Special Collections & University Archives Search

14th New Hampshire Volunteer Regiment was an infantry regiment that participated in the American Civil War. It was the last three-year regiment raised in New Hampshire, serving from September 24, 1862 to July 8, 1865. A small (2.5″ x 3.25″) diary for 1865, with 60 pages of entries leading up to the end of the war and Lincoln’s assassination, kept by an unknown officer or company clerk who made out payrolls,…

Alvin A. Gove enlisted at age 21 in Seabrook, N. H. on Dec. 6, 1861 into the 6th New Hampshire Regiment. On Oct. 15 1862 in Washington D.C. Alvin mustered out with a disability. A two page letter from eighteen year-old Alvin Gove, a private in the 6th New Hampshire Regiment sent from Camp Stanton, Roanoke Island, N.C. to Friend Albert, Seabrook, NH. Gove describes camp life off the coast of North Carolina and the rumor that General Ambrose Burnside has taken Richmond, Virginia.

William J. Barrus (b.1835), Ira Marshall Barrus (1837-1868), and John W. Barrus (b.1840), all of Richmond, NH, served in Massachusetts regiments during the Civil War. Their companies were: Company D, 36th Massachusetts Infantry; Company I, 2nd Massachusetts Infantry; and (later) the Invalid Corps. The collection consists primarily of the war-time correspondence of William J. Barrus, Ira Marshall Barrus, and John W…

Civil War soldier. Four page letter written from Berryville (Va.) by J.A. Blodgett, Civil War soldier, to his brother. The letter describes skirmishes with Confederate troops around Berryville, Va. during the Shenandoah Valley Campaign, August-November 1864.

Brooks K. Webber was born in Webster (Boscawen), New Hampshire in 1837. He was educated at Colby Academy in New London and went on to study law in Newport and Woodstock, Vermont. Webber was admitted to the Bar in 1859. He was a veteran of the Civil War, where here served as first Lieutenant for Company 1, 16th Regiment of New Hampshire Volunteers. Upon returning from the war, Webber settled in Hillsborough and…

The Browne family of Boston, MA consisted of Civil War veteran George Browne (1840-1912); Mountaineer/artist/author Belmore Browne (1880-1954) the youngest son of George and Nellie Browne; outdoor educator Evelyn Browne (1916-1994) the oldest child of Belmore and Agnes Browne; and outdoorsman George Browne (1918-1958). The bulk of the manuscript collection (Boxes 1-7) consists of correspondence from members of the…

John Bucknam (of Medford, Massachusetts) and Susan Ann Warren (of Concord, New Hampshire) married in the spring of 1830 in Massachusetts. They had 3 sons, of whom 2 survived. In the fall of 1838, Susan and sons Warren and George moved – without John – from Brighton to Concord, New Hampshire, where they lived as boarders in the home of John Brown. In the fall of 1860, Warren married Susan Emma Parkhurst of Chelmsford…

Charles E. Jewett, a 23 year-old resident of Gilford, N.H., joined the 2nd N.H. Regiment on April 20, 1861. He re-enlisted for three years on May 22, 1861. Jewett, a private, was killed at the 2nd Battle of Manassas on August 29, 1862. Primarily contains Jewett’s war-time (23) letters to his brother and sister-in-law. Also included: notice from Sergeant Hugh R. Richardson of Jewett’s death; a letter from Charles…

Edward Cross was born on April 22, 1832 in Lancaster, Coos County, New Hampshire. After working for many years in the west as a journalist and editor, he returned to New Hampshire at the outbreak of the Civil War and accepted a commission as colonel of the Fifth New Hampshire Volunteer Regiment. He was mustered into service on August 27, 1861. Cross led the Fifth into battle at Fair Oaks, Antietam, Fredericksburg,…

Daniel C. Currier (1841-1905) was born in Springfield, NH, later moving to Grantham, NH where his father Hiram and Daniel were sawyers. On August 8, 1862, at the age of 21, Currier enlisted and became a Corporal in I Company of the 14th Regiment of New Hampshire Volunteers and was mustered out on July 8, 1865 in Savannah, Georgia. Currier returned to Grantham and he married Sarah and they had six children. After the…

