1 linear foot
This collection contains correspondence, legal documents, financial records, and other material related to the family of Frederick Kislingbury, who died during Adolphus Greely's expedition to the Arctic in the early 1880s. The majority of the material pertains to disputes over his estate, the custody of his children, and his sons' later lives.
The Correspondence and Documents series (around 500 items) comprises the bulk of the collection. Before embarking on Adolphus Greely's Lady Franklin Bay Expedition in August 1881, Frederick Kislingbury signed several personal checks, received postcards from the Army Mutual Aid Association, and corresponded with acquaintances about his finances. On August 17, 1881, he wrote a letter to his sons about his upcoming voyage, and he marked the expedition's proposed landing point on a printed map of the Arctic regions. Soon after his father's departure, Harry H. G. Kislingbury received letters and legal documents regarding a package that his father had sent to him before leaving for the Arctic. Several other letters pertain directly to the expedition. In a letter to Kislingbury dated January 20, 1882, Adolphus Greeley criticized Greely's sleeping habits during his "enforced stay with this command" and discussed the circumstances that led to Kislingbury's initial dismissal for insubordination in 1881. A copied letter from Captain W. M. Beebe about the Neptune's attempted rescue mission (July 17, 1882) and a printed letter confirming the failure of the 1883 relief expedition (September 14, 1883) are also present.
The bulk of the series is made up of incoming letters, legal documents, and financial records to Charles Lamartine Clark, a Detroit resident who served as Kislingbury's estate executor. The material primarily concerns the estate's finances and the custody of Kislingbury's sons. Clark often corresponded with the Army Mutual Aid Association, and the collection has a copy of its 4th annual report (1883). John P. Kislingbury and William H. Kislingbury, Frederick Kislingbury's brothers, wrote to Clark from Rochester, New York. They argued over custody of the Kislingbury children, their brother's funeral and burial, and his financial affairs, though their later correspondence was more cordial toward Clark. Clark also owned an account book covering Kislingbury's relationship with Riggs & Co. from 1881-1884. Some items from 1885 concern a pension that the United States Congress awarded to his sons and related efforts to certify their ages.
After 1885, Harry H. G. Kislingbury wrote letters to Clark about his experiences at the Michigan Military Academy in Orchard Lake, Michigan. Clark also received letters about Harry's conduct from the school's superintendent. Harry later wrote about his life in San Francisco, California, and Flagstaff, Arizona, in the late 1880s.
Wheeler Kislingbury wrote several lengthy personal letters to Charles L. Clark in 1913 and 1914, mentioning his life in San Francisco, California, expressing regret over his uncles' actions following his father's death, and discussing the possibility of publishing his father's diary. Additionally, one letter describes an encounter with Adolphus Greely in which the officer refused to talk to Wheeler after discovering that he was Frederick Kislingbury's son (May 7, 1913). Douglas E. L. Kislingbury wrote a brief personal letter to Clark from Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1917, and Wheeler wrote 2 letters to Clark's wife from Winslow, Arizona, in 1919.
Henry H. G. Kislingbury kept a Diary (100 pages) while traveling from New York to San Francisco onboard the St. Mark between December 6, 1886, and April 22, 1887. Kislingbury wrote about the ship's crew, the weather, the scenery, and the captain's family, who were passengers on the voyage.
The Cass School (Detroit, Mich.) and Michigan Military Academy Papers pertain to the education of two of Frederick Kislingbury's sons. Two report cards from the Cass School in Detroit, Michigan, provide information on Walter Kislingbury's academic progress in 1883. The remaining 25 loose items are report cards and receipts concerning Harry H. G. Kislingbury's academic progress, conduct, and finances during his time at the Michigan Military Academy, 1884-1886. He also kept an account book while attending the school.
The Photographs series (5 items) contains portraits of Charles L. Clark, his wife Georgina Frazer Clark, and a group portrait of Clark with Walter Frederick Kislingbury and Wheeler Kislingbury. Frederick Kislingbury carried the carte-de-visite of Charles L. Clark during the Greely expedition.
A manuscript Menu lists the meals consumed by the Greely expedition on each day of the week.
The Printed Items series is comprised of 2 items: a copy of the Sunday Morning Herald with an article about Frederick Kislingbury's death (July 20, 1884) and Harry H. G. Kislingbury's copy of Emory Upton's Infantry Tactics Double and Single Rank. Adapted to American Topography and Improved Fire-Arms (Revised edition, 1884).
1 linear foot
5.5 linear feet
The collection consists of correspondence, primarily between George T. Stevens and Harriet W. Stevens of Essex County, New York, as well as documents, writings, a scrapbook, printed materials, and realia reflecting the Civil War service of surgeon George T. Stevens of the 77th Regiment N.Y. Volunteers, Harriet W. Stevens' experiences on the home front, and George T. Stevens' post-Civil War medical career in Albany and New York City, New York.
The Correspondence Series is divided into two sub-series. The Chronological Correspondence Sub-Series spans from 1859 to 1866 with over 560 letters. While a few other correspondents are represented, the bulk of this series reflects both sides of the correspondence between George T. Stevens and Harriet ("Hattie") W. Stevens. Beginning with their courtship in 1859, the letters reflect George's early efforts to set up medical practice in Keeseville, New York, in 1861, his entry into the army, and their relationship and experiences throughout his service during the Civil War.
George's letters give a detailed glimpse into the practices of Civil War surgeons. Beginning with his efforts to secure an appointment as an Assistant Surgeon and the internal jockeying for position that caused infighting, George's letters to Hattie provide insight into the interpersonal conflicts and partnerships that undergirded his experience as an officer. Miscommunications about a medical furlough he took from May to October 1862 due to a case of typhoid fever led to his dismissal, and George's letters speak frankly about his efforts to reenlist as well as his frustrations with barriers to accomplishing this goal. Writing reports, securing transportation and goods, and tending to administrative details also pepper George's correspondence, shedding light on the clerical demands on his time.
George wrote frequently of daily life and tasks in camp, noting food, music and reading, camaraderie, mud, weather, camp health, and more. His detailed descriptions of camp life and activity also provide glimpses of others, including those who worked for him, like Dall Wadhams, who entered the army with him and stayed until March 1862, and James Mages, a young German-American, who worked for George from September 1863 to around June 1864 when he was taken prisoner of war.
George's commentary on camp life also at times reflects information about African Americans' experiences and white soldiers' opinions on race, slavery, and emancipation. Example references include:
George T. Stevens' letters also reflect on marching conditions, as well as details about setting up hospitals and tending to the sick and wounded. Letters describing battles reflect not only on military movements and engagements but also on the fieldwork undertaken by surgeons, amputations in particular, and the dangers to which they were exposed. He commented on medicine, transport of the wounded, illness, and death. For much of May 1864, he was stationed in Fredericksburg tending to soldiers wounded during the Overland Campaign, before returning to his regiment late in the month, and his letters reflect this work.
In addition to passing references to additional battles, the military engagements or their aftermath that George T. Stevens' letters reflect on include:
George and Harriet discussed their own health in good detail. George experienced a difficult bout of typhoid fever beginning in May 1862 and another illness in April 1864, which brought Harriet to tend to him during his recoveries. George and Harriet both commented on military and political events. Harriet was an avid reader of the news, tracking the 77th Regiment's movements and engagements. George commented several times that she was better informed than he was. "The rumors you have in regard to our moving are only the reports of the soldiers in camp who know as much of our future movements as they do of the next arctic expedition in search of Sir John Franklin," he wrote on January 24, 1862. Both were candid in their criticisms of military leaders.
As his regiment was periodically stationed near Washington, D.C., including for several months in late 1861 and early 1862, George's letters contain commentary about conditions in the city. Harriet's occasional trips to visit George in camp or to tend to him during bouts of illness also found her staying in D.C. She remained in the city hoping to visit George while the Battle of Gettysburg was being fought. Her letters during these times provide additional insight into how women and camp followers experienced D.C. and how residents responded to war news.
Harriet's letters written while she was staying with family at Wadham's Mills and Crown Point provide information about the home front. Discussions of finances, family news, anxiety for George's wellbeing, military events, health, music and reading, and more pepper her letters. As she and George wrote each other frequently, both sides of their conversation are often represented, showing the back-and-forth dialog that the couple sustained throughout the war. Notes written on envelopes by Harriet W. Stevens in later years identify letters that were of interest to her or provide clarifying information, hinting at George and Harriet's ongoing consultation of their wartime correspondence. George and Harriet's interest in botany is also well represented in the series. They discussed plants and sent each other pressed flowers and leaves.
