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The Albert Davis papers contain letters written by Civil War soldier Albert Davis, of the 15th Massachusetts Regiment, Co. G. Davis described his regiment's roles in the battles of Ball’s Bluff, White Oak Swamp, Gettysburg, Bristoe Station, Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, and Petersburg.

The Albert Davis papers consist of 97 letters written by Civil War soldier Albert Davis of the 15th Massachusetts Regiment, Co. G, 3 letters written by his friends and family, one allotment receipt, his military discharge papers, and a photo of Albert Davis.

Albert Davis wrote letters while stationed with the Union army in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, between August 1861 and June 1864. Of the letters, Davis sent 83 to his widowed mother and 14 to his teenage sister, Angeline, both living in Upton, Massachusetts. The collection also holds one letter from Albert's mother to his sister (June 30, 1864), a letter from R. W. Ellis to Angeline Leland Davis (March 5, 1864), and a letter from W. I. Scandlin to Albert Davis (July 2, 1874).

Albert's letters document his participation as a soldier in the 15th Massachusetts Regiment from the beginning of the regiment’s formation in July 1861, until its dissolution after the battle of Petersburg (June 22, 1864), when all but eight men and one officer were killed or captured. In the early letters, Davis described his initial training near Worcester, Massachusetts. At first, he enjoyed soldiering, and sent home souvenirs: a piece of wood from the Harper's Ferry Bridge (October 6, 1861), and a piece of cotton from the breastworks at Yorktown (May 24, 1862). He wrote of snowballing a barge while on picket duty (January 4, 1862), and of picking wild blackberries during the fighting at Malvern Hills (August 2, 1862). Upon seeing the Monitor anchored among other boats at Hampton, Virginia, he wrote "it dont look as though it could take a Canal boat" (April 2, 1862). Many of his letters mentioned food, either what he was eating or what he would like to receive from home (cheese, tea, molasses, catsup, preserves, baked goods, chocolate, and checkerberry extract). On August 2, 1862, he sent a recipe for pudding made from hardtack. By December 1863, his feelings about soldiering had changed and he became determined not to reenlist. He was irritated by the "bounty men" who fought for money rather than patriotism (March 9, 1863; August 6, 1863). He witnessed several military executions (September 4, 1863; April 26, 1864). Davis also described his six months spent in hospitals and convalescent camps, and his part in the battles of Antietam, Cold Harbor, Gettysburg, and Bristoe Station.

His letters describing the Battle of Gettysburg are of particular interest not just for their accounts of the battle (July 4, 17, and 27, 1863), but also for his corrections of inaccuracies in the newspaper coverage of the battle (August 13 and 21, 1863). On May 14, 1864, Davis wrote from "mud hole near Spotsylvania Court House" and stated that the battle was "the hardest fight of the War." A few weeks later, on June 6, 1864, he wrote from the battlefield at Cold Harbor that "we are about sick of making Charges [--] we are not successful in one half of them and the loss on the retreat is great...there is some wounded men that are a lying between the lines that have laid there for three days and have not had a bit of care perhaps not a drop of water."

• October 22, 1861
• October 29, 1861
• November 6, 1861
• November 16, 1861
• November 17, 1861
• November 26, 1861
• May 6, 1862
• November 2, [1862]

The Bigelow-Monks correspondence contains correspondence from several soldiers serving in the Union Army during the Civil War, as well as a series of letters written by Charles A. Monks to his wife Susannah, when he was staying in Gibbon, Nebraska, in 1871.

The Bigelow-Monks correspondence contains correspondence from several soldiers serving in the Union Army during the Civil War, as well as a series of letters written by Charles A. Monks to his wife Susannah, when he was in Gibbon, Nebraska. Much of the collection consists of the war-era correspondence of several soldiers to Susannah Bigelow and to the Monks family, from friends and family members. Several of Susannah's friends wrote throughout the war, and described in detail their experiences in camp, on the battlefield, and in the hospital. Corporal Jeremiah P. Williams of the 57th New York Infantry Regiment wrote early of his optimism for the Union effort; he drew a patriotic picture of an eagle holding the shield of the United States in his letter of January 23, 1862; he also discussed his impressions of the battle site of First Bull Run at Manassas, Virginia. Lewis Turner, a soldier in the 15th New Jersey Infantry Regiment, served with Charles A. Monks in Company C, and frequently told Susannah of his experiences, including a detailed description of the Battle of Fredericksburg (May 28, 1863). Turner was wounded in the Spotsylvania campaign, but later returned to his regiment. Beverly Post of the 7th New York Heavy Artillery Regiment became a frequent correspondent later in the war, as did his brother Jerry, who often discussed his experiences recuperating from a wound at Stanton Hospital in Washington, D. C. The Posts often referred to Susannah's brother Jonathan, and alluded to his status as a prisoner of war in early 1865.

