Old Wilcox County news items available through Library of Congress

During the average work week, I spend a lot of time riding around in my truck, and I try to make good use of this time. One way that I do so, is that I listen to podcasts, and one of my favorite podcasts is the Alabama History Podcast produced by the Alabama Historical Commission.

During the latest episode, which came out on Tuesday of last week, the podcast featured Tuscaloosa lawyer and author Chris McIlwain, who discussed his two recent books “Civil War in Alabama” and “1865 Alabama: From Civil War to Uncivil Peace.” McIlwain discussed his research methods for both books, and he mentioned that he’d looked through many old newspapers that have been digitized by the Library of Congress. Some of these digitized newspapers are “word searchable,” and if you’re willing to look through them, they contained a lot of interesting information.

When I got home, I went on the Library of Congress’ website (loc.gov) and discovered that McIlwain was referring to the Library of Congress’ ongoing Chronicling America project, which has digitized thousands of historic American newspapers for the general public. Best of all, it’s free, and you can view them online at any time.

If you go to the website and search for terms like “Camden, Alabama” and “Wilcox County, Alabama,” you’ll find some interesting results. Here are just a few of the interesting news items that I found during a quick search on Sunday afternoon.

From the July 20, 1867 edition of The Idaho Semi-Weekly World – “The Hon. Chas. L. Scott, formerly member of Congress from California, is part owner and associate editor of The Wilcox Times, published at Camden, Alabama.”

From the April 8, 1887 edition of The Times in Owossa, Michigan – “Samuel Tepper, who killed himself at Camden, Alabama, was a cousin of Turner, the English landscape painter, from whose estate he received $100,000.”

From the Jan. 27, 1881 edition of The Anderson Intelligencer in Anderson Court House, S.C. – “At a recent meeting of the Board of Trustees of Erskine College, Mr. John H. Miller of Camden, Alabama was elected Professor of Mathematics.”

From the July 21, 1853 edition of The Daily Republic in Washington, D.C. – “STRUCK BY LIGHTNING: The printing office of The Southern Republic at Camden, Alabama was struck by lightning on the 8^th inst. The lightning struck the printing press at the hour when they are usually at work, but did no damage.”

From the Aug. 30, 1850 edition of The Lancaster (Ohio) Gazette – “HORRIBLE EXCESSES OF A MANIAC: A Mr. Joseph Outlaw of Camden, Alabama, while in a state of mental derangement, committed some horrible and singular excesses. He bit off the head of a chicken, and after sucking the blood with an insane relish, swallowed the disgusting morsel. He then went to his wife, knocking her down, seated himself upon her, and inflicted a number of painful wounds upon her body with a gum lancet. She soon died and the maniac husband is confined in jail.”

From the Sept. 23, 1861 edition of The New York Herald – “Another arrest was made yesterday by the government officials at Portland, Maine in the person of Major John Bateman, a bearer of dispatches from England, who came by way of Montreal. He was conveyed at once to Fort Lafayette. The prisoner claimed to be a British subject, but we believe his is a native of Camden, Alabama.”

From the Jan. 2, 1868 edition of The Manitowoc (Wisconsin) Tribune – “Troops have been sent to Greenville, Demopolis and Camden, Alabama to quell disturbances. No particulars are given as to the nature of the disturbances.”

From the March 12, 1870 edition of The Memphis Daily Appeal – “The Montgomery Advertiser learns that a destructive fire occurred at Camden, Alabama on Monday, the 28^th ult. It will be recollected that nearly every business house and a number of dwellings in this pleasant courthouse town were destroyed by a very disastrous fire about one year ago.”

From the above examples you can see that a number of old Camden news items can be found in the Library of Congress’ collection of old newspapers. The above examples are just the tip of the iceberg. I found them within the first 40 of the 379 search results that came up when I searched for “Camden, Alabama.”

In the end, I hope that the many local history buffs who, like me, were unaware of this digital archive of old newspapers will enjoy scouting out old news items in the collection. My feeling is that there is a lot to be unearthed through this source, and there’s no telling what you’ll learn if you search for an ancestor’s name. Happy hunting!