A cash book for Robert F.W. Allston for the years 1823-1843. The book includes account transactions conducted by Allston including payment of overseer wages, the hiring out of enslaved people, transportation, taxes, governesses, nurses, crops, sundries, and cloth distributed to slaves. This book also includes accounts between Allston and other individuals including the Estate of Charlotte A. Allston (primarily for the purchases of blankets, shoes, and cloth for enslaved people) and an account with Mary P. Jones. The last several pages of the book contain cash ledgers. Allston explicitly notes accounting related to Matanza Plantation, later known as Chicora Wood. Other account records do not explicitly state plantation sites.
Volume contains a chronological record (1855-1856) of the number of bushels, tolls, vessels on which the rice arrived, names of individuals (plantation owners), where the rice was stored (floor and "binn") and the marks used, the names of factors, the vessels on which rice was shipped, and other data. Mill accounts contain expenses for rice, drayage, coopers, carpenters, watchman, Negroes (hire), labor, salaries of various individuals, repairs, baskets and brooms, rice, cords of wood, poles, barrels, mill stones, wharf building, cart license, a butcher's bill, horses, insurance on rice, discount on a note, sales of rice, ironwork, sweep chimney, blacksmith work, and other expenses. Income is from cash received at mill, from various individuals for rice flour and rice, from freight and tolls on rice, from notes, and from other items. The Cannonsborough Mills, begun in 1825 by former Governor Thomas Bennett, included twenty-two pestles driven by steam and fourteen pestles run by tide power. Its property fronted Ashley River a third of a mile. In 1847 Bennett deeded the property to his son-in-law, Jonathan Lucas, III. The larger of the Cannonsborough mills burnt in February of 1860.