The collection holds a large number of items written by Charles A. and Sidney N. Monks to their sister Jarrett and to their father William. The pair described the details of camp life during the defense of Washington, D. C., early in the war, but their later correspondence reflects their increasing involvement in the fighting; Charles wrote at one point that he was lucky to have only a bullet through his clothing. Both brothers detailed their battlefield experiences, and both participated in the Battle of Gettysburg. Sidney mentioned enclosing a ring taken from a dead Confederate soldier in his letter of August 15, 1863, and Charles twice provided detailed descriptions of the fighting, in his letters of July 6, 1863, and July 17, 1863. In the second letter, he drew a small map of the Confederate lines. Each of the soldiers provided a rich view of army life, and several wrote on illustrated Union stationery.

A series of letters from 1871 pertains to the experiences of Charles A. Monks as he headed to Gibbon, Nebraska, to assess the possibility of starting a farm there under the Homestead Act. In his letters to his wife Susannah, who remained in New Jersey, he provided detailed descriptions of people, scenery, and everyday life out west. He liked his neighbors and Nebraska, but he returned to his New Jersey home in October 1871.

Daniel B. Hutchins was raised in Wayne County, N.Y., and worked as a school teacher prior to the outbreak of the Civil War. In 1864, Hutchins was enrolled as a sergeant in the 111th New York Infantry, serving in eastern Virginia. In two pocket diaries, covering the years 1864 and 1866, Hutchins recorded his singularly awful experiences as he was transported through a succession of Confederate prison camps, including Libby, Andersonville, Charleston, S.C., and Florence.

The Daniel B. Hutchins collection consists of two pocket diaries, covering the years 1864 and 1866. In 1864, Hutchins was enrolled as a sergeant in the 111th New York Infantry, serving in eastern Virginia. After his capture at the Battle of Spotsylvania on May 10, his journal records his singularly awful experiences as he was transported through a succession of Confederate prison camps, including Libby, Andersonville, Charleston, S.C., and Florence. Hutchins' entries throughout the year are quite brief, due partly to the constraints imposed by the size of the diary page, and partly by exhaustion. These entries, though, are highly literate, with frequent literary touches and pithy quotes, and they include several allusions to his life prior to his imprisonment.

The heart of this diary is the five months in which he is imprisoned at Andersonville. From the moment of his arrival, Hutchins considered the conditions at the prison severe and inhumane, suggesting that "the treatments of State's Prison would be far preferable to this," adding, "The fiery elements of hell would be to[o] good for men that would treat a brute in this way" (1864 June 4). His writing is impassioned, and he carefully includes important details on the amount of food, living conditions, relations with other prisoners and guards, and morale.

The 1866 journal includes some retrospective commentary on his prison experiences, but is consumed more with Hutchins' search and discovery of a suitable university at which to study.

The Bridgman "autobiography" consists of a typescript of a long series of letters sent by Edward P. Bridgman to a cousin, which form a continuous, sometimes rambling narrative of Bridgman's life from the time he travelled to Kansas in 1856 through the end of the Civil War.

The Bridgman "autobiography" consists of a typescript of a long series of letters sent by Edward P. Bridgman to a cousin (?), Sidney, between June 10th, 1894 and April 9th, 1895. The letters were transcribed by another relative, Frank, and form a continuous, sometimes rambling narrative of Bridgman's life from the time he traveled to Kansas in 1856 through the end of the Civil War.

Written retrospectively, almost 30 years after the end of the war, many of the details of Bridgman's service have been lost, yet he manages to display a strong, if somewhat selective memory for anecdotes and for the emotions of the events that remained in his dreams for so many years. "As I look over some of my army letters," he wrote, "and Bowen's history [of the regiment], march after march and camp after camp are an utter blank to me. But the terrible battle scenes are stamped vividly in my recollection; they can never be forgotten" (p. 42). A fine writer with a gentle sense of humor, Bridgman's letters offer an interesting insight into the way that selective memory and time shaped veterans' experiences of the Civil War. The battles, numerous as they were, form the focus of the narrative, but the suffering faces of the dead and wounded and the small pranks he played assume almost equal prominence.