Frances ("Frankie") Wadhams Davenport Ormsbee is also well reflected in the series. While she contributed only a small handful of letters, George T. and Harriet Stevens commented regularly on her and her husband George Davenport, beginning with a reference to their courtship in a letter from May 13, 1859. George T. Stevens discussed visits with George Davenport while they were both in active service, as well as with Frances while she was visiting him in camp. Letters referencing Frances, as well as George's own letters detailing his preparations for Harriet to visit him in camp, provide insight into officers' wives' experiences staying in the military encampments. Upon George Davenport's death at the Battle of the Wilderness, George T. Stevens wrote home with news he had about the nature of his death and burial, and corresponded with Harriet and Frances as they worked to recover his body and process their grief.
Several letters from other members of the Stevens and Wadhams families are also present. Additionally, as Wadham's Mills was located near the Canadian and Vermont borders, the series at times reflects on affairs in those regions. For example, Harriet W. Stevens' letter from December 19, 1861, states, "...the most prominent business men in Canada were drilling men three times a week. Frankie & I think that if we go to war with England, we shall just put on pants & go to." She also wrote of news regarding St. Albans Raid (October 20, 1864; October 23, 1864; October 30, 1864; November 2, 1864).
Correspondence from after George's service is far less frequent. It includes a letter from a former patient whose arm he saved during the war (February 19, 1865), a few letters from other members of the 77th Regiment, and material relating to the Stevens's move to Albany. One item written by James McKean on May 3-June 8, 1865, outlines reactions to news of the Civil War in Honduras, including references to an African American man and young indigenous Honduran boy.
George T. Stevens included sketches and drawings in some of his letters to Harriet. Letters that include pen-and-ink illustrations are listed below:
The Bundled Correspondence Sub-Series reflects the original bundling of these sub-sets of letters, with each then arranged chronologically. One bundle consists of nine letters and documents from ca. 1859-1860, as well as undated items, relating to Miss Slater's School for Young Ladies in Lansingburgh, New York. The other bundle includes six letters from 1868 relating to resolving an incident when George T. Stevens received double payment while in the service in 1864.
The Documents Series is divided into four sub-series. The Chronological Documents Sub-Series consists of eleven items ranging in date from 1856 to 1864, including Castleton Medical College admission tickets; a subscription receipt toFlag of Our Union ; a partially printed notebook listing voters in the town of Keene in 1858; a small leather wallet containing notes documenting George and Harriet's travels in 1861, money received, and letters; an 1864 document from the Office of the Chief Medical Officer relieving Stevens of duty; General Orders 222 from 1864; a partial copy of the regiment's participation in military campaigns from May to July 1864; undated GAR Roster; and an undated list of three people, "not paid."
The bundled documents sub-series represent the original bundling of the documents as they arrived at the Clements, but each grouping was then arranged chronologically. The Bundled Military Documents Sub-Series consists of:
The Bundled G.A.R. Documents Sub-Series consists of the following bundles:
The Miscellaneous Bundled Documents Sub-Series consists of two rolled bundles:
The Writings Series includes:
The Scrapbook Series consists of one volume with material primarily relating to George T. Stevens' post-Civil War life and career tipped or pasted in. Dated items range from 1861 to 1918. Material relates to his work with the Albany Medical College, Nature Club of Albany, the Albany Institute and its Field Meetings, the Grand Army of the Republic, military reunions, the Troy Scientific Association, the Soldiers and Sailors Union, and some references to his publications. Some material relates to his medical career, primarily ephemera from medical associations, lectures, and notices of his awards and achievements. Two Civil War-era items include an 1861 newspaper clipping from Keeseville announcing George T. Stevens' appointment in the Army and an 1861 printed circular calling to organize a Bemis Heights Battalion. Only a handful of items relate to Harriet W. Stevens and their social life. Formats include newspaper clippings, postcards, disbound pages, fliers, programs, advertisements, business or calling cards, and circulars, among others.
The Photographs Series features the following:
In addition to the above, the Photographs Series also includes two tinted ambrotypes of George T. Stevens; one tinted tintype of George T. and Harriet W. Stevens with George and Frances Davenport; one tinted daguerreotype of Frances and George Davenport; and a ca. 1864 tintype of George T. Stevens in the field in Virginia, wearing his uniform while mounted on a horse, with his groom, Austin, standing with his mule.
The Printed Materials Series primarily consists of pamphlets dating from 1850 to 1915 and includes material relating to the Sons of Temperance, Castleton Medical College, the Independent Order of Good Templars, Masons, and an Ex-Soldiers' Handbook. One pamphlet includes George T. Stevens' address to the Survivors' Association of the 77th Regiment, "The First Fighting Campaign of the Seventy-Seventh N.Y.V." There are also 165 copies of the print, "The Chimneys - April 5, 1862. Drawing by George T. Stevens." Six books are located in the Clements Library's Book Division. Please see the list in the Additional Descriptive Data below for a complete list.
The Realia Series includes the following items:
5.5 linear feet
2 linear feet
The Hoit Family Papers are made up of 965 letters; 21 diaries, account books, and notebooks; 11 speeches, poems, and other writings; 49 documents and financial papers; six photographs, and other items related to New Hampshire state legislator Daniel Hoit (1778-1859) and Sally Hoit (1786-1837); their children Julia Maria, Eliza Flanders, portrait painter and artist Albert Gallatin, and Reverend William Henry Harrison Hoit; and their children-in-law Ira A. Bean, Susan Ann Hanson Hoit, and Enoch P. Sherman. The family lived primarily in Sandwich, New Hampshire.
The Correspondence Series contains 965 letters, including 39 by Sarah "Sally" Flanders / Sarah "Sally" Flanders Hoit, dating between December 3, 1803, and January 30, 1837. She wrote largely from Loudon and Sandwich, New Hampshire. In her courtship letters to Daniel Hoit, she offered her thoughts on marriage, the state of their relationship, the future, virtue, and remarks on living a good life. After their marriage, the topics of her correspondence turned to the health and welfare of their family. To her daughters Eliza and Julia she gave motherly advice while they attended a female academy in Concord, New Hampshire (beginning in 1822).
Sally Flanders's husband Daniel Hoit authored around 300 letters from June 6, 1808, to June 19, 1859. He sent over half of them to his wife, Sally Hoit (between 1808 and 1835), and his daughters Julia Hoit Sherman (between 1821 and 1859) and Eliza Hoit Bean (between 1822 and 1856). In them, he showed concern for the education and welfare of his children and family, and advised his wife on home and financial matters. Daniel appears to have had a close relationship with his daughter, Julia. In over 70 letters to her, he reflected on the importance of parenthood and morality; discussed politics, his speeches, elections, and other business matters; and praised her for her academic prowess. To Eliza, he sent 37 letters on the health and welfare of family members and friends. Many of these were co-authored by other Hoit family members. Daniel Hoit's letters include content respecting the state legislature and a small number of items during and after the War of 1812 pertain to recruiting. He remarked twice on local extramarital relationships (June 18, 1815, and June 20, 1830) and attended public Shaker worship in Concord, New Hampshire (June 20, 1814).
The Hoit's oldest child, Eliza Flanders Hoit / Eliza Flanders Hoit Bean, sent 22 letters between April 27, 1822, and September 16, 1859. She wrote the first six letters to her mother and sister while attending school in Concord, New Hampshire, from April to September 1822. The remainder of the letters date from 1836 to 1859, mostly from Urbana, Ohio. These letters focus on the health of friends and family, housework, and her spiritual life. She wrote several travel letters to her father from Ohio, New York, and Pennsylvania. Her husband Ira A. Bean wrote 30 letters, December 30, 1828-December 30, 1863, regarding his business and political endeavors, largely to his father-in-law, Daniel Hoit.
Julia Maria Hoit / Julia Maria Hoit Sherman sent around 110 letters to her mother, father, siblings, and other family members between February 3, 1827, and March 24, 1876. The majority of them originated from Sandwich, New Hampshire. In her often-lengthy correspondence, she discussed fashion, gossip about friends and family, weddings, marriages, clothing, and current events. She was independent and highly opinionated about the social behaviors of those around her. Particularly notable is her criticism of the fashion and diet of the women in Boston (1829). The Hoit Family Papers also contain around 50 political, financial, and property-related letters of her husband, Enoch P. Sherman, dating between June 9, 1828, and February 6, 1843, and around 10 from their son, Daniel H. Sherman between 1849 and 1873.
