Wetmore, Hoppin & Co. Records

Mercantile firm, New York City

Records, 1833-1841

Size: 1 linear foot (3 volumes)

Catalog number: MSS 797

Processed by: Rick Stattler, November 1996

©Rhode Island Historical Society

Manuscripts Division

Wetmore, Hoppin & Co. was apparently the New York subsidiary of Edward Carrington & Co., a large Providence firm engaged chiefly in the China trade and textile manufacturing. The New York firm seems to have sold goods imported by Carrington for a commission, as much of their international trade was by necessity filitered through New York. It was apparently formed in April of 1833, and was dissolved in November of 1841. Samuel Wetmore (1775-1851), Willard Wright Wetmore (1775-1833), John Griswold and Samuel Russel were founding partners. Providence merchants Benjamin Hoppin (1777-1865) and Thomas C. Hoppin (1785-1850) seem to have been later partners. See the 1861 The Wetmore Family of America by James Carnahan Wetmore, pages 326 to 328, for more details.

This small collection of three volumes seems to constitute a complete set of the books for the firm of Wetmore, Hoppin & Co., including two journals and a ledger covering from 1833 to 1841. No minutes, incoming correspondence or other loose papers seem to survive from this firm, though some correspondence from its offices can undoubtedly be found in the Carrington Papers.

This collection appears to have arrived in 1960 as part of the massive Carrington Papers, from the Rhode Island School of Design. For many years previous they had been stored at the Carrington House on Power Street in Providence.

The initial survey of the Carrington Papers was done in 1963 on a grant from the American Philosophical Society. These volumes were separated at that point, and informative book tags were attached.