Collections

Battle Creek (Michigan) resident, U.S. Railway Postal Service employee, and Spanish-American War veteran. Includes portraits, one of which shows Peters in military uniform.

The collection includes portraits, one of which shows Peters in military uniform.

The Charles Goore letter book contains letters, dated March 1774 to January 1783, from a prosperous Liverpool merchant to other English merchants, members of Parliament, British naval officers, customers, and friends. These letters touch on various aspects of Atlantic trade, including the detrimental effects of the American Revolutionary War on British commerce, whaling ventures off Greenland, and the trade in tobacco, hemp, flag stones, and ironware.

The Charles Goore letter book (170 pages) contains copies of 295 letters from Goore to other English merchants, members of Parliament, British naval officers, customers, and friends. These letters, dated March 1774 to January 1783, touch on various aspects of trade, including the detrimental effects of the American Revolution on the tobacco trade, his whaling ventures off Greenland, and trading interests in hemp, flag stones, and ironware. Goore discussed difficulties with war ships, effects of the Revolution on prices and trade, the practice of impressment of seamen, and news from the American colonies. He also described the effects of privateering on trade, the slave trade, and technical matters relating to navigation. Several letters concern helping friends who were hurt by the upheaval in America. For instance, he tried to place seamen, formerly in his employment, in the British navy. This letter book provides an interesting perspective of the British side of the Revolution and particularly English merchants' reactions to the conflict.

While the collection primarily consists of business, legal, and political papers, Goore occasionally related information about his family. Of particular interest are 6 letters related to Goore's niece, Jenny Tatlock, whom he placed as an apprentice to Mrs. Ann Carus (pages 15, 19, 28, 93, 144). Goore wrote two stern letters to his niece Ellen Tatlock, who often begged for money because her husband was in prison (pages 82, 97). Goore also wrote to his niece Jenny, advising her not to marry an apprentice painter because she would end up supporting him (page 162). Several letters document Goore's business relationships with women, and a few letters are condolences to widows of his employees.

• January 25, 1775: describing a crowd in a coffee house waiting to hear the "resolves of Parliament relative to American affairs..."
• June 13, 1775: revealing his opinions on the tense relationship between Great Britain and the American colonies: "The ax is laid to the root of the tree & it must be cut down or adieu to the colonies. God grant such measures may be taken that his Majesty may bring the Americans to become dutiful subjects."
• February 5, 1776: describing his early career in the tobacco trade and the effects of the Revolution on Atlantic trading.
• November 28, 1776: offering news of the war in America concerning generals Burgoyne and Howe.
• March 14, 1778: reprimanding a neighbor for physically abusing his wife.

This collection is made up of four letters from sugar planter and cattle farmer Charles Gordon Gray of Fairfield, St. James, Jamaica, to his father Charles Gordon Gray, Sr., at Stratton House in Somersetshire. The Gray family had three plantations in St. James, Jamaica, including Virgin Valley, Prospect, and Fairfield. The younger Charles Gray provided his father with updates on the status of crops and rum production, shipments of sugar, financial and legal matters, enslaved laborers and a mention of the potential for revolt, and the handling of Prospect Pen land.

This collection is made up of four letters from sugar planter and cattle farmer Charles Gordon Gray of Fairfield, St. James, Jamaica, to his father Charles Gordon Gray, Sr., at Stratton House in Somersetshire. The Gray family had three plantations on Jamaica, including Virgin Valley, Prospect Pen, and Fairfield. The younger Charles Gray provided his father with updates on the status of crops and rum production, shipments of sugar, financial and legal matters, enslaved laborers and a mention of the potential for revolt, and the handling of Prospect Pen land.

See the box and folder listing below for details about the contents of each letter.

Professor of chemistry and vice president for research at University of Michigan. Includes alphabetical files, 1957-1983, containing correspondence, lectures and speeches, and other materials relating to his career and associations as a chemist; also professional files created since leaving his position as University of Michigan Vice President for Research.

The papers of Dr. Charles G. Overberger are comprised of three series, Topical Files, Post Vice President of Research Activities, and Biographical Materials. These papers document his work as a professor, researcher, consultant, and expert in polymer chemistry, his administrative duties at the University of Michigan, and his career overall. The papers were originally filed and arranged by his various office assistants over the years and because of this constant attention to detail, have been preserved in the manner in which they arrived.

A civil engineer for the Austin Company in Cleveland, Ohio, who worked in the Soviet Union in 1929. Photographs and a journal documenting Palmer's work on an auto plant construction site near Nizhnii Novgorod. Also, an Alaska travel journal dated 1897.