Bridgman's descriptions of the battles in which he was engaged tend to be somewhat generalized, but the emotional impact of these events clearly remained strong with him. His descriptions of the costly capture of Marye's Heights during the Chancellorsville Campaign, of the battle of Chancellorsville itself, and of the Wilderness and Spotsylvania Campaigns are noteworthy. Always, his letters make for engrossing reading, whether he is writing about wormy hardtack, lice, making beds, drinking tainted water from the mouth of a dead mule, or doing battle. Because he served intermittently, unofficially, as a nurse and surgeon for his regiment, Bridgman also provides several brief, but powerful accounts of medical care, the wounded and the dead.

This collection consists of correspondence and visual material related to Edwin O. Conklin, 1st Sgt., of the 1st Regiment Michigan Volunteer Sharpshooters. It also includes one typescript volume entitled, The Civil War Letters of Edwin Orville Conklin. Conklin described his encampment at Camp Chandler, located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, service as a guard at the prisoner of war Camp Douglas, the Battle of the Wilderness, the Richmond-Petersburg campaign, and his capture at the Battle of the Crater. Conklin's letters contain reflections and observations on camp conditions, African-American soldiers, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Conklin's imprisonment at the Danville prisoner of war camp.

This collection consists of correspondence and visual material related to Edwin O. Conklin, 1st Sgt., of the 1st Regiment Michigan Volunteer Sharpshooters. It also includes one typescript volume entitled, The Civil War Letters of Edwin Orville Conklin. Conklin described his encampment at Camp Chandler, located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, service as a guard at the prisoner of war Camp Douglas, the Battle of the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, Cold Harbor, the Richmond-Petersburg campaign, and his capture at the Battle of the Crater.

Conklin's letters contain reflections and observations on camp life, food, marches, drill, cowardly officers, and recruiting in Michigan. At Camp Douglas, Chicago, 1863-early 1864, Conklin wrote about prison breaks, murder, camp conditions, invalid corps, and other subjects. In the summer of 1864, he provided his recipients with descriptions of areas around Annapolis; Washington, D.C.; Richmond; and Petersburg. After his capture, he wrote from the Danville POW camp.

Additional content includes brief remarks on African-American soldiers, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, Ambrose Burnside, and others.

This collection contains a diary chronicling Hiram W. Coppernall's service in the 24th New York Cavalry Regiment throughout 1864, as well as a photograph. Coppernall recorded his daily movements and activities with the regiment, which saw action at the Battle of Petersburg.

The Hiram W. Coppernall collection pertains to his service in the 24th New York Cavalry Regiment, Company H, during the Civil War. Throughout 1864, he kept a diary (120 pages), which concerns his military training, his unit's marches through Virginia, his participation in the Battle of Petersburg, and his affliction with severe sunstroke. He began writing shortly after his enlistment, and a woman named "Eliza" contributed some early entries in which she apologized for intruding and encouraged Coppernall to remember and write to her. After training and performing police duty in Washington, D.C., the regiment left for Virginia in late April. On May 7, they constructed a breastwork, and on May 18-19 they traveled to Spotsylvania Court House. Coppernall occasionally reported on military engagements that often ended in Union defeats. On June 18, he participated in an assault on Petersburg, Virginia, and on July 30 he mentioned a tunnel explosion and the resulting Battle of the Crater. He wrote less frequently after August 6, when he suffered from severe sunstroke, and he spent much of the rest of the year recuperating and on furlough in New York. He rejoined his regiment in December. In addition to Coppernall's diary entries, the volume has a list of men in his regiment and financial accounts, which include a list of the clothing he received from the United States government for his military service. The diary is accompanied by a carte-de-visite photograph of Coppernall and a framed photograph of two Union cavalry officers, with the message "Same here" (1864).

The Isaac Oliver Best manuscripts are post-war reminiscences that combine personal experience, anecdotes, and secondary source information in relating the critical campaigns of the Union Army in the spring and summer of 1864.

The Isaac Best manuscripts were prepared in the 1880s or 1890s for the veterans organizations of the 16th and 121st New York Infantry Regiments. These include three extended essays, "Sheridan in the Shenandoah" (F6:1a), "The Siege and Capture of Petersburg" (F6.1b), and "Through the Wilderness with Grant" (F6.1c).

These essays are clearly-written post-war reminiscences in the grand old style of the Grand Army of the Republic, and contain both personal, anecdotal information about the incidents gathered first-hand, and information undoubtedly gathered from secondary sources. They focus on the critical campaigns of the spring and summer of 1864, after the arrival of Ulysses S. Grant both bathed the soldiers in blood and revitalized the hopes of the Army of the Potomac.

