Hiram Barney papers

This collection contains the political, business, legal, and family papers of lawyer and Collector of the Port of New York Hiram Barney (1811-1895) and concern a wide variety of subjects including real estate, primarily in Iowa, and New York; court cases (often pertaining to the debt collection) and other legal services; politics generally, but especially patronage distribution; family affairs, business transactions concerning the Erie and other canals; small railroads (largely in the Lake Plains region); Mexico and Mexican-American relations; the Civil War; and the U.S. Customs Service.

The Hiram Barney papers are divided into three series: Business correspondence and political papers, New York Custom House papers, and Family papers. The collection also contains one box of photographs and two boxes of various printed materials.

The Business correspondence and political papers (boxes 1-31, 45-48, 50), are arranged in alphabetical order by author, contain the documents and letters of various groups and individuals, including Hiram Barney, whose papers are further subdivided into correspondence, legal documents, real estate documents, professional papers, and personal records.

Included in this series is the correspondence of nationally known business men, politicians, soldiers, foreign nationals, and civilian citizens. This correspondence contains many references to the anti-enslavement movement in the North, the Civil War, Republican Party politics, and Barney's friendship with Abraham Lincoln. Also found throughout this portion of the collection are transportation papers which indicate Barney's interest in and connection with the opening up of waterways, the railroad, and the telegraph from the Atlantic to the Mississippi.

The majority of Barney's real estate papers pertain to the Half-Breed Tract lying between the Mississippi and Des Moines rivers. Which includes signed documents of land indentures by specific Indigenous tribal members of the Sauk and Fox (Meskwaki) Nation with papers pertaining to the first Anglo proprietors and settlers. Also, related to Barney's real estate documents are the Francis Scott Key papers. Key, a friend of Barney's, acted as attorney-in-law for the proprietors. He died before he could collect his fee (in lands) and his estate, and Barney inherited that responsibility.

Barney's legal documents extend from 1825 to 1888. They include articles of partnership, court cases, powers of attorney, and notes for collection.

The New York Custom House papers (boxes 32-34, 45) consist of documents and correspondence concerning the general operations, patronage, and personnel of the Custom House, as well as records of the frauds investigation conducted by the U.S. Treasury Department. To gain a full idea of Barney's activities as collector, the correspondence in the Business correspondence and political papers between Hiram Barney and Salmon P. Chase, Charles P. Clinch, William P. Fessenden, Abraham Lincoln, Manton M. Marple, Albert M. Palmer, and Edward D. Smith must also be consulted.

The Family papers (boxes 35-44, 49), presumably collected by Hiram Barney's daughter, Sara Barney, includes family correspondence arranged alphabetically by author, photographs of the family and family home, various forms of ephemera, and emptied envelopes originally addressed to Hiram Barney.

Materials created by United States presidents in this collection include: James A. Garfield letter to Hiram Barney, 1877 December 6 (Box 18 (3)); Ulysses S. Grant letter to Philip H. Sheridan, 1865 July 25 (Box 18 (10)); Ulysses S. Grant letter extract, approximately 1879 (Box 18 (11)); Ulysses S. Grant letter to Edwin M. Stanton, 1865 February 24 (Box 18 (12)); Ulysses S. Grant letters to John McAllister Schofield, 1867-1881 (Box 18 (9)); Benjamin Harrison letters to John McAllister Schofield, 1889-1892 Box 18 (36)); Rutherford B. Hayes letters to John McAllister Schofield, 1879 May 17, August 12 (Box 18 (40)); James Madison appointment to Aaron Hassert, 1812 May 22 (Box 45 (2)); William McKinley letter to John McAllister Schofield, 1896 November 9 (Box 22 (25)). Some presidential items are contemporary copies.