Nathaniel C. Browder Collection of Cryptography Manuals and William Thomas Prestwood Diaries
MC 00098
Special Collections Research Center
1.5 Linear feet
1808 - 1983
Nathaniel C. Browder Collection of Cryptography Manuals and William Thomas Prestwood Diaries, includes twenty-eight original Prestwood diaries, most of which are encrypted, and enlarged copies of several of the diaries. Also included are a copy of
The Enciphered Diary of William Thomas Prestwood 1808-1859, a description and transcription of the diaries produced by Nathaniel Browder, and two of Browder's World War II-era cryptography manuals.
Nathaniel C. Browder worked as a cryptographer during and after World War II. After his retirement he worked on a number of genealogical and local history projects. Among these projects was the researching, deciphering, transcribing, and editing of William Thomas Prestwood's diaries. William Thomas Prestwood, a descendant of the influential Coker family, wrote a ciphered diary from 1808 until his death in 1859.
For current information on the location of these materials, please consult the
Special Collections Research Center Reference Staff.
3 archival boxes
Browder, Nathaniel C., 1904-
Prestwood, William Thomas, 1788-1859
Restrictions to Access
This collection is open for research; access requires at least 24 hours advance notice.
Acquisitions Information
Received as a gift upon the death of Nathaniel C. Browder in 1984 (Accession 1984-0006).
Preferred Citation
[Identification of item], Nathaniel C. Browder Collection of Cryptography Manuals and William Thomas Prestwood Diaries, MC 98, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC
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The materials from our collections are made available for use in research, teaching, and private study, pursuant to U.S. Copyright law. The user must assume full responsibility for any use of the materials, including but not limited to, infringement of copyright and publication rights of reproduced materials. Any materials used for academic research or otherwise should be fully credited with the source.
Processing Information
Processed by Jennifer McElroy,
2005 December
Encoded by Jennifer McElroy,
2005 December
Biographical Note
Nathaniel Clenroy Browder, was born February 4, 1904, in Hickory, North Carolina. He received a bachelor's degree in education from the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill in 1930 and married Blanche Penland, of Hayesville, North Carolina, in December of the same year. He worked as a high school teacher before moving back to Chapel Hill in 1938. Browder completed a year of graduate level study in English at the University of North Carolina and then began working for the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) in Chapel Hill, North Carolina from 1939 to 1940. His projects for the FWP included various history-related interviews throughout the southern United States. In April 1940, Browder moved to Raleigh, where he completed a course in drafting at North Carolina State College (later North Carolina State University) and began work for the North Carolina State Highway Department.
In 1943, Browder began working for the Army Signal Corps and served as a cryptographer in Arlington, Virginia during the war. During his term of service, he was also loaned to the Air Force and stationed in Okinawa, Japan. After the war, he continued his career in cryptography in Washington, D.C., working for the National Security Agency until his retirement in 1965. After his retirement Browder moved to Clay County, North Carolina and pursued his interest in local history and genealogy. He wrote, edited, and published a number of books, including:
Notes on the Browder Family of Tidewater, Virginia, 1704-1850 (with Blanche Penland Browder, 1970);
The Cherokee Indians and Those Who Came After: notes for a history of the people who settled western North Carolina (1973);
De Soto & Other Spanish Explorers & Their Historians (1975);
The Tri-State Tobacco Growers Association, 1922-1925 (1983);
Just Plain Folks (abstracted stories from the Federal Writers Project, ed., 1983);
The Enciphered Diary of William Thomas Prestwood, 1808-1859 (ed., 1983);
Ground Level History (1984);
A Story of the Civil War: a story of the late war by Hannah Lide Coker (ed., 1984); and
Isham Browder, Revolutionary soldier, man of mystery (with Blanche Penland Browder, 1984).
In 1984, Browder made arrangements to donate his papers and books to North Carolina State University. Included in these papers were the original enciphered Prestwood diaries, which Browder spent six years deciphering, transcribing, editing, and researching. Also in 1984, Browder and his wife created the Nathaniel C. and Blanche P. Browder Scholarship Endowment, an undergraduate endowment in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at North Carolina State University. Browder died on November 7, 1984.
William Thomas Prestwood was born in 1788 in Chesterfield County, South Carolina. His grandfather was the founder of the influential
Coker family, which was established on the upper Pee Dee River prior to the Revolutionary War. He often taught school, but he also did a variety of other types of work, including jobs as a surveyor, mapmaker, clerk, constable, militia officer, farmer, gold miner, and stone carver. He was also a musician and naturalist, and, at the time of his move to Burke (later Caldwell) County, North Carolina between 1813 and 1814, he was a Master Mason. Prestwood married Celia Clarke and they raised six sons and one daughter. Prestwood began keeping an enciphered diary in 1808, and continued to do so until his death in November 1859.