"Sheridan in the Shenandoah" includes a rapid, second-hand narrative of the struggle for the Valley in 1862 and 1863, and Best's personal recollections of the fall campaign of 1864. Particularly noteworthy are his accounts of the 3rd Battle of Winchester and Fisher's Hill, and a very detailed account of Cedar Creek. As an aside, Best comments that the importance of "Sheridan's Ride" has been much overplayed, and argues that much of VI Corps was not in flight and had never been broken at all. While he reserves praise for Sheridan, he argues that the emphasis on the importance of the ride robbed Gen. Horatio Wright of his due. Best also offers his analysis on the role of morale in shoring up the efforts of the armies.

"The Siege and Capture of Petersburg" is an attempt at a comprehensive retelling of the major events of the siege of Petersburg from the end of the Battle of Cold Harbor through the end of the war. Best witnessed the long, drawn-out battles in front of Petersburg during the summer of 1864, including the disaster at the Crater, and the several attempts to circumvent the Confederate defenses during the following winter. In 1865, it appears that Best was assigned to Sheridan's command during his final raid into Northern Virginia.

The essay "Through the Wilderness with Grant" includes detailed accounts of the Battle of the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, North Anna River, and Cold Harbor, nearly all written from Best's recollections, including seeing several close friends killed. The end of the essay includes a generally positive appraisal of Grant's strategy.

The Jayne papers contain letters from Samuel Ferguson Jayne, during his service as a relief agent with the U.S. Sanitary Commission, to his fiancée Charlotte Elizabeth Jayne in the summer of 1864. He described his work at the U.S. Colored Hospital at City Point, Virginia, treating wounded soldiers from the battles at Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, and the Battle of the Crater (Petersburg).

The Jayne papers consist of 17 letters from Samuel Ferguson Jayne, during his service as a relief agent with the U.S. Sanitary Commission, to his fiancée Charlotte Elizabeth Jayne in the summer of 1864. The letters, dated May 22-August 19, 1864, track his travels on the Mary Rapley steamboat and document his efforts at the U.S. Colored Hospital at City Point, Virginia. They discuss the numerous wounded soldiers coming from battles at Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, and the Battle of the Crater (Petersburg), and include vivid details on the treatment of the men and the facilities of the hospitals. Jayne often notes the difficulties of getting the Union doctors to treat black troops. He wrote, "We have had to almost fight the doctors to get them to treat the colored men decently and to find them proper attention. When we came here most of the men were without beds. Now we have them upon, not only beds, but every man has also an iron bedstead, entirely covered by mosquito netting" (July 12). On August 9th, Jayne wrote that "There are very few agents here, who are adapted to such 'low' work as that of taking care of sick negroes" (August 9).

Jayne described in depth the types of wounds and afflictions the solders suffered. On August 4, he wrote "we are overcome with sick and wounded...I have found many who fought hand to hand with rebels, as their wounds are those made by the butts of muskets or clubs...We have twelve men digging graves today for our hospital alone." In a letter dated April 9th, he described a "terrible explosion" of an ammunition boat at City Point, Virginia, and its aftermath. Though the letters contain many details on his work managing the sick in the hospitals, they also include expressions of love for Charlotte, who Samuel was "compelled to write" in order "to keep [his] wits straight" (August 9, 1864). Jayne also commented on political and ethical issues of the war. For example, in the letter from August 19, 1864, he questioned the morality of paying black soldiers to fight in place of a drafted white soldier:

"I do not think it would be exactly fair to obtain a negro for a substitute. In the first place, in all modesty, they do not make as good soldiers as the whites, and at the present crisis of affairs, from all that I can learn from observation and report, one white man, even as insignificant as myself, is equal to two negroes for war purposes. Then, the negro fights under great disadvantages. If taken prisoner he is either murdered or sold into slavery--and I think that a government that permits its soldiers to be thus dealt with, without retaliating upon the enemy ought to go to perdition, or at least to a strongly seasoned purgatory. I would not ask a man to go as my substitute who would be murdered in cold blood because he was not of my race and color. Until we can procure the African some rights of civilized warfare, let the Anglo Saxon fight his own battles."

Jayne drew several sketches and commented on them. Of note is a picture of a ground plan of the U.S. Colored hospital, City Point, Virginia camp, annotated with the functions of many individual tents. It includes the positions of hospitals for the 5th, 6th, and 9th Corps. This plan accompanies the letter from July 15, 1864, in which Jayne provided additional details of the hospital camp.