The Hoit's oldest son Albert Gallatin Hoit / Albert Gallatin Hoyt wrote approximately 110 letters between November 27, 1820, and October 21, 1853. His earliest correspondence, largely to his parents and sisters, covers his time at Effingham Academy, Wolfeborough & Tuftonborough Academy (1825), and Dartmouth College (1826-1829). In 1829, he established a school at Newport, Connecticut, but quickly found himself in debt. Struggling to remedy his plight, he took a trip to Rochester, New York, in 1830, where he decided to embark on a career as a portrait painter. He then wrote from Portland and Bangor, Maine, until 1839 when he settled in Boston with his wife Susan. His letters regard his everyday life, education, career, and relationship with his father. Susan A. Hanson Hoyt, originally of Conway, New Hampshire, wrote approximately 40 letters between March 28, 1837, and February 11, 1873. They focus on health and her daily routine, anxieties about her husband Albert's career as an artist, the art scene in Boston in the early 1840s, and the activities of her husband. Albert traveled a great deal, and stayed in Europe from 1842 to 1844 to paint. Susan also wrote about her stillborn children (i.e. March 30, 1845), concerns over the presidential election of 1844, sewing, dressmaking, and her efforts to learn how to draw. By 1853, she moved to Roxbury, Massachusetts, with her husband. In a series of letters from there, she wrote about the sickness and death of Albert in 1856. She then returned to Conway. In early 1872, she traveled to Minneapolis where she apparently remained.
William Henry Harrison Hoit / William Henry Hoyt's approximately 70 letters date from May 13, 1826, to November 15, 1882. Beginning at around age 11 with letters from school at Wolfborough & Tuftonborough Academy (where he studied along with his brother Albert), informed his parents about his studies and asked them to send books and educational advice. He then wrote to his parents, sisters, and brother-in-law while studying at Dartmouth College (1827-1831). From 1835 to 1836, he sent letters from the Episcopal Theological Seminary in New York, and, by 1838, he settled in to his parish at St. Alban's, Vermont. His conversion from the Episcopal Church to Catholicism in the later 1840s is the subject of a portion of his correspondence. The collection includes three letters by William Hoyt's wife, Anne Deming Hoyt, dated October 6, 1838; March 30, 1856; and July 11, 1867.
The collection's remaining 190 or letters are from almost as many correspondents. They are addressed to members of the Hoit family, particularly Sally, Daniel, Eliza, and Julia, from various members of their extended family and business associates. Updates on deaths, marriages, health, education, and children predominate in the letters by women. Of interest are letters pertinent to Albert Hoyt's debt in the early 1830s and five letters from Julia's niece, Frances Prescott, a teacher in Ellenburg, New York. She briefly remarked on her school and wages (late 1850s).
The Diaries, Account Books, and Notebooks Series includes 10 daily diaries and account books of Daniel Hoit (1814-1817, 1851-1859), one diary by Sally Flanders Hoit (1823, 1830), two diaries of Ira A. Bean (1829-1859), one volume of notes and accounts of Enoch P. Sherman's estate (1843-1849), three sparse diaries and two notebooks by Daniel H. Sherman (1870, 1873, 1878, 1900, and 1918), and one daily diary of Julia M. Hoit Sherman (1884).
The Speeches, Poems, and Other Writings Series includes a poem by William Burleigh to Mr. and Mrs. Hoit (March 4, 1812) a fragment of a verse by Sarah F. Hoit (undated), three essays by Albert G. Hoit (two from his school days and one entitled "Early Recollections" (undated), and a written renewal of vows to God by Julia M. Hoit on her 24th birthday (November 15, 1831). Also present are a temperance address by Ira A. Bean (October 1823), an incomplete address to the Franklin Society (November 1, 1824), and a 4th of July 1834 temperance speech by Daniel Hoit.
The Hoit Family Papers contain 49 Documents, Accounts, and Receipts, dating from [1809?] to 1863. The various financial papers include good documentation of the Hoit children's educational expenses and Albert G. Hoit's expenditures and debts of the later 1820s and early 1830s. Among the documents are Enoch P. Sherman's June 11, 1840, resignation from a colonelcy in the 19th Regiment New Hampshire Militia.
The Photographs Series is made up of seven carte-de-visite photographs, all bearing Civil War era tax stamps. Identified individuals include "Mrs. E. G. Weaver" and "A. J. Church & wife & daughter."
The collection includes two Maps:
The collection also contains 14 Printed Items, among which are The Dairyman’s Daughter (religious tract, 1831), a copy of a bill to extend an 1838 act to grant half-pay and pensions to certain widows (1841), Final Notes on Witchcraft in Massachusetts by George H. Moore (1885), a program for the Semi-Centennial celebration of the New Hampshire Conference Seminary and Female College (1895), The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain, by Mrs. Hannah More, and a children's book Jocko and Minette (1846). See the box and folder listing below for a complete list of the printed materials.
2 linear feet
3.5 linear feet
This collection consists of letters, documents, writings, bound volumes, printed materials, original art, photographs, ephemera, and other materials related to the life and study of Emily Howland of Sherwood, New York, between 1849 and 1974. Howland worked to advance abolition, African American education, and women's rights and suffrage, and her papers reflect these varied reform movements and her long-standing relationships with leaders in the causes. She was especially active in Freedmen's relief and education in Virginia during and following the Civil War, and her work centering in Northumberland County, Virginia, is documented in the collection, as well as her domestic life in Sherwood following her return there in the late 1860s.
The Correspondence Series contains letters written to and from Emily Howland from 1849 until her death in 1929, touching on topics like antislavery, African American education, women's rights and suffrage, pacifism, among other social reforms and personal matters. Several items were written to other correspondents within Howland's social circles that were possibly shared with her or others researching her life at a later date. These letters reflect the Howland family's broader social reform networks, including several items written in the 1850s and 1860s to or from David Wright, an Auburn, New York, attorney active in the antislavery and temperance causes, as well as Eliza Wright Osborne, a suffragist, in the late 1890s.
Some of the correspondence from the 1840s and 1850s reflects the Howland family's involvement in antislavery efforts. Circular letters from the New York State Vigilance Committee (March 10, 1849) and the "Provisional Committee, for the Promotion of Education among the Colored People, in such of the Slave States as are, or may be accessible" (October 18, 1849) are present in the series. Hiram Wilson wrote a letter from St. Catharines, Canada, to Susan Marriott, a woman involved in gathering clothing for enslaved people fleeing across the border (October 30, 1851). He noted that Emily Howland alerted him to Marriott's "deep interest" in the work preparing the shipment, indicating Howland's interest in the effort. Similarly, W. O. Dawson wrote to Slocum Howland on November 16, 1853, discussing the travels of William Darsey, a man fleeing from slavery to Canada, and support offered by abolitionists. "He said you told him to have me write you as to his safe arrival at our house," Dawson wrote, confirming the Howland family was active in efforts to assist escape attempts. One writer asked Howland to check in on Catharine M. White, a former resident of the Colored Orphan Asylum, to determine if she was in financial straits, revealing how Howland operated within abolition and benevolence networks (October 26, 1858).
Correspondence in the collection documents Emily Howland's long career supporting education. Several letters between 1857 and 1859 relate to her first foray in teaching, as she taught in the school previously operated by Myrtilla Miner in Washington, D.C. Letters include one dated July 3, 1857, written by Miner noting her failing health and coordinating with Howland for the upcoming school year. A letter Howland wrote while on her initial trip to D.C. is also included, in which she described her voyage to Philadelphia, meeting with Samuel J. May who had promised to raise funds for the school, and picking up a young formerly enslaved girl named Virginia Ayer who was going to attend Miner's school (September 25, 1857). In another early letter home (November 7, 1857), Howland described the climate, flora, teaching 30 students, social visits, and viewing the "Greek Slave" in the art gallery. By February 26, 1858, she was also teaching an evening school and upwards of 40 students in the day school. In May 1858, Howland related a visit she took to the homes of some of her students and speaking with an older enslaved woman. A ca. May 1858 document in the Writings Series, "A visit to Aunt Nella," written by Margaret McAnulty, one of Howland's students, further describes this visit. The final letter written during Howland's tenure at the Miner school is dated March 27, 1859, and reports Myrtilla Miner's return, abrupt dismissal of the teachers, and Howland's hope that one of her students, Susie, might return to New York with her, "the idea of a chance for education overcomes her dread." She noted visiting the student's mother.
