Z 0959.000 Wailes-Covington Family Papers

Correspondence and other papers of the Wailes and Covington families, settlers of Prince George's County, Maryland, who moved to Washington, Mississippi Territory, ca. 1806. Levin Wailes (1768–1847) and Alexander Covington (1777–1848) left Maryland, lived several years in Augusta, Georgia, then moved to the Mississippi Territory.

Leonard Covington (1768–1813) served in the United States Army, rising to the rank of Captain; resigned that rank in 1795; returned to his family home at Acquasco; and engaged in agriculture. He served in the State House of Delegates; was elected to Congress (1805–1807); was commissioned as Lieutenant Colonel in the Light Dragoons in January and as Colonel in February, 1809; and moved to the Mississippi Territory as commander at Fort Adams. He tells in his letter of taking possession of Baton Rouge from the Spanish in 1810 and serving at Fort Stoddard. Covington was appointed Brigadier General in 1813; was wounded at the Battle of Chryslers Field on November 11, 1813; and died at French Mills, New York, on November 13, 1813. At the time of General Covington's death, his wife was residing in the home of Alexander Covington and she continued living in Mississippi.

Most of the seventy-nine items covering the period 1797–1813 are letters from Leonard Covington to his brother Alexander Covington. He writes fully of affairs in the Maryland legislature and the Congress during the periods he served in those bodies, mentioning the slave tax, Edmund Randolph and the Federalist party, and the arrest and trial of Aaron Burr. There are two letters to Leonard Covington from Joseph Kent, representative and senator from Maryland and Governor of Maryland, one letter from Covington to Benjamin Mackall, one from Mackall to his sister, Mrs. Covington, after the death of her husband. There are also letters from and to Dr. James Blake, Major Joseph Kean, Dr. Daniel Rawlings, Levin Wailes and Captain James T. Magruder.