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Curwen family. Papers, 1637-1808.

Title: Papers, 1637-1808.

The papers in this collection consist of wide-ranging correspondence and documents touching on many events throughout the American colonial period. Those items that were donated by Rosseter Cotton (descendant of the famous divine, John Cotton) are listed in the AAS Donation Book for 18 April 1815. (See also a listing filed in Box 1, Folder 1 of this collection.) The provenance of the remaining items is unclear, but all were evidently gathered together early in the 19th century and labeled Curwen Family Papers. A few of the items were written by Samuel Curwen, and some correspondence is addressed to members of the Curwen family. Two brief diaries of Samuel Curwen, 1751 and 1757 (both originally interleaved in Nathaniel Ames' Almanack), Curwen's notebook, 1768-1771, containing financial memos, and a volume titled "His Colledge Laws," which Curwen apparently kept from 1731 to 1732, while a student at Harvard College, are also included. It is possible that those items relating to the Louisbourg Campaign, the French and Indian War, and Salem, Mass., were once in the possession of Samuel Curwen, who was an antiquarian and who gave the choicest items of his collection to his friend, William Bentley (1759-1819). The collection consists of letters, deeds, contracts, rough sermon notes, government documents, maps, and charts. The bulk of the collection is significant correspondence concerning religious and political developments in Old and New England, especially in colonial Massachusetts, during the 17th and 18th centuries. For example, there are letters written to or by the Mathers, John and Josiah Cotton, Joseph Dudley, Jeremiah Dummer, Jonathan Edwards, Samuel and Stephen Sewall, Dennis DeBerdt, Edward A. Holyoke, Nicholas Street, Robert Wodrow, and Thomas Walley. Several letters and documents refer to troubles with (especially King Philip's War) and poor treatment of Indians, e.g., letters of George Shove, Josiah Cotton, Thomas Walley, Henry Dering, Benjamin Colman, Noah Newman, William Bradford, and Jeremiah Dummer. The letters and orders of William Shirley, Benjamin Green, Sir William Pepperrell, and the New York and Massachusetts legislatures refer to the Louisbourg and Crown Point Expeditions of 1745 and 1755, respectively. Several items concern smallpox outbreaks and inoculation, e.g., letters of Samuel Sewall and Thomas Robie. There is business correspondence between Robert Hale and his estate agent in England, Bennett Swayne, as well as business correspondence of bookseller Samuel Gerrish and George Curwin. Peter Collinson's letters from London to John Custis at Williamsburg, Va., 1734-1745/46, concern horticultural subjects, and a letter written by Cadwallader Colden, 1741, objects to the treatment of blacks in New York. There are Indian wills and deeds, an account, 1808, by Ashley Bowen of a 1750 shipwreck, and a copy of the Records of the Salem, Mass. Social Library, 1760-1761. The latter includes the covenant and articles, list of subscribers, rules of borrowing, and a catalog of the books and their cost.

ArchivalResource: 3 boxes.1 folder (20 items) ; oversize.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/207128834 View

Louisbourg, Cape Breton Island Campaign collection, 1745-1746.

Title: Louisbourg, Cape Breton Island Campaign collection, 1745-1746.

The papers include the draft of Pepperrell's report on the fortifications of the grand battery at Louisburg following its capture, orders to Col. Robert Hale (1703-1767) concerning the state of his regiment, and a nine-page poem by an unidentified author which is entitled "Siege of Louisbourg, 1745. By General Pepperel [sic] and the New England Troops--and Consequent Peace of Aix-la-Chappele as Narrated by a Field Officer, afterward General in the Revolutionary War." There are also two documents of [John?] Osborne ( - ), chairman of the Committee of War of the Massachusetts General Court, seeking compensation for his work as military paymaster. There is also a folio volume entitled the "Journal or Minutes made in an Expedition against Louisbourg, 1745," which is a detailed account of the campaign by Benjamin Green ( - ), Secretary to Sir William Pepperrell. This journal covers the period 24 March to 13 August 1745 and includes daily entries; it describes the expedition from its earliest organization and departure through the temporary encampment of the New England army at Canso in Nova Scotia, naval engagements, the siege and fall of Louisburg itself in June, and the eventual return of the force to New England in the fall.

ArchivalResource: 1 folder (6 items)1 v. (42 leaves) ; folio.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/207150928 View

Gilman, Nicholas, 1708-1748. Papers II, 1700-1784.

Title: Papers II, 1700-1784.

Papers of Nicholas Gilman include an essay by Benjamin Colman and others in response to Increase Mather's "Gospel Order"; notes on some Nathaniel Gookin sermons (1725-36); a 1741 list of books lent; and assorted letters. Among the correspondence is a letter from John Seccombe, a letter to Colonel Robert Hale reporting on troops during King George's War, and a letter from his son Tristram Gilman to his wife Mary Gilman.