Emily Howland was active in contraband camps, Freedmen's relief programs, and African American school efforts during and after the Civil War, and her correspondence reflects these interests. A letter of recommendation written by F. W. Seward endorses Howland's desire to "go to the front to aid in taking care of the wounded," noting how she "has labored very diligently and effectively in the Contraband Camps in this vicinity for the past three years" (May 14, 1864). Letters like the one by Walter L. Clift, a lawyer in Savannah, Georgia, on July 23, 1867, speak directly to struggles experienced by Black Southerners during Reconstruction, commenting on efforts to collect "small claims against their employers who take advantage of their inability to keep accounts to defraud them of their wages" and their political sensibilities and registering to vote.
Howland was instrumental in purchasing land and raising funds for the construction of a school in Heathsville, Virginia, in 1867 and her correspondence reflects her ongoing investment in the project, through discussions of financial issues, building upkeep, and land transfers. On July 13, 1867, L. Edwin Dudley wrote from the Union Republican Congressional Executive Committee office in Washington, D.C., offering support for raising funds for the completion of the school and noting his endorsement of woman suffrage. A detailed letter from F. E. Dow documents the construction of the Howland Chapel School in Northumberland County, Virginia (August 25, 1867), noting African American residents' efforts in the construction and securing government funds. The correspondence also documents the transfer of land ownership from Howland to African American residents in Heathsville and Howland's reasoning to do so as "a great check on the wicked wills of the old slaveocracy, who let no whit of a chance to oppress escape them" (January 16, 1870). On April 17, 1876, Howland wrote while in Heathsville overseeing repairs to the school and managing land sales, including one to a man she "put the screws on" to press him to be more industrious and build a house on the land in order to secure the sale. Other letters indicate ongoing relationships with the Black community in the area, including two letters from Thamsen Taliaferro written when she was 22 years old indicating she was a teacher preparing to leave Heathsville to undertake other educational efforts in Manassas, possibly attending the Manassas Industrial School for Colored Youth with Howland's financial support (January 6 and 17, 1895). At least two letters were also written by Sidney Taliaferro Boyer (1854-1927), who was taught by Howland and was active in the Heathsville region (August 4, 1903), and Howland references her elsewhere in her correspondence. Several letters between Howland and Anna M. Stanton, who taught at Heathsville, are also present.
Howland frequently corresponded with others involved in contraband relief efforts and African American education, including Cornelia Hancock, who moved to South Carolina in 1866 to work alongside newly emancipated enslaved people and founded the Laing School for Negroes in Mount Pleasant. Letters between Howland and Hancock in the collection span from 1865 to at least 1884, beginning just as Hancock was preparing to begin her post-war labors. In one dated December 20, 1865, Hancock bristled at Philadelphian Quakers' failure to recognize Howland and other women's efforts in the South. Hancock's frustrations with the Society of Friends continued through the month as she tried to prepare a trip south, lamenting on December 31st that "Their extreme timidity seems to rest in a fear that their teachers will not have a feather bed to lie on and hotel fare for diet." She wrote requesting Howland's financial assistance to secure her transportation to South Carolina, "and I know too thee is not fastidious about where the work is done so it is getting done." Putnam directly linked Howland's support as essential to bringing her to the Laing School and reflected on their shared sense of dissatisfaction and restlessness at the close of the Civil War. She enclosed a manuscript map of the Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, region and worked with Howland to secure funds to purchase property on Cat Island to transfer to African American residents (January 14, 1869). She continued to write to Emily and Slocum Howland about land purchases and financial matters relating to her efforts in South Carolina, African American residents working in the area, and the strain the labor placed on her health.
Howland also stayed in regular contact with Caroline F. Putnam who founded the Holley School in Lottsburg, Virginia. She noted a festival endorsing "care and vigilance for the protection of the hitherto enslaved" (April 17, 1871) and reflected on their early ventures ([November 12, 1906?]). Howland wrote frankly to Putnam regarding their shared interests in education and other matters, including financial inducements to encourage African American voters to decline liquor licenses in Heathsville, Virginia (March 20, 1898), the Spanish-American War (February 8, 1899), and Putnam's ongoing work in Virginia (January 14, 1901).
Two letters written by Sallie Holley, a close colleague and partner of Putnam, are in the collection, written in October 1867 while she visited Howland in Sherwood, New York, after the passing of Howland's mother. They touch on the waning of abolitionist sentiment, teaching, Charles Sumner's wife, and Howland's comments about her "Virginia life" and the need for land ownership by the formerly enslaved. One letter from Howland includes a later annotation that it may have been addressed to Holley, but the attribution is unverified (March 11, 1866). A letter written on March 7, 1893, concerning Sally Holley's will acknowledges some of the tension that could arise in the work, as her will allowed Putnam's continued use of the school but not its ownership.
Howland maintained a long-lasting friendship with Harriet Tubman, and several letters in the collection relate to Tubman, including correspondence arranging for her to speak at the National Association of Colored Women's convention in Washington, D.C., in 1896 by figures like Victoria Matthews who was helping to organize the convention (July 8, 1896). These items were not addressed to Howland, instead principally directed to Eliza Wright Osborne, so their presence among her papers is suggestive of them being forwarded to Howland, possibly to aid in working to secure Tubman's presence. Other letters reference discussions of reprinting biographies of Tubman and working to record her oral histories, including by figures like Franklin Benjamin Sanford. While these letters tend to focus on the events and projects, descriptions of Tubman emerge, such as having a limited "ability to speak in public" (July 1, 1896), or that "She is difficult to understand, unless one is familiar with the negro talk; but she can tell her experiences very graphically, and she seems to have a very good memory" (July 4, 1896), or that she would "want her books for Washington" (July 5, 1896).
Others reference Tubman visiting with Howland and include anecdotes about her experiences, such as having surgery and tending to an impoverished widow (September 5, 1897), or her tendency not to eat until after noon on Fridays, "the hour when the Lord descended from the cross" (November 24, 1899; June 22, 1900), or wondering whether Tubman would include the Manassas Industrial School in her will (June 14 and 20, 1900). Howland recounted one encounter with an African American man who claimed to be fleeing from lynching threats in North Carolina and was directed to her by Tubman, which turned out to be a scam, underlining the depth of the two women's relationship and how Tubman's reputation was wielded for unintended purposes (October 21, 1905).
Howland wrote twice to Eliza Wright Osborne (January 11 and 28, 1897) referencing her displeasure with a meeting and financial decisions for the nascent Harriet Tubman Home for Aged and Indigent Negroes, as well as her scathing displeasure with the fundraising efforts of John J. Smallwood for the Temperance, Industrial and Collegiate Institute. She noted her enlistment of Booker T. Washington and William Lloyd Garrison in her opposition, hinting at the complicated politics and interpersonal conflicts present in such efforts. Garrison wrote to her on November 5, 1896, about his work to publish warnings in newspapers, to expose "him by voice & pen for two years" as a "phenomenal liar, forger & sneak" and to work with Booker T. Washington to spread awareness.
Into the twentieth century, Howland continued to financially support educational institutions, including those focused on Black education such as the Kowaliga Academic and Industrial Institute for Colored Youth in Kowaliga, Alabama; Selma University in Selma, Alabama; the Piney Woods Country Life School for Training Colored Boys and Girls in Christianity, Character, and Service in Braxton, Mississippi; the Manassas Industrial School for Colored Youth in Manassas, Virginia; and the Tuskegee Institute, in Tuskegee, Alabama. Oswald Garrison Villard wrote to Howland on June 18, 1907, with a detailed report of the Manassas Industrial School, its teachers and administrators, plans for construction, and the need for contributions. Other letters reference the building of Howland Hall (December 17, 1910) and the secession of leadership following Oswald Garrison Villard's resignation (November 1 and November 22, 1912). Laurence C. Jones, principal of Piney Woods Country Life School, wrote a letter of thanks for Howland's interest in the institution and described the hardships African American communities were experiencing in Braxton, Mississippi. Howland also was heavily involved in the Sherwood Select School of Sherwood, New York, and letters in the collection reveal her planning, financial support, and frustrations with the school.
Howland also provided financial support for individuals' educational pursuits, and letters of thanks for her generosity (see August 11, 1903) or correspondence describing specific cases (August 6, 1903) are present in the collection. Howland's letter of January 11, 1897, illustrates how she worked her interpersonal networks towards her causes. She wrote to her colleague Mrs. Osborne, about a former African American student from Auburn, New York, Mary Williams, whom she had secured a teaching position for at the Manassas Industrial School and was now in need of someone to fund her salary. Howland noted Williams visiting her and following up on his request for Osborne's support, which is also in the collection (December 7, 1896).
