The Jeremiah W. Graves Collection includes a cash book, correspondence, receipts and ledger pages, newspaper clippings, and genealogy materials relating to the personal and business activities of Captain Jeremiah White Graves (1801-1878), a farmer and financial advisor/real estate broker/slave broker in Cedar Hill, Pittsylvania County, Virginia,

Genealogical materials in the collection relate to the histories for branches of the Graves, Whitehead, Hunt, and Jones families.

The collection consists of a microfilm copy of Graves' extensive diary, and a typescript manuscript of selected transcribed passages from that diary. In his diary, Graves refers to working his farm, the sale of Negroes in the area, and his children's schooling. During the Civil War years Graves mentions the fighting and the war's end. After the war he comments that Negroes could vote while he could not.