Dictionary of Virginia Biography: Source list

• Genealogical notes with birth and marriage dates, newspaper clippings, commission as Supreme Court of Appeals judge, and one Westel Willoughby letter in William F. Willoughby Papers, Earl Gregg Swem Library, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Va.
• Self-reported birth date and place in passport application, July 19, 1889, General Records of the Department of State, Record Group 59, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.
• Willoughby's alumnus file, Hamilton College Archives, Clinton, N.Y.
• Will dated December 24, 1895, Washington, D.C., Register of Wills.
• Death date in Washington, D.C., death records index, Department of Health, Washington, D.C.

• Annual Report of the Adjutant-General of the State of New York For the Year 1903 (1904): 1024.
• Anthony J. Gaughan, The Last Battle of the Civil War: United States versus Lee, 1861–1883 (2011).

• Stafford County Circuit Court Minute Book (1865–1910), p. 53.
• Supreme Court of Appeals Order Book (Richmond Session), 22:59, Accession 31022, Library of Virginia.
• Willoughby's published opinions in (19 Grattan) Virginia Reports, 60:547–555 (A. C. Smith v. R. P. Smith, 1869), 581–591 (Griffin's executor v. Cunningham, 1870), 600–624 (Washington, Alexandria and Georgetown Railroad Company v. Alexandria and Washington Railroad Company et al., 1870), 630–634 (Wright v. Commonwealth, 1870), 642–652 (Whitehead v. Commonwealth, 1870), and 654–655 (Shelly v. Commonwealth, 1870).
• Legal brief by Lucius E. Chittenden and Willoughby in Bennett v. Hunter (1870) (9 Wallace), United States Reports, 76:330–332.
• Legal brief by Willoughby and Lunsford Lomax Lewis in George W. C. Lee v. Frederick Kaufman, R. P. Strong, et al. (1879), in Robert W. Hughes, ed., Reports of Cases Decided in the Circuit Courts of the United States for the Fourth Circuit (1877–1883), 3:43–102.

• New York Times, July 25, 1854.
• Alexandria Gazette, July 6, 1864; August 16, 1867; May 2, 1868; May 10, 1870; March 11, 1871; May 23, 1873; January 17, 1876; November 1, 1884.
• New York Revolution, May 19, 1870.
• Washington Post, August 12, 1881.
• Washington, D.C., Evening Star, September 18, 1889; October 3, 1890.

• Alexandria Gazette, December 23, 1897 (variant report of death on "Wednesday night," i.e., December 22, 1897).
• Washington Post, December 23, 1897; December 24, 1897 (account of funeral).
• Hamilton Literary Monthly 32 (1898): 236.

Primary Sources 
 

• United States Census Schedules, Dinwiddie Co., 1880 (age sixty-three) and 1900 (age eighty-two with February 1818 birth, and with implied 1869 marriage year), and Agriculture Census, Dinwiddie Co., 1870, Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.

• J. A. Yeckley to Brigadier General O. Brown, Mar. 18, 1867, Reports on Prominent Whites and Freedmen, March–May 1867 in Records of the Assistant Commissioner for the State of Virginia (1865–1869), Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, Record Group 105, M1048, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.

• Summary of the Result of the Election for Members of the House of Delegates of Virginia, Held on the 6th Day of July, 1869, 11, printed with General Orders and Circulars, Headquarters First Military District 1869 (1870).

• Journal of the House of Delegates of the State of Virginia for the Session of 1869–70 (1870), 54, 606–607, 610–611, 614–615.

• Journal of the House of Delegates of the State of Virginia for the Session of 1870–71 (1871), 23, 160, 387.

• Dinwiddie Co. Deed Books 12:384, 422–423, 477, 501, 562–563, 629–630, 13:12–13, 14:521–522, 15:158, 20-2:617–618, 23:335, 26:1, 525–529.

• Land Tax Returns, Dinwiddie Co., 1872–1904, Auditor of Public Accounts, Record Group 48, Library of Virginia.

• September death date in Henry Wilson v. Administrator of Ellis Wilson, Etc., Dinwiddie County Chancery Causes, 1914-018, Library of Virginia.

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Secondary Sources 
 

• Biography in Luther Porter Jackson, Negro Office-Holders in Virginia, 1865–1895 (1945), 43, with birth in 1824 and death ca. 1904.

• Richard Lowe, "Local Black Leaders During Reconstruction in Virginia," Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 103 (1995): 181–206 (esp. 188).

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Newspapers 
 

• Petersburg Daily Express, June 23, 1869.

• Richmond Daily Dispatch, July 10, 1869 (quotation); Sept. 23, 1870; Mar. 2, 1871.

• Richmond Daily State Journal, Sept. 21, 1871.

• Richmond Whig and Advertiser, Oct. 25, 1872.

• Wilson's testimony, with full name, in Papers in the Matter of James H. Platt, Jr. vs. John Goode, Jr., Second Congressional District of Virginia, 44th Congress, 1st Session, House of Representatives, Misc. Document 65, Serial 1700 (1876), 199–202.
• Richmond Daily Dispatch, August 20, 1875
• New York Freeman, January 24, 1885 (with month and year of birth)
• I. Garland Penn, The Afro-American Press, and Its Editors (1891), 174–180 (with "surpasses that of any other work …" on 179).
• Marriage Register, Norfolk City, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Commonwealth of Virginia Department of Health, Record Group 36, Library of Virginia.
• Death Register, Norfolk City, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Commonwealth of Virginia Department of Health, Record Group 36, Library of Virginia.