Howland was heavily involved in efforts to secure women's suffrage in New York State, and letters relating to the New York State Woman Suffrage Association are included as well as those detailing efforts to advance women's suffrage during the New York State Constitutional Convention. Correspondence touches on meetings and conventions, distribution of materials, planning events and campaigns, financial concerns, and political outcomes, among other topics. Letters to Howland from various politicians indicate she was writing to them concerning their positions relating to suffrage. In a letter dated November 8, 1917, to her niece Isabel, Howland wrote about celebrating the successful vote for women's suffrage in New York, including getting their photograph taken at the Headquarters, a copy of which is present in the Photographs Series of this collection.
Howland corresponded with those working to advance women's suffrage in other states and at the national level. Her letters include those relating to Wimodaughsis, the National Council of Women of the United States, the National-American Woman Suffrage Association, among others. A November 9, 1893, telegram from Fred E. Smith from Greely, Colorado, announces it to be "the 1st State in the Union to extend Equal Suffrage to Woman," and a letter from her cousin J. H. Allen of Canon City, Colorado, answered questions Howland posed about the impact of women's suffrage in the state (November 4, 1897). Howland also reacted to the 1911 referendum in California that extended suffrage to women (October 21, 1911).
In the course of her work to advance women's suffrage, Howland amassed correspondence with many involved in the effort. The collection includes five letters from Susan B. Anthony, remarking on the tension between women's suffrage and enfranchising formerly enslaved men (February 29, 1892); the New York State Constitutional Convention (December 27, 1893); distribution of The History of Woman Suffrage, including to African American institutes and libraries (November 4, 1895); travel arrangements (April 2, 1899); and directions for sending mail (May 15, 1899). A postcard sent to Howland in August 1903 was addressed to her, care of Susan B. Anthony, suggesting how the two visited and travelled together on occasion. Other correspondents include figures like Harriet B. Laidlaw, Eliza Wright Osborne, Alice Stone Blackwell, Mariana W. Chapman, Harriet May Mills, Anna Howard Shaw, among others.
Several items reflect international efforts, including a manuscript circular letter originally written by Marie Goegg of the Association Internationale Des Femmes, dated March 1870. A June 8, 1889, letter written from Alice Stone Blackwell of the Woman's Journal to Hannah Howland refers to the upcoming Woman's Rights Congress in Paris and their openness to receiving a report on the proceedings. Anna Howard Shaw wrote to Howland on December 4, 1907, about European meetings and getting "in touch with some of the old suffragists again," and wrote from Triberg, Germany, on July 19, 1908, commenting on her international trip, her speech in London, and plans for future events in England. An undated letter from the Central Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage in London, England, notes their willingness to send Howland notice of their meetings. Other letters indicate Howland was tracking international news, like her letter dated March 28, 1898, where she noted, "progress since the time of Roman splendor & vileness is not so great as some shallow good folks may flatter themselves, with our lynchings & prisons & the condition of Cuba & Armenia the world is not in sight of the millennium & will not be soon." She elsewhere reflected on the "Philippine question" (May 25, 1902) and the suffering caused by the First World War (November 1, 1914).
Howland met and corresponded with Pandita Ramabai Sarasvati, a noted reformer from India who advocated for the rights of women, widows, and orphans, who visited the United States from 1886 to 1888. Howland wrote of meeting Ramabai and Dr. Rachel Bodley of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania on August 23, 1886, calling it a "red letter day in my calendar." Howland described Ramabai and their conversation, noting a discussion about religion and missionaries, women in India, opposition to English rule, and some references to Anandibai Joshee. Howland also wrote about introducing Ramabai to Harriet Tubman, and Ramabai inquired after Tubman and sent her regards in subsequent correspondence (December 20, 1886; October 31, 1889). Letters between Ramabai and Howland continue through 1895 and touch on women's rights publications, speaking engagements, introductions to Howland's networks, fundraising, plans for visits, and the school Ramabai ran in India. Ramabai also wrote of the death of Rachel Bodley and confusion about financial affairs, including an order under Howland's name for twenty-four copies of her book The High Caste Hindu Woman (July 27, 1888). She requested at least twice for Howland to write to her about her work with African American causes. In her letter dated January 10, 1890, Howland obliged, describing her personal history, being raised in an abolitionist house and a "station on the Underground Railroad," feeling the constraints of the "bonds of custom" of Quaker tenets, and her entry into teaching at the Miner school. Several pages are missing from her autobiographical letter.
In addition to state and national affairs, Howland appears to have stayed apprised of local politics as well. A letter from the Superintendent of the Board of Education in Auburn, New York, wrote to her on December 19, 1883, in regards to whether women could vote at school meetings. Howland's political activities are also represented in her correspondence, such as her work with the Sherwood Equal Rights Association and the Cayuga County Political Equality Club.
The lines between Howland's work with Freedmen's relief, Black education, and woman's suffrage sometimes blurred, with her letters on behalf of race-based projects written on suffrage letterhead, or correspondence with those she likely met while working on Freedmen's affairs, such as with James Inglish Ferree, touching on women's rights (June 5, 1882). On April 5, 1903, Howland wrote to Caroline Putnam about a trip she was taking in company with Susan B. Anthony to the Tuskegee Normal School and Kowaliga Academic and Industrial Institute. A letter dated February 28, 1913, from the president of the Ohio Woman Suffrage Association, Harriet Taylor Upton, asserts that "the Washington people have decided wisely in regard to the colored question," and in a letter dated May 2, 1913, Howland wrote of Anna Howard Shaw and how "she is blamed because there is no more organizing done in the South but since Southern women will exclude colored women she is not in it."
Howland remained in communication with Margaret Jones Burleigh, an abolitionist and reformer who taught Howland for a period in her youth. Burleigh connected Howland with Edward Strange, a British immigrant who had been incarcerated and whose reform Burleigh took a particular interest in. Letters in the collection reflect on their partnership in this issue, Strange's housing and eventual stay with Howland, his health, care, and diet as he lived with tuberculosis, his thoughts on religion and his personal changes, broader interest in his case, concerns for his spiritual state, and his eventual death in March 1872. Howland referred to Strange in childlike terms and admitted to a sense of motherly affection inspired by him (March 15, 1872), and compared her grief to "some bereft mothers to whom I have listened who never knew when to stop talking of the departed" (April 11, 1872). Additional items relating to Edward Strange can be found in the Documents Series (a document penned by Strange authorizing Howland to tend to his personal property), in the Writing Series (Howland's retrospective of her full encounter dated April 3, 1872), and in her Diary.
Later in her life, Emily Howland became more active in pacifist efforts. Alfred H. Love, president of the Universal Peace Union, wrote to Howland on July 8, 1909, to discuss the organization's business and publications and seek her continued support. Five undated postcards from the American Relief Administration reflect her involvement with the program during World War I, seemingly for food packages, and in a letter to Caroline F. Putnam on November 1, 1914, she lamented the consequences of World War I, including her belief in the "crime against animals" by using horses in battle.
Miscellaneous correspondence with family members and friends from the Sherwood, New York, region document Howland's everyday life. Some letters suggest her family's broader interests or awareness of what would intrigue her, such as her nephew Herbert Howland describing his visit to Jamaica, Mexico, and South America, commenting on race and armed conflicts (January 21, 1903). Howland corresponded with friends over decades, and in her later years she reflected on aging and historical memory. For example, she wrote on March 17, 1914, "I find that I must keep out of the Past, as it makes the Present so poor, and summons a yearning feeling to follow."
The Documents Series spans from 1840 to 1928, the earliest being a manuscript copy of the rules for the Nine Partners Boarding School. Other materials reflect Howland's work supporting African American education. Three items relate to Myrtilla Miner's school in Washington, D.C.: a "List of scholars during April 1858," a bill of lading for apples and butter sent to Howland while teaching there, and "Questions in history prepared & written by Mrs. Seward.... When teaching Miss Miner's school in 1858 & 9." A copy of the 1869 "Deed of Bargain & Sale" that transferred ownership of the property in Northumberland County, Virginia, from Emily Howland to Benjamin and Beverly Taliaferro, Robert Walker, and Maurice Moore is also present, with the condition that "a school shall be established and maintained thereon, wherein no person shall be excluded on account of race, color or sex."
One document signed by Edward Strange on December 11, 1871, empowers Howland to dispose of his property upon his death.
Other items pertain to the Political Equality Club, the Women's Christian Temperance Union, and the Emily Howland High School in Aurora, New York.