ArchivalResource: 1 narrow box.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/18030322 View

Gilman, Arthur, 1837-1909. Papers, 1738-1908, bulk: 1738-1869.

Title: Papers, 1738-1908, bulk: 1738-1869.

Papers concerning Arthur Gilman's work on the Gilman, Ives, and Robbins family history and genealogy which resulted in two published genealogies (1863 and 1869). Several corrected proofs and a typescript family letterbook are also included. The letters are largely about family matters but there are also business papers and correspondence of Folsom, Gilman and Gilman, merchants of Boston. Among the correspondents are: Nathaniel Folsom, Benjamin Ives Gilman, Hannah Robbins Gilman, Joseph Gilman, Josiah Gilman, Mary Thing Gilman, Nicholas Gilman, Peter Gilman, Tristram Gilman, Jane Prince Robbins Gilman, Robert Hale, John Hurd, Robert Hales Ives, Chandler Robbins, and Jane Prince Robbins.

ArchivalResource: 1 box and 6 v.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/18030976 View

Hale, Robert, 1703-1767. Papers, 1717-1741.

Title: Papers, 1717-1741.

This collection includes a 528 page volume of notes on arithmetic, logic, metaphysics, physics, geography, and Euclid. It was compiled by Hale in 1720 and 1721. There is a 21 page "Quotidiana" or commonplace book of medical notes transcribed by Hale in 1722, and a copy of extracts from Charles Morton's science textbook, "Compendium Physicae," transcribed in 1717. The latter volume includes drawings and diagrams (some pages have been torn from the volume). From c. 1727-c. 1741 Hale kept a notebook of eclectic information including charts of men's and women's names that appear in the Bible, extracts from a technical lexicon, surnames of men who had earned Harvard degrees to 1727, and his schedule of reading the Bible. According to Clifford K. Shipton these manuscripts constitute one of the best surviving collections of student papers of the period. There is also a brief journal of a trip Hale made to Nova Scotia, June and July, 1731, with additional notes for August to 2 September, 1732. At the back of the journal there are accounts for 1731, a few miscellaneous jottings, and an incomplete letter.

ArchivalResource: 5 v. ; octavo.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/207141094 View

French and Indian War collection, 1754-1774.

Title: French and Indian War collection, 1754-1774.

This collection of French and Indian War papers includes papers of several individuals. The Burk collection includes the military correspondence of Major John Burk (1717-1784), with letters to Burk from Governor Shirley, Robert Hale, Ephraim Williams, William Pitt, Timothy Ruggles, John Chandler, and others. The collection of Sir William Johnson's (1715-1774) letters consists primarily of drafts of his correspondence with General Thomas Gage, Benjamin Franklin, and others, dealing with his activities among the tribes of the Six Nations. Robert Hale (1703-1767), a physician who commanded a regiment during the Louisburg Campaign, 1745, kept a chronicle of the major political and military events in America and Europe for the war period. The first volume was begun in July 1755 but some items dating back to 1748 were entered at the start of the volume. There are three volumes, the third ending 30 October 1762. There is also a small folder of Hale correspondence. The 1756 Receipt Book of Sir John St. Clair, Quartermaster, is an account of the men employed and receipts for the money expended in the bateau service, New York. Other accounts have been preserved in a "Book of Ballances 1759," a record of money paid and due to men of several Massachusetts companies. There are two diaries of soldiers. The first is by Lieutenant Cornelius Stowell (1724-1804) of Worcester who was stationed at Crown Point, N.Y., 1759. This volume includes regimental orders for the 1st Battalion of Brigadier General Timothy Ruggles' regiment. The second diary is composed of two separate accounts: the first part was written while the soldier was stationed at Fort William Henry, N.Y., 1758, and the second, written by the same soldier, describes an expedition to Louisburg, 1759. The volume includes scattered orders for 1760 and ends with the announcement of 24 September of the surrender of Montreal to General Amherst. The rest of the collection is composed of an assortment of returns, rolls, lists, bills and receipts, documents, commissions and enlistments, and a memorandum book for 1755-1761. Included in the miscellaneous documents is a series of four letters and one undated letter fragment addressed to Michael Martyn who participated in the 1759 campaign against Louisburg. Three of the letters and the fragment were written in 1759 by Benjamin Kneeland from Boston to Martyn in Louisburg. These letters mention other military campaigns, as does a 1762 letter from Rush Salter to Martyn.

ArchivalResource: 3 v. ; octavo.4 v. ; folio.1 box.1 folder ; oversize.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/207136562 View