The bulk of the collection documents Palmer's work and travel in the USSR. Over 100 photographs- many annotated on verso- depict projects in progress, work sites and workers, and other scenes related to the Avtostroi plant construction. Also, views of Monastyrka, Kostroma, Ples, and other towns along Volga, as well as Moscow.

A black "Record" volume includes Palmer's journal dated September-November 1929 with entries about work and work methods, as well as people, places, and local culture. In addition, the journal includes entries about Palmer's trip to the industrial cities of Sverdlovsk, Cheliabinsk, and Kharkiv; and his travels through Warsaw, Berlin, and Amsterdam on his way back home. The volume also contains Palmer's job-related drawings and notes. Topics include materials description, materials acquisition and movement, job requirements, labor, cost estimations, production procedures, equipment construction, and a report on gravel pits in Nizhnii Novgorod, dated 1930.

Correspondence and documents related to Vaux's support of the colonists in the Revolutionary War, his business interests, and his efforts to relocate to Canada.

The Charles Grant, vicomte de Vaux papers are composed of 8 unbound letters and 2 volumes containing correspondence, notes, and other writings. A total of 32 items that had been laid into the front of the volumes have been removed to their own folders.

The Unbound Correspondence series contains letters spanning May 8, 1778, to April 26, 1779, and primarily concerns Vaux's activities during the American Revolution, including his attempt to send aid to the colonies on the ship Comtesse de Brionne (May 8, 1778). A letter from June 1778 pertains to permission obtained from congress to arm a ship. Several other letters deal with Vaux's naval pursuits and contain news of the trans-Atlantic shipping business.

The Bound Volumes and Removed Items series contains two bound volumes of manuscripts, as well as the loose documents originally laid into the volumes, now arranged chronologically into folders. Materials in the series span approximately 1756-1805, though much of the material is undated.

Volume 1 contains correspondence, drafts, and documents, primarily dating from the period during which Vaux resided in Great Britain to escape the French Revolution. The items relate mainly to Vaux's attempts to organize a military regiment and to his efforts to settle in Canada. One undated document, entitled "State of the case of Charles Grant Viscount de Vaux in Great Britain," documents Vaux's life and history, and relates to his ancestry, birth, exile from France, attempts to build a military career in Britain, and literary works ([n.d.]; Folder 2). Vaux and his supporters' attempts to secure a military post or some other means for him to settle in Canada are a constant theme throughout. Also of interest are several letters that contain information on Vaux's son, Romain Grant, who remained in France when Vaux fled and was arrested attempting to travel to London without a passport (pp. 17-21).

Volume 2 primarily contains essays related to travel and notes on regions outside of France, such as Mauritius and the Americas. Included is a journal titled "Journal du voyage de Louis-Charles Grant de Vaux . . . lorsqu'il revenoit de l'isle Maurice en France en 1758" (Travel Journal of Louis-Charles Grant de Vaux. . .when returning from the island Mauritius in France in 1758). The journal begins on page 73 of the volume. Also included is the essay "Amerique ou Nouveau Monde," which contains an account of the history of the Americas from its discovery by Columbus in 1492, with descriptions of different regions such as Virginia, California, Nantucket, and the West Indies (begins on p. 25). The loose items include letters and notes related to the American Revolution and Canadian settlement. Of particular interest is "Memoire au congrés ameriquain," a draft of a letter to the American Congress describing vessels Vaux lost off the coast of America during the Revolution, and asking for some land in Ohio and Connecticut as recompense for his losses (1782).

This collection contains 6 diaries that Charles Grimké Cosslett, a student in Dublin, Ireland, kept between 1794 and 1795. Cosslett recorded detailed descriptions of his travels around the British Isles and reflected on his daily life while studying at Trinity College, Dublin. The collection also includes a pastel portrait of Cosslett and an ivory profile of his father, Judge Charles Mathews Cosslett of South Carolina.

This collection contains 6 diaries kept by Charles G. Cosslett, a student in Dublin, Ireland, between 1794 and 1795, as well as two framed images. Each diary is between 66 and 250 pages in length, and they cover most of the period between January 1, 1794, and December 31, 1795, with occasional gaps as a result of missing volumes.

Cosslett's Diaries contain daily entries about various aspects of his life, such as his studies at Trinity College, Dublin. He had an active social life and traveled throughout Ireland, Scotland, and England. Cosslett maintained precise records of the places he visited, which included both small towns and heavily populated areas, recording his (often negative) opinions of local residents and details about geography, topography, and local customs. In 1795, he spent a significant amount of time on the Isle of Man, after which he proceeded to Cumbria, where he described local lakes, and eventually to London, where he viewed several plays and visited notable locations. Two of the diaries have records about the distance Cosslett traveled, and the second volume contains a printed portrait of George Washington.

