Finding Aids

The Collection of Philadelphia merchants records comprises the papers of major and minor merchant houses in Philadelphia throughout the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and primarily documents trade with major port cities in Western Europe and the West Indies. Included are the papers of merchants Andrew Clow & Co., Dutilh & Wachsmuth, Manuel Eyre, and George Louis de Stockar, along with records of other miscellaneous merchants from the Philadelphia area. The records include correspondence, accounts, bills, orders, invoices and other material that give insight into the rise of capitalism in the Early Republic.

Jane Farson (1704-1792) ran an unidentified shop in Wilmington, Delaware. The letter is from Farson to Samuel Coates (1748-1830), a Philadelphia merchant, regarding her shop and small house and large lot in Wilmington.

Joseph P. Hornor (1785-1845) was a merchant in Philadelphia in the early nineteenth century. The collection is comprised of a letter book of Hornor's outbound letters, describing mercantile business spreading throughout the Philadelphia hinterlands.

Peter Arnold Karthaus (1765-1840) immigrated to the United States from Hamburg, Germany in 1796 and established a mercantile business in the West Branch of the Susquehanna River Valley. The collection documents Karthaus' mercantile business, land development in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, and his partnership with fellow German immigrant, Frederick W. Geissenhainer, a pioneer in using coal to smelt iron.

Keys & Miller Lumber Company were dealers in lumber, grain, hay, lime, fertilizers, and coal. Located in Elkton, Maryland, the company incorporated in 1892. The records consist of inbound correspondence regarding orders received primarily between the years 1892 and 1895.

Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein (1766-1817), known as Madame de Staël, was a writer, philosopher, and politically engaged woman who survived the French Revolution and was exiled multiple times by Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821). The letter from "Necker de Stael Holstein" to Le Roy, Bayard & Co., New York, concerning accounts with the firm and with W. Saladin.

Masters & Markoe was a mercantile house which operated throughout the early nineteenth century. Most of the records date from the period 1810 to 1814 and document the West Indian trade of Markoe & Masters. The collection consists of the business correspondence and accounts records which shows that the firm was primarily involved with the importation of sugar from Santa Cruz (St. Croix). The company also imported molasses, rum, coffee, mahogany, and logwood. There are also personal papers of the firms co-founder, Thomas Masters (1781-1844) and members of his family.

The firm of Orrick, Grubbs & Parker, iron merchants, was formed in Philadelphia around 1839, succeeding the firm of Samuel D. Orrick & Co. The records consist of 26 letters addressed to Orrick & Fox, Samuel D. Orrick & Co., Orrick, Grubbs & Parker and E. B. & C. B. Grubb concerning shipments of iron from the Grubb furnaces and its resale to manufacturers along the east coast.

William Deas (1768-1806) was a merchant in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Initially, Deas was in a partnership with David Knox (dates unknown) and James Henderson (1756-1801) Knox, Henderson, and Co., which formed in 1796. After that partnership was dissolved, William Deas and David Knox formed a new partnership, Knox and Deas, located at 30 Front Street in Philadelphia. The business imported and sold textiles and garment-making items as well as dry goods and other things. This collection consists of a letterbook of approximately 175 pages of business transactions from William Deas to his business partner, English merchant David Knox, from 1800 to 1803 inclusively.