Dates: 1901; 1915-1916.

History:

Sherard Family

John Holmes Sherard was born in Livingston, Sumter County, Alabama, on August 31, 1855. His parents were John Holmes Sherard (1798-1855) of Wayne County, North Carolina, and Mary Martha Malvina (Arrington) Sherard (b. 1820) of Nash County, North Carolina. After the early death of his parents, John Holmes Sherard lived with his uncle, Joseph Arrington. Sherard attended schools in Livingston and a business school in Poughkeepsie, New York. Sherard and his uncle, Joseph Arrington, purchased a tract of land in Coahoma County, and Sherard moved there in 1874. The town of Sherard would later be established nearby, and John Holmes Sherard would be its first postmaster.

On September 28, 1882, John Holmes Sherard married Sarah Alice DuBose of Coahoma County. After her death in 1931, he married Lulu Chapman (d. 1959) in Livingston on June 1, 1932. Sherard had a number of children, including Homer J. (b. ca. 1893), John Holmes, Jr., and Mallie.

John Holmes Sherard continued to work as a merchant and as a planter who primarily cultivated cotton and pecans. He was a member of the Mississippi Senate from 1891 to 1895 and a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives from 1920 to 1924. Sherard served for many years on the board of supervisors of Coahoma County. He was a founder of the Methodist Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, and the Sherard wing of the hospital was named for him and his family. Sherard was also one of the founders of the Methodist Orphans Home in Jackson, Hinds County, Mississippi. He owned six thousand acres of land at the time of his death in 1941.

Rawles Family

Eldred Leslye Rawles was born in Finley, Tennessee, on March 10, 1881. He was the son of Dr. Isaac Newton and Johnnie (McDavid) Rawles. After graduating from the Memphis Hospital College in 1903 and from Tulane University in 1904, Rawles attended medical schools in Chicago and New York. He married Mallie Sherard on April 30, 1908, and they later had three daughters. Dr. Rawles practiced medicine in Dyersburg, Tennessee, at least through 1915, before moving his family next door to John Holmes Sherard, Jr., in Sherard, Mississippi. He continued his medical practice there, primarily attending the many workers on the Sherard plantation. Dr. Rawles served as a first lieutenant in the armed forces during World War I. There were over six hundred workers on the six-thousand-acre Sherard-Rawles plantation in 1950. Three churches and a high school had also been constructed on the plantation by 1950.

 
Scope and Content Note:

This collection consists of an accounting ledger kept by Dr. Eldred Leslye Rawles and a business-contract proposal concerning the plantation of John Holmes Sherard.

The 1915 accounting ledger kept by Dr. Rawles during his medical practice in Dyersburg, Tennessee, is bound, paginated, and indexed. Dr. Rawles arranged the accounts by patient, chronologically entering fees for medical visits. Several items accompanied the ledger, including blank receipts, a Franklin Life Insurance Company advertisement, and a 1916 letter concerning poultry that was written to Dr. Rawles from the Meridian College-Conservatory in Meridian, Mississippi.

There is a 1901 business-contract proposal for John Holmes Sherard from the Chickasaw Iron Works Company of Memphis, Tennessee, regarding cotton-ginning and sawmill equipment. The proposal includes equipment specifications and a short business letter.

 
Series Identification:

Series 1: Accounting Ledger. 1915-1916; n.d. 1 folder.

Series 2: Business-Contract Proposal. 1901. 1 folder.