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George Washington Jonson (1801-1880) Diaries Mss. W-151 George Washington Jonson (sometimes misspelled Johnson), a Buffalo, New York, lawyer, land agent, and abolitionist, kept detailed diaries for most of his adult life. A prominent attorney in Buffalo, he was an associate of Millard Fillmore. In his will, he designated that his diaries and other personal papers and effects be placed in the hands of his nephew, Hon. Justin Smith Morrill (1810-1898): "then living as shall have in point of merit and scholarship be, in his opinion the most suitable to receive and have charge of the same, taking from a written promise to keep them together and preserve them. And although I have no legal right...it is my wish that such nephew or grand nephew should transmit them in the family line, so that they may continue as heirloom in the line for all future time."
Jonson was born in Enfield, New Hampshire and attended Dartmouth College. He came to the Buffalo area around 1832. He read law with Millard Fillmore in East Aurora and ran a school there. He later became an agent for the Holland Land Company in Buffalo. He was a member of the Liberty Party, later the Free Soil Party. A wealthy man with unorthodox views, he maintained a low profile as a public figure. However, his citizen activism included work with the Underground Railroad, opposition to debtor's prisons, and participation in the movement to impeach President Andrew Johnson. He retired to the town of Royalton in Niagara County, where he died in 1880. He is buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo, NY.
Several of the diaries were presented by Jonson descendent Dr. C. S. Swan to the Historian of Enfield, New Hampshire, who in turn presented them to Dartmouth College. Dartmouth also acquired a volume from the estate of Justin Smith Morrill. The Buffalo History Museum (TBHM) acquired several volumes from a rare book dealer in Middleborough, Massachusetts. Many thanks to the University Archives at the State University of New York at Buffalo for allowing us to reprint this biographical note. | ||||||||||||||
Below is our best attempt to map out the locations of Jonson’s original volumes and whether they have been transcribed or microfilmed. To the best of our knowledge, none have been digitized or put online.
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Dates | Description | Location of Original | Microfilmed? | Transcribed? | Dimensions | |
1817-1824 | Journal | No | No | |||
Jan.1, 1825 - Dec. 31, 1831 | Journal | Yes: TBHM | No | |||
1832-1833 | Letter book | TBHM, vol.1 | No | No | 9.5 x 14” Approx. 776 pages | |
1833-1835 | Letter book | TBHM, vol. 1A | Yes: TBHM | Partially: Oct. 1, 1833- Dec. 28, 1835 | 9.5 x 14” Approx. 806 pages | |
Jan. 1, 1836 - Oct. 31, 1837 | Journal | Yes: TBHM | No | |||
1837-1838 | Letters | Swan Family Papers, Mss. N-1644 | Unknown | Unknown | ||
1838-1839 | Swan Family Journal | Unknown | Unknown | |||
Nov. 1, 1837 - Dec. 31, 1839 | Journal | Yes: TBHM | No | |||
Nov. 1, 1840 - June 30, 1843 | Journal | Yes: TBHM | No | |||
July 1, 1843 - Dec. 31, 1844 | Journal | Yes: TBHM | No | |||
1847 | Journal | No | No | |||
1848 | Day book | Ms 38 | Yes: UB Mf23 | No | ||
1849 | Journal | No | No | |||
1850 | Day book | TBHM, vol. 2 | No | Partially: Jan.1-June 30, 1850 | 9.5 x 13” 690 pages | |
1852 | Day book | TBHM, vol. 3 | No | No | 9.5 x 13” 661 pages | |
1854 | Journal | No | No | 9.5 x 13” 680 pages | ||
1855 | Journal | TBHM, vol. 5 | No | No | 9.5 x 13” 675 pages | |
1856 | Journal | No | No | |||
1857 | Yearbook | Ms 38 | No | No | ||
1858-1878 | Journal | No | No |
Secondary Sources on Jonson | ||
Link if online | Citation | |
Donald, Ada Pace, ed. Diary of an Abolitionist: George W. Jonson Niagara Frontier, vol. 3, pp 45-52, Spring 1956-Winter 1957 | ||
Not online | Douglass, Harry S., ed. A Journey to Arcade by Buffalo Abolitionist, 1844: From the Journal of George Washington Jonson Historical Wyoming, vol. 27 no. 2, pp 45-47, October 1980 | |
Not online | Heintzman, Nelson Terry ‘Not a scintilla of abolition in Buffalo’: The Rise of a Liberty Man as Revealed in the Journals of George Washington Jonson Thesis (M.S.)--State University of New York at Buffalo, 1990 | |
Powell, Elwin H. Dialectics in the Street: Disputation and Assembly Buffalonian.com, Feb. 2001 | ||
Not online | Powell, Elwin H. [Buffalo : s.n., 1976] | |
Powell, Elwin H. Urban Education, vol. 18 no.4, pp. 413-25, January 1984 | ||
Powell, Elwin H. Talking Abolition: Frederick Douglass Speaks in Buffalo’s Front Park Buffalonian.com, n.d. [Note: Front Park is incorrect, as it did not exist when Douglass spoke here. He spoke in Lafayette Square.] | ||
Winner, Julia Hull George Washington Johnson [sic], Lawyer, and the Holland Land Company office in Buffalo Niagara Frontier, vol. 10, pp 56-61, Summer 1963 | ||
Winner, Julia Hull New York History, Vol. 46, No. 1 (January, 1965), pp. 60-78 | ||
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