David W. Hill was born in Swanzey, N. H. on April 4, 1838 (1837?), the son of David Hill, a veteran of the War of 1812, and Keziah Franklin Hill. He died 28 February 1931. David W. Hill’s diary entries run from January 1858 until January 1863 and primarily reflect Hill’s day-to-day activities as a farmer and laborer, and follow his move to Cambridge, but they include little detail on his work at the Walworth…

Fort Constitution was built in 1632 on the island of New Castle, New Hampshire. Through several centuries, the post served as a trading port, a target of warfare, and a training ground for the military. It was a center of rebellion several months before the battles of Lexington and Concord ushered in the American Revolution. In 1961, the state of New Hampshire regained custody of the site, and in 1973, Fort…

Joseph Foster was a colonial MA ship captain who served in the American Revolution. Lyman Spauling was a doctor in Portsmouth around the same time. Their families (including Elizabeth Coues, Adelade Spaulding, and Joseph Foster III) intermarried over several generations. Both families went to sea. The Foster-Spalding Family Papers consist primarily of the correspondence to and from Elizabeth Parkhurst Spalding,…

The 4th NH was organized in Manchester on Sept. 18, 1861. Length of service was four years. Order of exercises: for the celebration of the 86th anniversary of American independence at St. Augustine, Fla., 1862 July 4. Humorous broadside listing the 4th New Hampshire Regiment’s July 4th activities. Pencil notations and signature of “Sergeant Davis,” probably Francis H. Davis, Co. D, of Laconia, N.H.

George H. Lang was born June 6, 1827 in Rye, N.H. He served in the 17th regiment of Massachusetts, Company D. He was a farmer. He died July 12, 1901. The George H. Lang Diary consists of copies of the diary spanning the years 1871-1901 when he was a farmer, as well as copies of transcriptions prepared by Louise Tallman, member of the Rye Historical Society.

In April 1861, George Naylor Julian enlisted as a private in the Second Battery (Nims) of Massachusetts Light Artillery, later becomming Captain of a newly-formed company of the 13th Regiment of New Hampshire Volunteers in 1862. The company fought at the Battle of Fredericksburg, Virginia, as well as the battles of Providence Church Road, Proctor’s and Kingsland Creeks, Drury’s Bluff, Cold Harbor, Petersburg, and…

Howard M. Hanson (1835-1909) was born in Lebanon, Maine. A resident of Somersworth, New Hampshire, Hanson joined the Ninth New Hampshire Volunteer Regiment on June 28, 1862. Hanson was mustered in as a commissary sergeant on August 6, 1862. Following the war, Hanson returned to Somersworth where he operated a grocery store until his death. 180 page pocket diary of Howard M. Hanson, commissary sergeant, the Ninth…

Papers of the Howell, Beatty, and Grier families are included. The Howell family consisted of Presbyterian missionary to Brazil John Beatty Howell (1847-1924), wife and author Elizabeth Hibler Day (b. 1850), doctor/author Archibald Alexander Howell II (d. 1918), WWI veteran Lawrence Day Howell (?-?), and poet Isabell Howell Thatcher (?-?). The Beatty family included missionary Charles Clinton Beatty (1715-1772),…

James Hooker Baker (1837-1923), was born in Brookfield NH, son of Benjamin Baker and Lydia Wedgewood. He served in the 2nd New Hampshire Regiment, Companies C and F. Following the war, Baker moved to Iowa, where he maintained a farm. He was an early member of the Reorganized Church of the Latter Day Saints, later being ordained as a priest and elder. This collection consists primarily of the records and official…

James Franklin Fitts, son of Moses Hall Fitts and Rachel Harrison Fitts, was born in Lockport, New York on September 11, 1839. He saw action in the Civil War, rising to the post of Battalion Adjutant in the 10th Cavalry prior to his joining the 114th New York Volunteers in a similar capacity. Fitts was promoted to the rank of Captain on March 27, 1863. In March 1865, he was appointed Brevet Major U.S. Volunteers …

James Nichols (1821-1889) of New Hampshire served in the United States Civil Ware in Company G of the Eighth New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry Regiment. After the war he continued his life as a farmer. Personal correspondence between James and Abby Nichols during the time James was serving with the 8th New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry comprises the majority of the collection. Misc. other papers and envelopes are also…

Joab Nelson Patterson was born in Hopkinton, NH on January 2, 1835. He fought in the Civil War enlisting as a First Lieutenant in Company H, 2nd Regiment New Hampshire Volunteers. He was promoted captain in May 1862 and the following year was wounded at the Battle of Gettysburg. Patterson rose to the rank of colonel before the end of the war. He was appointed Brevet Brigadier General of U.S. Volunteers prior to…

John Henry Jenks enlisted in the 14th New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry during the US Civil War. He was killed at the Battle of Cedar Creek (October 19). The Jenks Papers primarily contain Civil War letters from Jenks to his wife, Almina Crawford Jenks.