• "Our pet lamb Molly," City Point Virginia, a pencil sketch of a young Black woman sitting in front of shelves of supplies (July 26, 1864).
• "Special Diet," a barefoot black man walking past army tents holding a mug and plate of fish (August 10, 1864).
• "For this are we Doctors," a black soldier with a bloody amputated arm (August 10, 1864).
• "Lizzie," a profile of a black woman sitting on a crate with her hands to her head (August 10, 1864).
• "Hospital bed" on the back: "This is a drawing of our hospital beds, with mosque-to netting. Made by Roberts, S. "(August 19, 1864).

The Lewis Simonds journal contains brief daily entries by Simonds, a baritone horn player with the band of the 1st Brigade, 2nd Division, 9th Army Corps for 1864. Included are brief descriptions of the battles of the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor, and the Siege of Petersburg, as well as accounts of rehearsing and practicing music with the band.

The Lewis Simonds journal contains brief entries, written almost daily and covering January 14-October 6, 1864, while Simonds was stationed in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia with the band of the 1st Brigade, 2nd Division, 9th Army Corps. Early entries describe Simonds' daily life while at Camp Nelson in Jessamine County, Kentucky. He had a great deal of free time; the activities he recorded primarily consisted of reading, writing, "playing B[ack]gammon" (January 28, 1864), and rehearsing with the band. He also noted weather conditions, illnesses among his brigade, and other scattered activities.

Simonds frequently mentioned his musical pursuits and band-mates. In addition to fastidiously documenting his rehearsals, he wrote that the band performed at such occasions as a funeral (January 19, 1864), a dress parade (April 15, 1864), an inspection (August 14, 1864), and a flag raising (January 23, 1864). He also recorded the times when band members received new instruments or repaired existing ones. However, he did not provide the names of songs played.

He also wrote tersely about several battles, though as a band member, he frequently experienced them from a distance. On the Battle of the Wilderness, he wrote, "our Division got engaged.… Rebles broke our right line at six in evening we had to skedaddle…" (May 6, 1864). He also briefly described fighting at the Battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse and noted that he helped pitch several hospital tents for the wounded (May 19, 1864). At the Battle of Cold Harbor, Simonds reported that "the Brigade went into the rifle pits," adding "the Band fell back to the teams as usual" (June 4, 1864). The brigade also experienced a great deal of fighting during the Siege of Petersburg, beginning in mid-June 1864, which he documented repeatedly as "heavy firing," without further comment. Although the diary does not provide much detail on military engagements, it sheds light on the daily life of an Army musician and many aspects of his service.

The diaries of Nathan Webb include vivid descriptions of life in one of the most active Union cavalry regiments, the 1st Maine, during the Civil War. Webb's thoughtfulness, candor, and his insight into the minds of soldiers and civilians make his diary a rich resource for the study of the social and military history of the Civil War.

The strengths of Webb's diaries are his ability as a writer and his willingness to describe important incidents at great length. His descriptions range widely in content, but are always thoughtful, and he has a flawless aptitude for an anecdote. He seems particularly to have been interested in the attitudes of his fellow soldiers and of local civilians, particularly the women, but he comments extensively on daily life in the camps, strategy, officers, drilling, ethics in the army, and his feelings, positive and negative, towards those who remained in Maine. Webb's careful and detailed descriptions of every battle and skirmish in which he was involved include everything from vignettes relating an individual soldier's reactions, to specific information on the tactics and strategy of cavalry. But it is the incidents he records about day to day life that provide the greatest insight into the soldiers' minds, and Webb is both uncommonly detailed for a Civil War diarist and allows his personal opinions and perspective to dominate his descriptions. His description of Belle Isle is extraordinary in the intensity of detail and emotional impact.

These five volumes are copies from the original diaries, and were made by Webb in the late spring and summer of 1865. He notes that, with the exception of some additions made from memory to his descriptions of Libby and Belle Isle Prisons, he has copied the diary exactly as it appears in the original. Offering an interesting balance to the original, he includes occasional footnotes offering retrospective commentary on his own writing. For example, while in 1862 he wrote that the men were upset at the dismissal of McClellan, a footnote indicates that in 1865, Webb came to feel that the men had been deluded by McClellan's self-aggrandizing play for their affection. His later comments on his own vacillation while deciding whether to reenlist, on the opinions of the media and non-combatants regarding the war, and on his opinions of Meade and other leaders also include some revealing reflections.

The first fifty pages of volume 3 are severely damp-stained and written in faint ink, and in parts are very difficult to read. Included with the diaries are an 1878 receipt for the payment of poll tax in Boston and one issue and two supplements of the First Maine Bugle (Campaign II, call 3, 5 and 9), dated January and July, 1891, and July, 1892. The Bugle was the publication of the veterans' organization for the 1st Maine Cavalry. A war-time photograph of Webb was included in Tobie's regimental history.