Richard Henderson Rivers correspondence

Collection

Identifier: SC-Cent. Misc. Mss. 46

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

Collection consists of letters addressed to Richard Henderson Rivers, who served as president of Centenary College of Louisiana (Jackson, La.) from 1849 to 1853. Letter dated 1851 from Daniel Martindale, Centenary faculty secretary, contains details about students suspended during the past year. Letter dated 1853 from Henry Tutwiler expresses thanks for being awarded an honorary degree. Letter dated 1854 from Thomas Coffee (with additional note from E.R. Porter) contains details about scholarship donations.

Dates

1851 - 1854

Creator

Rivers, R. H. (Richard Henderson), 1814-1894 (Person)

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research use.

Conditions Governing Use

Physical rights are retained by the Centenary College of Louisiana Archives and Special Collections. Copyright is retained in accordance with U.S. copyright laws.

Biographical / Historical

Richard Henderson Rivers (1814-1894) was an educator and Methodist minister. Born in Montgomery County, Tennessee, he is the son of Edmund Rivers (1783–1859) and Sallie Henderson Rivers (1787–1876). Rivers joined the Tennessee Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1831. He graduated from LaGrange College (Leighton, Ala.) in 1835 and taught as that college’s professor of ancient languages from 1836 to 1843. He next served as president of the following institutions: Athens Female Institute (Athens, Ala.) from 1843 to 1848, Centenary College of Louisiana (Jackson, La.) from 1849 to 1853, LaGrange College (Leighton, Ala.) and its successor Florence Wesleyan University (Florence, Ala.) from 1854 to 1861, Centenary College (Summerfield, Ala.), Somerville Female Institute (Somerville, Tenn.), Logan Female College (Russellville, Ky.) in 1868, and Martin Female College (Pulaski, Tenn.) from 1874 to 1879. During the 1870s and 1880s, Rivers also served as pastor at churches in Kentucky and Alabama.

Rivers authored the following books: Elements of Moral Philosophy (1859), Elements of Mental Philosophy (1862), Our Young People (1880), The Life of Robert Paine (1884), Arrows from Two Quivers (1890). During the 1890s, he also served as corresponding editor of the newspaper Central Methodist (Catlettsburg, Ky.).

In 1836, Rivers married Martha Bolling Cox Jones (1818–1897); they had nine children.

Extent

1 Folders

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Arrangement

Arranged chronologically.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Likely transferred circa 1930 with additional records documenting Centenary College of Louisiana (Jackson, La.) by Centenary's president, George Sexton. See caption published in Yoncopin (Shreveport, LA: Centenary College of Louisiana, 1938), page 9.