R.A. Brock Collection

Like other Southern antiquarians, R.A. Brock was fascinated with the golden age of the Old Dominion, identified by the colonial era and the Revolutionary War. At the same time, Brock was also invested in collecting and preserving the antebellum, Civil War, Reconstruction, and Gilded Age materials. While his collection primarily focuses on Virginia, it also contains materials on other Southern states, especially Georgia and South Carolina. Additionally, items from Pennsylvania, New York, New England, the British Isles, and Continental Europe are represented.

In part, his collecting was propelled by the genealogical studies that Brock undertook on behalf of prominent Virginia families as well as his publishing projects. Some materials are copies and transcripts made by Brock or his associates. 

Brock sought out not only the papers of the likes of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, but also of those created by lawyers, jurists, educators, physicians, scientists, clergymen, scholars, entertainers, financiers, writers, literary agents, booksellers, journalists, merchants, artisans, businessmen, entrepreneurs, commissioners, dealers, brokers, engineers, local, state, and federal government employees, and soldiers as well as businesses, churches, and learned, historical, charitable, fraternal, patriotic, heritage, and genealogical societies and associations.

Many components of the Brock collection contain the papers of enslavers as well as farmers, merchants, and middle-class professionals.

Brock’s heirs offered to sell the collection to the Virginia State Library, which declined to the offer. Similarly, the Virginia Historical Society did not make any attempt to acquire it. Earl G. Swem, the Librarians of the College of William and Mary, engaged by the family to find a buyer, informed Henry E. Huntington. In 1922, Robert O. Schad negotiated the acquisition on Huntington’s behalf. The collection departed for California on November 10, 1922, filling an entire freight car. Five days later, Douglas Southall Freeman denounced “the indifference on the part of the public and inaction of the legislature,” which led to the best collection of Virginiana to leave the Old Dominion.

A number of items originally in this collection were transferred to the George Washington collection (call number: mssGW) and the Thomas Jefferson collection (call number: mssJefferson).