Search

Henry Jackson McCord (1827-1917) was a California Forty-Niner who later fought in the Civil War with the 111th Ohio Volunteers, 1862-1865. His journals include two diaries describing his trip to California in 1849, a diary describing a return trip from San Francisco in 1853, and a duty roster from 1864.

The journals of Henry Jackson McCord include two diaries describing his trip to California in 1850, a diary describing a return trip from San Francisco in 1853, and a duty roster from 1864. The first, a diary and commonplace book, contains a few sketchy notes about the trip to California, some quotations, accounts, and lists of names. A second journal is a long account of McCord's voyage to California in the brig Orleans, in which he writes daily descriptions, and later account entries. The third journal has entries for the return trip from California by ship, but it is much shorter than the journal he kept on the outgoing voyage. A final journal contains accounts and duty rosters for 1864, during McCord's service with the 111th Ohio Volunteers in the Civil War.

In 1859 M. E. Mann traveled to California to take a teaching position in Merced County. Her letters detail her travel experiences, teaching career, and impressions of gold-rush era California.

The Mann papers consist of five letters written by M. E. Mann to a close friend from Milton, Fla., Miriam Leigh. The first two were written during June, 1859, while Mrs. Mann and Amanda were traveling to California. These letters, provide brief descriptions of New Orleans (a disagreeable "Babel") and Havana (where she was terrified of catching yellow fever), some brief commentary on the trip and Mann's expectations for her life in California, and some interesting opinions on her fellow travelers, who, she wrote, included "every grade... from the free Negro & gross Irish woman, to the young & timid bride."

The other letters in the collection are longer and somewhat more detailed accounts of her new life and her attitudes toward her profession in Merced County. Mrs. Mann was simultaneously bemused and put off by the rough edges of life in male-dominated California, but she enjoyed the independence of being a teacher and the relatively equitable division of domestic labor. Mrs. Mann's letters, though brief and containing few specifics on her teaching, provide some interesting insight into gender relations and social life in the maturing gold regions of California.