Correspondence, business, and legal papers, and photographs of Thomas Barns (1750-1836) and his son John S. Barns, who operated a grist and saw mill at Polsleys Mill (now Fairmont). Papers deal with a river trip to Indiana, 1837; coal mining in 1839; the money question, 1838; land transactions, farming, and mercantile operations of the Barns family; Rosecrans in Middle Tennessee, 1863; and the poor economic conditions, 1878.