Day Books & Ledgers for Goods Bought and Sold and Work Performed

Four volumes. Folio.  410 x 160 mm., [15 ¾ x 6 inches]. Manuscript in ink.  About 800 pages of text in total.  Full contemporary reversed sheep, red leather labels; bindings soiled but sound and attractive.  Each volume is marked in ink on the upper board with a letter, A, B, C. D to designate sequence.  Paper stock a bit brown with age but in good condition and the handwriting is highly legible. 

Remarkable set of financial records of a general store which records both the purchase and payment for goods and services in a "Ledger", and a day-to-day listing of business activities in a corresponding "Day Book" for the towns of Rochester, Strafford and Barrington, New Hampshire over a fifteen-year period.  In addition there is a separate 4to. accounting record documenting the costs of managing a store and building a school house in District One in Stratford in 1829.  There is also another separate 4to. ledger appraising the "Estate of Amos Tebbetts" dated January 1835.  Finally, there is a narrow folio alphabetical list of customer names laid into the volume "A".

The four volumes list thousands of entries and customers names and is a veritable who's who of southeastern New Hampshire for an inclusive period of 1822 -1837.  Both the "Ledgers" and the "Day Books" cover the same period and in combination document much of the economic life of these towns in the County of Stratford adjacent to the State of Main.  The contents of the volumes list foodstuffs, animal products, building materials and tools, household goods, clothing, a lot of tobacco rum sales and an occasional sale of gin.

Although the ownership of the volumes is not designated, in a separate part of the estate appraisal of Amos Tebbetts, there is a five-page section with the heading "Goods in the Store".  Also the name of Margaret Tebbetts appears on the back cover of the volume documenting the costs of the Store and the building of the school.  The attribution of ownership of the store is made from these two pieces of evidence.