• Compiled Service Military Records of Volunteer Union Soldiers Who Served With the U.S. Colored Troops, Records of the Adjutant General's Office, Record Group 94, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.
• Joseph T. Wilson Pension File, Federal Pension Application Files, Certificates 78,530 and 324,127, Records of the Veterans Administration, Record Group 15, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C. (with John Mitchell 1890 quotation).
• Equal Suffrage: Address from the Colored Citizens of Norfolk, Va., to the People of the United States (1865), with "give us the suffrage …" on 4.
• Joseph T. Wilson, The Black Phalanx (1888), with some autobiographical details, frontispiece portrait, and "shocking crime …" quotation on 349, "Fort Pillow massacre" quotation on 418, and "war of extermination …" quotation on 316.

• Michael Hucles, "Many Voices, Similar Concerns: Traditional Methods of African-American Political Activity in Norfolk, Virginia, 1865–1875," Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 100 (1992): 543–566.

• Norfolk True Southerner, April 19, 1866 ("are we to be forbidden …" quotation)
• Richmond Daily Dispatch, April 19, 1867 ("platform of human rights" quotation); August 11, 1881; August 12, 1881
• Washington Post, July 22, 1881
• Lynchburg Virginian, August 11, 1881 ("stand by their colors" quotation); August 12, 1881
• Richmond Daily Whig, August 11, 1881; August 12, 1881
• Richmond Dispatch, April 16, 1890
• Richmond Planet, July 23, 1898 ("every patriotic colored man …" quotation)

• Richmond State, September 25, 1891
• Norfolk Virginian, September 26, 1891
• Richmond Planet, September 26, 1891; October 3, 1891
• New York Age, October 10, 1891
• Eulogy by John Wesley Cromwell, In Memorium … (1891), 7–12 ("proudest monument" quotation on 11).

• Autobiographical writings by Wise include:
• The End of an Era (1899), with date and place of birth on 1–7 (variant birth date of December 25, 1846, printed in Richmond Daily Whig, July 17, 1885, and in "Genealogical Chart Showing Descent of John Sergeant Wise and Evelyn Beverley Douglas in the Direct Descent Line" (n.d. [ca. 1890–1894]), Virginia Historical Society).
• The Lion's Skin, A Historical Novel and a Novel History (1905).
• Wise letters in numerous collections in various libraries, including:
• William Mahone Papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina.
• Wise Family Papers, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond.
• Marriage in Richmond Daily Dispatch, November 11, 1869
• Papers and Testimony in the Contested-Election Case of John E. Massey vs. John S. Wise, from the State of Virginia at Large, 48th Congress, 1st session, 1884, House Misc. Document 27, serial 2226 and 2227 (2 vols.).
• John E. Massey vs. John S. Wise, 48th Congress, 1st session, 1884, House Report 2024, serial 2259.

• Bibliography of publications in Curtis Carroll Davis, "Wise Words from Virginia: The Published Writings of John S. Wise, of the Eastern Shore and New York City," The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 54 (1960): 273–285.
• Curtis Carroll Davis, "Very Well-Rounded Republican: The Several Lives of John S. Wise," Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 71 (1963): 461–487.
• Otho Carlino Campbell, "John Sergeant Wise: A Case Study in Conservative-Readjuster Politics in Virginia, 1869–1889" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Virginia, 1979).

• New York Times, May 13, 1913
• New York Sun, May 13, 1913
• New-York Tribune, May 13, 1913
• Norfolk Ledger-Dispatch, May 13, 1913 (with editorial tribute)
• Richmond News Leader, May 13, 1913
• Richmond Times Dispatch, May 13, 1913; May 16, 1913 (editorial tribute)
• Washington, D.C., Evening Star, May 13, 1913
• Washington Post, May 13, 1913
• Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, May 14, 1913 (with editorial tribute)
• Confederate Veteran 21 (1913): 452

• William Edwin Hemphill, "George Wythe, the Colonial Briton: A Biographical Study of the Pre-Revolutionary Era in Virginia" (Ph.D. diss., University of Virginia, 1937).
• Alonzo Thomas Dill, George Wythe: Teacher of Liberty (1979).
• Robert Bevier Kirtland, "George Wythe: Lawyer, Revolutionary, Judge" (Ph. D. diss., University of Michigan, 1983).

• Wythe correspondence in Julian P. Boyd et al., eds., The Papers of Thomas Jefferson (1950– ).
• Decisions of Cases in Virginia by the High Court of Chancery, with Remarks Upon Decrees, by the Court of Appeals, Reversing Some of Those Decisions, by George Wythe, Chancellor of Said Court (1852 edition), with Wythe's will on xxxvii–xxxix.
• First marriage recorded in Spotsylvania Co. Will Book A, 406.
• Death of second wife in Richmond Virginia Independent Chronicle, August 29, 1787.
• Election to the Convention of 1776 in William J. Van Schreeven, Robert L. Scribner, and Brent Tarter, eds., Revolutionary Virginia, the Road to Independence: A Documentary Record (1973–1983), 3:418–419.
• Election as Speaker of the House of Delegates in Journal of the House of Delegates of Virginia (1777), 4.
• Election as judge of High Court of Chancery in Journal of the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of Virginia…on Monday the Twentieth Day of October, in the Year of Our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Seventy-Seven (1827), 115.
• Election to Constitutional Convention in Journal of the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of Virginia…in the Year of Our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Eighty-Six (1828), 86.
• John P. Kaminski et al., eds., The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution: Ratification of the Constitution by the States, vols. 8–10: Virginia (1988–1993), 9:622–625 and 10:1473–1474, 1513–1515, 1540.

• Wythe Holt, "George Wythe: Early Modern Judge," Alabama Law Review 58 (2007): 1009–1039.

• Richmond Virginia Argus, June 10, 1806; June 17, 1806 (with funeral oration); June 20, 1806.
• Richmond Enquirer, June 10, 1806; June 13, 1806 (with funeral oration).