Scope and Content Note
Nathaniel C. Browder Collection of Cryptography Manuals and William Thomas Prestwood Diaries contains papers and publications related to some of Browder's interest and work with
cryptography. The
William Thomas Prestwood Diaries series contains 28 diaries written between 1808 and 1859. All were handwritten by Prestwood; most in a cipher. Generally, the entries are daily, very short, and reflect Prestwood's everyday activities, his observations, and information about his friends and relations. Illnesses, births, deaths, and major community events were recorded, as well as observations of weather, astronomical events, and animals. Prestwood recorded information about Masonic activities, his daily work, and his amorous encounters. Also in this series are photocopies of some of the diaries and the book,
The Enciphered Diary of William Thomas Prestwood 1808-1859, written by Browder. The collection's cryptography manuals series consists of two United States military cryptography manuals from the late years of World War II.
The collection contains materials dating from between 1808 and 1983, fitting into three distinct time periods. The bulk of the collection is the original Prestwood diaries, dating from 1808 to 1859. The manuals date from 1944 to 1945, and the book and photocopies date from the early 1980s.
Organization of the Collection
The collection is organized into two series: Cryptography Manuals and William Thomas Prestwood Diaries.
Related Material
-
Levine (Jack) Papers, 1716-1994, MC 00308
-
Nathaniel C. Browder, #4807 Manuscripts Department, Library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Southern Historical Collection
Prestwood, William Thomas, 1788-1859
Ciphers
Cryptographers
Cryptography
Diaries
North Carolina--History--1775-1865
North Carolina--Social life and customs--19th century
Cryptography Manuals
0.12 Linear feet
0.25 archival boxes
Scope and Contents note
The Cryptography Manuals series consists of two of Nathaniel C. Browder's World War II-era War Department manuals on cryptography.
Elementary Military Cryptography
1
1
1945
Advanced Military Cryptography
1
2
1944
William Thomas Prestwood Diaries
1.38 Linear feet
2.75 archival boxes
Scope and Contents note
The bulk of the William Thomas Prestwood Diaries series consists of the original diaries. There are twenty-eight of these
diaries, numbered in a modern hand based on their chronology. The first
diary is actually a handwritten description of an out-of-body experience as recorded by a minister in 1783. The remaining twenty-seven diaries are small, hand-sewn volumes, varying in size from 3 x 3.5 inches to 6.25 x 7.7 inches. Twenty-two of these volumes contain short daily entries that are almost all written in ciphered writing (excepting the dates and any writing on the covers). Another three books are partially or mostly enciphered. The remaining two volumes are #12, a book of Prestwood's thoughts on various subjects (especially mathematics), and #20, a ledger or accounting-type book.
Prestwood generally wrote short, daily entries recording his everyday activities, observations, and information about his family and friends. Notably, several members of the
Baird family make appearances in the diaries. Illnesses, births, deaths, and major community events were recorded, as well as observations of weather, astronomical events, and animals. Prestwood wrote about Masonic activities and his work--farm work, teaching, milling, surveying, and mustering for the militia. He also recorded his various romantic and sexual exploits. His wife and mistress, as well as several other women, appear in the diaries in this context.
Also in this series are photocopies of diaries 2 through 5, and the book
The Enciphered Diary of William Thomas Prestwood 1808-1859, a deciphered and transcribed version of the diaries written by Nathaniel C. Browder and published in 1983. In the published edition the diaries, and portions of diaries, not originally written in cipher are not necessarily presented in full and the excerpts tend to be replications rather than transcriptions.
Browder, Nathaniel C.
The Enciphered Diary of William Thomas Prestwood 1808-1859. Raleigh, N.C.: Nathaniel C. Browder
1
3
1983.
Copy of Prestwood Diary #2, 1808 March 13 - Dec. 31
1
4
Copy of Prestwood Diary #3, 1809 March 26 - 1811 Aug. 25
1
5
Copy of Prestwood Diary #4, 1812 May 1 - 1813 March 27
1
6
Copy of Prestwood Diary #5, 1813 March 28 - Nov. 30
1
7
Diary 1
1
8
Diary 2
1
9
1808
Diary 3
1
10
1809 - 1811
Diary 4
1
11
1812 - 1813
Diary 5
2
1
1813
Diaries 6 and 7
2
2
1814 - 1816
Diaries 8 and 9
2
3
1816 - 1819
Diaries 10 and 11
2
4
1819 - 1823
Diary 12
2
5
Diary 13
2
6
1825 - 1826
Diary 14
2
7
1826 - 1828
Diaries 15 and 16
2
8
1822 - 1833
Diaries 17 and 18
2
9
1833 - 1837
Diary 19
3
1
1837 - 1839
Diary 20
3
2
1832 - 1840
Diaries 21 and 22
3
3
1841 - 1848
Diaries 23 and 24
3
4
1848 - 1851
Diaries 25 and 26
3
5
1852 - 1856
Diaries 27 and 28
3
6
1856 - 1859