The Writings Series includes miscellaneous written works, such as essays, poems, drafts, speeches, and obituaries. Several of the poems are political in nature, including one reflecting on women's political positions. A poem written by W. Darwin Wooden in June 1856, consists of acrostics for Charles Sumner and Stephen A. Douglass, focusing on their political positions relative to slavery, and another undated poem by A. H. Reynolds of Auburn, New York, is entitled "Tribute to Susan B. Anthony." Others are more sentimental in nature, but at least one undated poem was copied on a fragment of a letter from Harriet May Mills, providing insight into the intermingling of Howland's literary and political worlds.
Other items in the series reflect Howland's longstanding interest in suffrage. Howland wrote a draft for a speech to the Political Equality Club of Cayuga County ca. 1897 about women voting in school meetings. Typed lyrics to the song "Help Us Win the Vote" by Deborah Knox Livingston are noted as being sung to the tune of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic." A copy of Howland's October 26, 1915, letter to the editor of the Advertiser Journal refuting an anti-suffrage address is also present, as is an undated draft of an article for the Advertiser relating to suffrage. Undated draft notes in Howland's hand for a letter to George Allen Davis, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, appeal for his support to strike the word "male" from the New York constitution.
Materials documenting Howland's efforts with educational projects are also well represented in the series. Margaret McAnulty, an African American student at Myrtilla Miner's school, wrote an essay ca. May 1858, "A visit to Aunt Nella," describing a trip Emily Howard took with students to visit their families and an older enslaved woman. This corresponds to a May 23, 1858, letter written by Howland in the Correspondence Series. Two other sheets of draft notes reflect on the history of Myrtilla Miner's school near Washington, D.C., one written on the back of a partially printed circular sent in March 1868 by Jerusha M. Skinner to former patrons of the School for Colored Deaf, Dumb and Blind Children.
Two copies of a circular appealing for financial support of the Holley School appear in Howland's hand, ca. March 23, 1901, with notes about Mr. Chadwick plagiarizing her writing. An undated essay entitled "The Story in Brief" regarding the Holley School in Lottsburg, Virginia, was possibly written by Sarah Thomas Miller.
Another undated piece provides personal opinions about higher education for African Americans and that "we must discriminate and choose the proper education for the individual."
Typescript copies include a piece entitled "A Virginia School" from the February 1899 Friends' Intelligencer regarding the history of the Heathsville school. Typescripts detailing Cornelia Hancock's work during and after the Civil War are also present, along with an envelope annotated by Howland, "A letter from Cornelia Hancock and a M.S. account of her life in the army at various places and times beginning at Gettysburg." It is unclear whether the typescripts are the contents Howland refers to or were added to the envelope at a later date. The series also contains typed and manuscript notes for commencement addresses by Emily Howland and others for the Sherwood Select School in the 1920s.
Several items in the series relate to Howland's pacifist beliefs. Between 1919 and 1924, Howland copied three of her reports for the Women's Christian Temperance Union concerning peace. These sentiments are further echoed in a ca. 1919 draft responding to anti-suffrage sentiments and advocating pacifism which was written by Howland on miscellaneous scrap paper, including letters from the First Congregational Church in Little Rock and the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, a brochure of the closing exercises of Centreville Industrial Institute, and a circular for the National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Another undated draft responds to a piece in Harper's Weekly about foreign policy and war, and is written on the verso of printed New York Woman Suffrage Association notices. Two other drafts relate to pacifism, one a resolution deploring "the present belligerent attitude of nations, & the spirit of conquest wh. everywhere prevails" and the other reflecting on how patriotism does not require "a jealous dislike of other nations & peoples." An undated draft of pacifist resolutions opposing "the present belligerent attitude of nations" is also present.
Howland wrote a 23-page retrospective, recounting her experiences with Edward Strange, a British man who had been formerly incarcerated and who spent six months ill with tuberculosis at her house, dated April 3, 1872. She described how they met, his stay with her, and the progression of his disease. She also noted the tumultuous emotions his stay caused, calling it a "whirlpool of feeling - a confusion as great as the mystery he was to me. Mystery then, mystery now and ever!"
Obituaries for Lisette M. Worden, Sarah Thomas Miller, C. de B. Mills, William Howland, and Elizabeth Jacobs are included.
The Bound Volumes Series consists of four items. The first is a handmade blank book wrapped in stenciled wallpaper, inscribed by Emily Howland, "My 1st day school book when a little girl." It includes copies of religious texts and answers to Biblical questions. One page appears to bear the name "Sidney Taliaferos," but additional research is needed to verify whether this was written by Sidney Taliaferro Boyer.
The second volume is a commonplace book kept by Emily Howland's brother, William Howland, ca. 1850s-1860s, in which he compiled quotations and proverbs and pasted in various newspaper clippings relating to recipes, remedies, legal subjects, poems, and miscellaneous topics like whining. Subjects relate to the law, politics and society, education, morality, and more. Some content is suggestive of abolitionist circles, such as quotations from the North Star and Gerrit Smith.
The third volume is Emily Howland's diary dating from January 1, 1871, to March 11, 1873, opening with Howland travelling away from home, likely in Heathsville, Virginia, and in discussion with Theodore Dow about partnering together with the school (January 11, 1871; January 31, 1871). Several entries include quotations written in dialect and Howland noted her reaction to "their strangely inspiring songs" (February 2, 1871), suggesting she was meeting with African American residents, and she recorded visiting the schoolhouse. By March 9, Howland had returned to Sherwood, and her diary entries reflect on the weather, family and social visits, local news, and her emotional state.
The diary skips from August 14, 1871, to March 27, 1872, beginning again with a brief reflection about her sadness over the death of Edward Strange ("Teddy") beginning to lift. The diary records her housekeeping tasks, attending religious services and Sunday School, reading, visits and correspondence, and remembrances of Strange and adjusting to his absence. Her entries reflect displeasure with the demands of domestic labor and a troubled emotional state. Howland expressed some dissatisfaction with the limited recognition she received for her efforts, "A good many times I've been omitted where it seemed to me I belonged, or I've had to see others reap where I had sown. How keenly H Greeley must felt this. One is not anxious to be conspicuous but one likes recognition of ones good intentions or one's services or places" (December 10, 1872).
Some content in the diary reflects Howland's ongoing interest in racial affairs, women's rights, and benevolence. At least two entries reference Native Americans (May 1, 1872; June 6, 1872), and others note making donations to Freedmen's groups (October 18, 1872; January 23, 1873), attending a festival for the Orphan Asylum (August 2, 1872), and reading material such as the Woman's Journal (January 27, 1873) and Eminent Women (July 22, 1872). Throughout the diary Howland made several mentions of Colonel Charles W. Folsom, Sidney (possibly Sidney Taliaferro Boyer), and Caroline Putnam.
The fourth volume is a minute book for the Quaker Picnic Association of Sherwood for 1894-1904. "Resolutions of Respect and Condolence, on the death of Hannah L. Howland" are laid into the volume. The volume documents meeting attendance, committees, discussions, and votes relating to the planning of the Sherwood picnics, in addition to accounts of the picnics themselves. William and Hannah Howland were especially active in the association, and several other members of the family also appear in the minutes.
The Printed Materials Series contains the following pamphlets, brochures, and programs:
A number of broadsides, circulars, and fliers are also in the series relating to topics such as Freedmen's Relief, Reconstruction, women's suffrage, the Political Equality Club, temperance, African American educational institutions, pacifism, and more. These include two "Votes for Women" broadsides featuring maps of the United States color-coded to identify suffrage status, as well as instructions on how to fill out ballots regarding suffrage questions. Oversize materials include two printed broadsides advertising lectures by Harriet May Mills, President of the New York State Woman Suffrage Association, and one printed broadside advertising a lecture by Mrs. Minnie J. Reynolds, who "lived and voted in Colorado for many years and is fairly conversant with the working of suffrage in the hands of woman. She is not one of the window smashing kind, but is noted for her intelligent and womanly methods."
The series also includes newspapers and periodicals. Full papers include editions of the Ulster County Gazette (a later reproduction of the January 4, 1800 edition), with content relating to the death of George Washington; the New-York Weekly Tribune (November 17, 1849); the National Anti-Slavery Standard (August 12, 1852); two volumes of the Evening Auburnian with articles concerning the death of James Garfield (September 20, 1881 and September 24, 1881); the Woman's Tribune (January 13, 1894); The National Bulletin (April 1892); The Peacemaker (October 1902 and April 1905); and Young People (September 23, 1933). Single sheets from an unnamed paper from 1876 reported on the "Soul Stirring Speech" of Col. R. G. Ingersoll to "the Boys in Blue" in Indianapolis about the Democratic Party, and a single sheet from the Advertiser-Journal of April 18, 1918 reports on the passage of prohibition in Auburn, New York, and women's influence in the vote.
