BOOK REVIEWS
The Transylvania Colony. By William Lester Stewart (Spencer,
Indiana, Samuel R. Guard & Co.,
1935. 288p. $3.00.)
Professor W. L. Stewart has made an
exhaustive study of
the sources by using the Draper
Manuscripts, the Haldimand
Papers, the American State Papers, the
Swain Manuscripts, the
Colonial Records of North Carolina, newspapers, etc.
He points out in an informative preface
that the Transyl-
vania company, among the several that
were formulated for the
exploitation of the land lying west of
the seaboard colonies, was
the only one that actually planted a
colony. Although its period
of proprietary control was brief its
contribution to the settlement
of the West was significant and well
worth an accurate appraise-
ment.
Aside from the development of his thesis
in such chapters
as "Transylvania Institutes a
Government," "Administration in
Transylvania," and "The
Fourteenth Colony," the author treats
interestingly, in such chapters as
"Early Pioneer Kentucky" and
"Social and Economic Life in
Transylvania," of the everyday
life of the people. The latter chapter
is a fresh story of the
hardships of pioneers of this particular
community told from the
documents cited above.
Being the result of a careful study of
the available materials
and containing long extracts from many
of the manuscript
sources, the chief value of the volume
seems to be for the student
of the period rather than a volume for
the perusal of the layman.
There is a bibliography and a table of
contents but no index.
W. D. O.
(297)