenth century, the Sixth South Carolina Cavalry Regiment, and for the siege of Petersburg, VA during the Civil War.
This collection is open to the public without restriction.
Sarah de St. Julien Walker was born in Newberry, SC on October 31, 1838, the daughter of Edward James and Eleanor Ball Wilkie Walker. She married Peterson Witten Goodwyn on September 27, 1864. They had five children: Adella Evelyn, Edward Walker, Ellen Ball, Eugene Rogers, and Taylor St. Julien Goodwyn. Sarah de St. Julien Walker Goodwyn died in 1876 and was buried in Lake City, FL.
Her husband Peterson Witten Goodwyn was born on July 30, 1830 to William A. and Sarah Witten Goodwyn of Orangeburg, SC. He was employed as a railroad engineer and farmer in Abbeville and Greenwood, SC before the Civil War. He married Charlotte Augusta Calhoun (1831-March 5, 1861), the daughter of Dr. Ephraim Ramsey and Charlotte M. Moseley Calhoun of Greenwood, SC in 1851. They had five children: Charles Calhoun, Charlotte E., Frank, Sallie Whitten, and William Ramsey Goodwyn. In 1862 he joined the Confederate Army and was elected lieutenant of the Sixth South Carolina Cavalry, later being promoted to captain and taking command of Company C of the Sixth. After the war Goodwyn worked as a railroad agent in Abbeville and Ninety-Six, SC and after 1870 was living in Florida. After Sarah’s death he married Emma Louisa Ives (1852-1942) on September 11, 1877 in Lake City, FL and they had two children, Albert Norman and Morgan Jones Goodwyn. He moved to Renfroe in Talladega County, AL in 1883 and accepted the position of chief engineer of the Birmingham and Atlantic Railroad. He died in Talladega County, AL on November 6, 1892.
.5 Cubic Feet
English
The collection can be used for research on courtship in the nineteenth century, the activities of the Sixth South Carolina Cavalry Regiment during 1864-early 1865, and for the siege of Petersburg, VA during the Civil War, particularly the battles of Boydton Plank Road, the Crater, Ream’s Station, and Trevilian Station.
The Papers contain correspondence, financial notes, a summons, and a thesis with the bulk of the material documenting P. W. Goodwyn’s courtship of Sarah de St. Julien Walker and his service in the Sixth South Carolina Cavalry Regiment during the Civil War.
Alphabetical.
Donated by Eugene Rogers Goodwyn in 2023. Accession 2023-019.
The collection was processed and a finding aid created by James Cross in 2023-2024.
Part of the Clemson University Libraries Special Collections and Archives Repository