Student periodicals include a copy of the Tuskegee Institute's The Student (February 1897); a copy of the The Industrial Student (November 1926) with an article about Emily Howland and her support of the Southern Industrial Institute in Camp Hill, Alabama; two volumes of The Intermountain Institute News (January 1928 and April 1932); and two volumes of The Pine Torch from 1940 relating to the Piney Woods School in Mississippi.
Various newspaper clippings dating between 1894 and 1965 primarily focus on local, state, and national suffragist activities, the Cayuga County Political Equality Club, profiles of Emily Howland and other women's rights activists, and reports on anti-suffrage news and opinions. Several relate to the Sherwood Select School, including a memorial for Hepisbeth C. Hussey (ca. 1908), the Tuskegee Institute, and other topics. A number of the clippings include notations of the newspaper name and date in Emily Howland's hand.
The collection contains several books including educational material, a sammelband (composite volume of multiple publications) of anti-slavery, farming, and temperance almanacs, the six-volume set of History of Woman Suffrage (inscribed by Susan B. Anthony to Isabel Howland), a Bible, and a copy of Harriet: The Moses of Her People (1901). Please see the list in the Additional Descriptive Data section for more information.
The Postcards Series consists of 76 blank postcards produced by companies and photographers like Fred Harvey, Detroit Publishing Company, Karl E. Moon & Co., among others, featuring imagery relating to Native Americans residing in the Southwestern United States, particularly New Mexico and Arizona. One postcard from the sequence can be found in the correspondence series with a postmark of August 6, 1932, suggesting the postcards were likely produced in the 1920s and 1930s. Images include artistic renderings, color printed photographs of portraits of individuals and families, scenes of everyday life and labor, artistic and cultural productions like woven blankets and pottery, buildings and pueblos, and dances and other gatherings. The bulk of the postcards represent individuals from the Hopi tribe, but other tribes and nations include the Dakota, Navajo, Apache, Pueblo, Hualapai, and Havasupai.
Two additional blank picture postcards are also included, one depicting the Sherwood Select School and the other for "Oklahoma Women Want Votes for Women. Let the People Rule Women are People," showing a woman standing at a desk.
The Photographs Series includes cartes-de-visite, tintypes, cabinet cards, a real photo postcard, a cyanotype, photographs, and reproductions, ranging in date from 1863 to the mid-twentieth century. They feature portraits of Emily Howland, women's rights activists, African American schoolrooms and students, and residences and Quaker meeting houses related to the Howland family, among others subjects. Portraits depict individuals such as Emily Howland, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Henry Ward Beecher, Pandita Ramabai Sarasvati, and Anna E. Dickinson, as well as an unidentified man seated in a wheelchair, possibly Edward Strange, a formerly incarcerated man who died of tuberculosis in Howland's home in 1872. Photos of Emily Howland include three of her in regalia, relating to her receiving her honorary doctorate in 1926 and her centennial birthday, and other photos depict her from young adulthood through older age. There is a reproduction of a photo of Emily with her father Slocum Howland, and an original snapshot of her seated with the "Brown children" in 1921. There is also one photo of an unidentified African American man standing before Howland Hall in Statesboro, Georgia.
Group photos are also present in this series. One group portrait is of the National American Woman Suffrage Association's 1891 delegates, with Susan B. Anthony, Anna Shaw, and Emily Howland present, among others. One photo shows thirteen women, a child, and a man inside a Cayuga County suffrage office, decorated with pro-suffrage posters, American flags, and Cayuga County Political Equality Club flags. Emily Howland captioned it: "Nov. 7, 1917 - 'The Morning After' - the victory of Nov. 6," commemorating the passage of woman suffrage in New York State. It may have previously been part of a scrapbook, as it is affixed to a sheet bearing a clipping from the November 11, 1917, Post-Standard newspaper from Syracuse, New York, for "Suffrage Party Leaders and Advocates."
Photographs in the collection reflect Howland's longstanding interest in African American education. Two photos depict the Holley School at Lottsburg, Virginia. One, a reproduction of an 1893 photograph of the interior of the Holley School, is accompanied by a note likely written by Isabel Howland describing a visit to the establishment with Emily Howland. It shows a Christmas tree, bookshelves, portraits, flags, and several African American students. The other is a class photo from 1907 with several rows of students and their teacher(s), with a pencil inscription on the back reading "Miss Putnam's school." A reproduction of a photo taken in 1897 depicts Howland posing in front of a machine, noted on the back as one she "presented . . . to the iron-workers" at the Tuskegee Institute, while another reproduction of a photo taken in 1908 shows a group of people, possibly African American students and residents, standing outside of the "Howland School & Buildings" in Avalon, Virginia. A reproduction of a photo of Emily Howland, two white women, and an African American man and woman is labeled "Principal of Kowaliga School, 1913." A reproduction of a photograph of Emily Howland shows her seated in a chair while wearing a floral crown and two African American girls seated on the floor on either side of her. A pencil note written by a relative identifies it as a photo taken during a visit to Manassas, describing a program in Howland's honor. One mid-twentieth-century photo of a group of African American men, women, and children gathered in a cemetery was identified by the dealer as "likely Heathsville, Virginia" but requires further research to confirm.
Other photos primarily document places. Some of these appear to have been taken or reproduced in relation to Florence W. Hazzard's research on Emily Howland and include materials depicting the interior and exterior of Howland family residences and the Sherwood Select School. Two card photographs, dated 1912 and 1914 respectively, relate to Quaker Meeting Houses. They bear inscriptions on the verso by Emily Howland describing how she attended meeting in one for forty years and how her parents were married in the other. Another card photograph is of the exterior of "Leonard Searing's former house," again with an inscription by Howland with information about individuals captured in the photo.
The Original Art Series consists of five items. An unattributed artist drew three pencil sketches on March 23, 1891, of the exterior of the Holley School at Lottsburg, Virginia, Sallie Holley's residence, and a "Virginia log cabin" with individuals, possibly of African American descent, outside the front door. An unattributed and undated watercolor painting of the "Old Hicksite Meeting House West of Scipioville" is also included, as well as a manuscript map of the western United States with pen and ink and pencil drawings on the verso of buffalo, John Brown, a murderer at the gallows, two bearded men wearing hats, and a box addressed to F. D. Kohler.
The Ephemera Series contains business cards, notices related to the Association for the Advancement of Women and the Cayuga County Political Equality Club, several invitations for Howland during her stay in London during the 1899 International Congress of Women, and a sheet of paper that was previously used to wrap a biscuit "From the Queen's table spread . . . to refresh the members of the Council who went to see her by invitation" during the Congress. A disbound portrait of Slocum Howland and a clipped portrait of Anna Howard Shaw are also present. The series includes a handheld fan encouraging New York voters to vote in favor of woman suffrage in 1917. It features a poem on one side (The rose is red / The violet's blue / We want to vote / As well as you!) and a statement to "Keep Cool and Raise A Breeze for Suffrage!" on the other. An undated bookplate for S. Clayton Sumner and a small remembrance of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton are also present.
The Research Materials Series includes approximately one linear foot of items relating to the historical study of Emily Howland, principally by historians Florence Woolsey Hazzard, Charles V. Groat, and Phebe King from the 1940s to 1970s. The series contains correspondence to Hazzard and Groat relating to their research, drafts of historical writings and biographical sketches on Howland, research bundles on various topics from Howland's life, photocopies and typescripts of original sources, and miscellaneous notecards and citations.
3.5 linear feet
77 linear feet
[NB: This is a TEMPORARY finding aid for an IN-PROCESS collection. This current scope note pertains almost entirely to Handy family papers acquisitions of the 1980s (an estimated 60-65 boxes of the total 153 boxes). Among the in-process materials are 60 boxes of scrapbooks, largely kept by Rozelle P. Handy and Sarah V. C. Handy].