• A color pastel portrait of Charles G. Cosslett, with a newspaper obituary from The Northern Whig affixed to the back
• An ivory profile of Charles G. Cosslett's father, Judge Charles Mathews Cosslett

Charles Geddings Rogers graduated from West Point in 1854 and served in the cavalry of the Army of the Tennessee during the Civil War. His pocket diary contains entries from February to May 1865, with a brief retrospective of his unit's movements in 1864. It also includes registers of pupils from his post-war teaching days, drafts of poems, and various other personal notes.

The pocket diary in which Rogers writes has on the flyleaf and in several other places the name Alfred Stout, but the entries begin in Rogers' hand on February 9, 1865, with a retrospective detailing briefly his unit's movements from September, 1864, through Tennesee and Alabama with General Forrest. Engagements noted include the capture of Athens and fighting at Sulphur Branch Trestle, Ala., and at Pulaski, Tenn., where he notes that he was within 400 yards of his family, but could not see them because of the presence of Union troops. Rogers apparently spent most of December and January visiting friends and family, but rejoined his unit in early February just in time to participate in the largely unsuccessful attempt to block Sherman's march through South Carolina. He mentions briefly the defense and evacuation of Fayetteville, skirmishing along the Black River, and the Battle of Bentonville, N.C. Disappointingly, he mentions Lincoln's inauguration and assassination with little more than a straightforward notation; Lee's surrender at Appomattox rouses him slightly more: "sad news indeed, " though he does inveigh briefly and bitterly against the men at home who are too cowardly to join the fight: "so much for the boasted chivalry of the South." By war's end he seems embittered by the fate of "our noble little army" whom he sees as having been "sacrificed on the altar of a ruthless and hopeless cause." His anger is seemingly directed against the C.S.A., and he notes, it seems without irony, on the day of his mustering out, "and now for home, and there forever as a truly loyal citizen of the great U.S." The diary ends shortly thereafter, although the notebook also contains registers of pupils from his post-war teaching days, drafts of poems and various other personal notes.

The papers include family correspondence before, during, and after the Civil War, photographs, muster rolls, lists of military supplies and men.

The Papers include his personal and family correspondence, 1854-1878 and 1882-1926, mostly with his parents, brother (Frank), sister (Maggie), and his bride, or soon to be wife (Fannie Spencer). There are four diaries, 1860-1864, which like his letters discuss marches, battles, General McClellan and General Hooker, the treatment of soldiers, and cadets shot for desertion. Letters prior to and after the Civil War discuss life and business in Detroit. Part of the collection includes eleven muster rolls of Company E, 7th Michigan Infantry, June 1861-August 1863, and nine monthly returns, October 1862-September 1863. These are now separately housed with the collection of oversized Civil War muster rolls. Lists of military supplies and men killed may be found in Curtiss’ 1864 diary. There are also photographs of Curtiss and one of Fannie, including one of her in a 1855 New Testament. An illustration of the Curtiss homestead is found in one April 1907 issue of the Huntington Hills (p.3). Lastly, item index cards are available to assist researchers.

Charles H. Davey received this pre-printed daily pocket diary from his mother Ella Chamberlain Davey on Christmas Day 1901, at which time he was 13 years old. Davey kept daily entries throughout 1902, documenting his school attendance, almost daily reading (though he almost never mentioned book titles), visits to the library, and recreation such as skating on the river and swimming in the creek. He also documented his chores, which included sawing wood, cutting ice, planting, and harvesting. Laid into the back endpapers are one invitation to a gift-giving party, and three pencil illustrations of railroad engines and cars.

Charles H. Davey received this pre-printed daily pocket diary from his mother Ella Chamberlain Davey on Christmas Day 1901, at which time he was 13 years old. Davey kept daily entries throughout 1902, documenting his school attendance, almost daily reading (though he almost never mentioned book titles), visits to the library, and recreation such as skating on the river and swimming in the creek. He also documented his chores, which included sawing wood, cutting ice, planting, and harvesting.

Near the beginning of the volume, Davey wrote down identifying information, such as his age, height, and clothing sizes (hat, hosiery, collar, cuffs, shoes, shirt, and drawers). He also identified his mother as an emergency contact. Laid into the back endpapers are one invitation to a gift-giving party, and three pencil illustrations of railroad engines and cars. One similar pen illustration of a train is on the rear pastedown. Two of the coal cars are marked, one reading 700 and the other 4004.