http://worldcat.org/entity/work/id/57475571

Ballinger, William Pitt, papers

This collection, produced and collected by William Pitt Ballinger (1825-1888), soldier, attorney, and businessman of Galveston, Texas, remains one of the outstanding sources of documentation for nineteenth-century Texan and Southern development and history. The papers are equally valuable for the study of the extended family and prominent associates of Ballinger. The papers are particularly rich in documentary value for the post-1850 period when Ballinger served as United States district attorney for the Texas District and later when he opened his private practice. Many of them relate to the financial and legal affairs of Galveston businesses and antebellum plantations in southeast Texas. A large number of the papers document Ballinger's service as Confederate States receiver for Galveston during the Civil War. His voluminous correspondence with Texan and Southern officials and with officers and men in Confederate service are also reflected here. Many of the papers from the post-Civil War period relate to his involvement with railroads in Texas and to other business and civic affairs of Ballinger and his associates in Galveston. His personal diary (1854-1886), which is accompanied by a typed transcription and an index, contains much information about that city. The papers include correspondence, diaries, literary productions, business papers, legal papers, pamphlets, broadsides, and other printed items, newspaper clippings, maps, and a photograph.

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