The Handy Papers document the lives and professional activities of four generations of the Handy Family of Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware. The collection largely revolves around James Henry Handy (1789-1832), Isaac William Ker Handy (1815-1878), Moses Purnell Handy (1847-1898), Sarah Matthews Handy (1845-1933), Frederick Algernon Graham Handy (1842-1912), Egbert G. Handy (1858-1938), Rozelle Purnell Handy (1871-1920), Sarah V. C. Handy (1876-1963), and H. Jamison Handy "Jam Handy" (1886-1983). The Handy family were largely educated, politically active, literary southerners, who were a part of many of the social and intellectual currents of especially the mid- and late-19th century. The papers offer resources for study of the Civil War, particularly its effect on Virginia civilians and southern prisoners of war at Fort Delaware; the history of southern families; late nineteenth-century American politics; Presbyterian history; late nineteenth-century newspaper journalism; the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1892-93; and genealogy.
In its current, temporary housing (see the box listing in this finding aid), the papers include 50 boxes of correspondence, 26 boxes of family papers and topics files, six boxes of World's Columbian Exposition papers; eight boxes of photographs, plus separately housed cased images; four boxes of newspapers and newspaper clippings; 12 boxes of Jam Handy and Jam Handy Organization papers; 60 boxes of scrapbooks; and six boxes of books and serials (plus many loose books and other printed items).
The following is a former description by Curator of Manuscripts Galen Wilson, for the Handy Family Papers acquisitions of the 1980s (50-60 boxes of materials):
"Isaac Handy's fondness for history led him to the belief that he lived at an important moment in the life of the nation, and every wrinkle of the sectional crisis of the 1850s and 60s seemed to confirm. His correspondence and diaries from the eve of the war through its conclusion are a reflection of a well-educated southerner's reaction to the events unfolding about him and provide insight into the development of his political sympathies. Even after his arrest in July 1863 and his incarceration at Fort Delaware, Handy remained conscious of being part of "history in the making," not only continuing his twenty-five-year habit of keeping a diary, but in planning for a future book on Fort Delaware, soliciting memoirs of war service from his fellow prisoners. Handy saved these manuscripts, plus the correspondence he received while in prison (much of it from Confederate civilians), pasting them into two large scrapbooks. These have been disbound and the material cataloged item-by-item and interfiled chronologically in the collection's correspondence. Drafts and copies of the book which Handy wrote about his confinement, United States Bonds, are present in the collection.
Among the many individual areas of American Civil War interest are Isaac W. K. Handy's description of the battle between the ironclads Monitor and Merrimac, and the journal which Moses Handy kept during his service in the Confederate army in 1865. The soldiers' reminiscences collected by Isaac Handy at Fort Delaware include several exceptional accounts, including biographical and autobiographical sketches of M. Jeff Thompson, the mayor of St. Joseph, Missouri, turned "Swamp Rat" militia commander. Thompson played a major role during the summer of 1861 in defending Missouri's slave system from John C. Frémont's emancipation proclamation.
Other Civil War war-related materials include Isaac Handy's 1861 sermon on "Our National Sins" and fast-day sermons from the same year. The reminiscences of a myriad of former Confederate officers are scattered throughout Handy's correspondence of the late 1870s, all intended to be used in a history of the war planned by the Philadelphia Times. Also present is some documentation of Frederick A. G. Handy's father-in-law, Edwin Festus Cowherd, a Confederate soldier.
While the Handy collection provides thorough documentation of life among the eastern Handys, it also contains a significant body of correspondence from the westward sojourn of Isaac and Mary Jane Handy from 1844 to 1848. Isaac and his wife wrote over 100 letters from Missouri, in which they described the powerful ideological lure of the west, their family's adjustment to new surroundings, and the social and political climate of the old southwest. An index to these letters, prepared by Isaac Handy, is present, along with an original binding. Isaac's diary for the years spent in Missouri provides a valuable point of comparison for the letters.
Political and social commentary flows throughout most of the collection, from Jesse Higgins' campaign for reform of the federal legal and judicial systems, 1805-1806, through the fin de siècle political interests and involvements of Moses Handy.
The political impact of Reconstruction plays a major role in the collection, particularly in the letters of Congressman Samuel Jackson Randall (1828-1890) of Pennsylvania. The election of 1896 is well documented and the collection includes much correspondence with the Republican President-maker Mark Hanna. For his efforts on behalf of the Republican Party in this election, Moses Handy had hoped to net a foreign consulate through Hannah but was disappointed. Handy's transition from Confederate soldier to Republican politico is subtly documented and provides an interesting case study in political opportunism.
The Handy Family Papers are an important resource for the history of the Presbyterian Church during the 19th century. The 2nd Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., was a major focus of James Henry Handy's life, and the early history of this congregation is well documented in correspondence dating from the 1820s. Rev. Daniel Baker was the first pastor of the congregation, and although Baker's tenure was controversial, James remained a close friend of Baker's for the rest of their lives. The collection thus contains items concerning Baker and his relationship with the 2nd Church, and several letters written by him after he left to assume a pastorate in Savannah, Georgia.
Isaac Handy's vocation as a Presbyterian minister and his avocation as an historical researcher merge in this collection, deepening the documentation of the church. Perhaps spurred by being asked to contribute some biographical sketches to William B. Sprague's Annals of the American Pulpit, Handy sought out primary documents relating to the colonial Presbyterian clergy and congregations. Aspects of his own career in the church is documented through a scattered series of letters from former parishioners--many of which were received during his imprisonment at Fort Delaware--and in letters written by Isaac to his sons. A thick file of Isaac's sermons is present, several of which were published. Among these sermons is "The Terrible Doings of God" (23:31), which concerns the Yellow Fever Epidemic near Portsmouth, Virginia, in 1855. He delivered this eulogy at a Baptist church for members of several different Portsmouth churches. Handy earned acclaim during the crisis by staying to help the victims rather than fleeing to safer ground.
Isaac Handy's literary flair was inherited by Frederick and Moses, and both pursued careers in newspapers. Moses' career is more thoroughly documented than Frederick's, and much of the correspondence written between 1869 and 1890 concerns Moses' efforts in the newspaper business. There are several folders of general newspaper correspondence dating from 1865 to 1897, an entire box of unsorted clippings by and about the Handys, and boxes of mounted clippings of Moses, Sarah, and Rozelle Handy's published writings. Journalistic endeavors of other family members are also present.
One of Moses Handy's greatest claims to fame was his role as chair of Department O (Publicity and Promotion) for the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1893. His involvement with the Exposition is documented in correspondence, reports, financial papers, brochures, photographs, and memorabilia. The advertising campaign begun in 1890 has been cited as the prototype of modern publicity strategies, and the Handy Papers offer an unparalleled view into the inner workings of the key department. The collection also contains information about the San Francisco Mid-Winter Exposition (1893), a sort of subsidiary event to the main Chicago attraction, and the general correspondence for 1891-93 contains some references to the World's Fair.
Isaac Handy's lifelong ambition was to publish "The Annals and Memorials of the Handys and their Kindred." Beginning in the 1850s, he gathered genealogical data on all descendants of "Samuel Handy, the Progenitor," an Englishman who emigrated to Maryland to farm tobacco. Three drafts of this work, in increasing thickness, were completed in 1857, 1865, and the 1870s. Isaac was prepared to publish the work in the 1870s and had an advertising flier printed, but when subscriptions did not meet expectations and Handy died in 1878, the project foundered. The manuscript then passed to Moses Handy, whose own intentions for publishing the book never reached fruition, possibly due to his untimely death at the age of fifty. In 1904, Isaac's youngest surviving son, Egbert, acquired the manuscript from Moses's widow, Sarah Matthews Handy, but his publication plans did not gather momentum until 1932.
With a great deal of vigor, Egbert attempted to update the manuscript, now sixty years out of date, and had a new advertising circular printed. Again, death removed the Annals' main advocate. The manuscript remained in the possession of Egbert's widow, Minerva Spencer Handy, and in the 1940s she gave it to Frederick A. G. Handy's widow, Lelia Cowherd Handy, then living in Arlington, Virginia. Before her death in 1949, Leila entrusted the material to her granddaughter Mildred Ritchie. The Clements Library acquired the manuscript from Mrs. Ritchie along with other family papers. A century and a third after Isaac began the project, the Annals were published by the Clements Library in 1992. The Handy Family Papers contain various drafts of the manuscript, plus many notes and letters concerning its publication."
[NB: This is a TEMPORARY finding aid for an IN-PROCESS collection. This current scope note pertains almost entirely to Handy family papers acquisitions of the 1980s (an estimated 60-65 boxes of the total 153 boxes). Among the in-process materials are 60 boxes of scrapbooks, largely kept by Rozelle P. Handy and Sarah V. C. Handy].
77 linear feet
Current results range from 1670 to 1980