John W. F. Locke was born on October 13, 1838 in Barnstead, New Hampshire to Eliphalet and Sally Locke. When the Civil War began he was unable to join the New Hampshire Volunteers because he suffered from asthma. According to his diary entries, he spent his time “fixing accounts,” surveying land, “tending store” and “fixing pension papers.” He was also active in local government, serving as town selectman of…

John Hamm Miller (1838-1887) was a printer from Portsmouth, Rockingham Co., New Hampshire. He was the son of Tobias Hamnn Miller (1801-1870) and Mary Moses (1805-1845). He also served on the Portsmouth Volunteer Fire Department. Miller's scrapbook contains clippings from newspapers (mostly local to New Hampshire), and a few drawings and receipts. Topics include the Civil War, local obituaries, matrimony, and current…

John W. Warner enlisted in the New Hampshire Battalion of the First Regiment New England Volunteer Cavalry on September 15, 1862. He was captured near Middleburg, VA on June 18, 1863 and taken to Libby Prison in Richmond, VA. After his parole in 1864, Warner recuperated at the Lovell Hospital in Portsmouth Grove, RI. He later returned to his home in Hampton, N.H. where he was employed as a carriage maker. Three…

Joseph Woodman Sanborn was born on March 10, 1801 in New Hampton, N.H. and died on Aug. 9, 1868 in Bridgewater, MA. He resided for some time at Benicia, California where his sons died. He was a cordwainer in 1850, resided at "Sanborn's Corner" in a house that stood at the N.E. corner of Hancock and East Squantum Streets in Quincy, MA. The house was demolished about 1918-20. Four page letter written from Benicia, California to his brother Thomas in Sanbornton, N.H. on Christmas Day, 1864…

Leander Harris (1833-1912) was born in Fairlee township, Vermont. He married Emily S. Hunt and they had two daughters: Annie M. in June 1857, and Clara Josephine in September 1858. At the beginning of the Civil War he enlisted as a private in Company I of the Fourth New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry Regiment. Leander’s usual position was an aid at the military base hospital, though he later served as mail messenger…

Louis Bell (1837-1865) was a lawyer born in Chester, NH. His wife was Mary Anne "Mollie" Persis Bouton of Concord, NH. He served as Lieutenant Colonel of the 4th New Hampshire Volunteer Regiment, and was killed in action at Fort Fisher, North Carolina. This collection consists of extensive letters between Louis and Mollie Bell as well as detailed papers relating to the 4th New Hampshire Volunteer Regiment (1861-1865…

Luther Locke (1820-1892) was a dentist and physician who had been trained at Harvard Medical School. He also served as a Union Army surgeon in the American Civil War. This collection is mostly comprised of papers from his Civil War service.

Martin Snow, Civil War sailor, was born in Boston, Mass. in 1839 and died in Blair, Neb. in 1891. He married Caroline Augusta Barker in 1860 and was buried in Pittsfield, N.H., where he once lived and where his daughter, Lena Snow Sargent, resided. Contains a 92-page diary kept by Martin Snow from 1861 to 1862. The diary documents Snow’s experiences as a Navy sailor during the Civil War, his financial accounts, and some of his literary efforts. Included with the diary is Snow’s enlistment…

Lt. Col. Nelson Cross (1824-1897) was born in Lancaster, N.H., and lived in Brooklyn New York by 1860. He was married to Mary (Whetten) Cross (1832-1911) and they had one daughter, Amy Cross (1856-1939). Nelson Cross was the half brother of Edward Cross, who commanded the 5th New Hampshire until his death in July 1863. Cross's letters, dated 1861-1864, commence with his mustering in and progress through the war, often with vivid descriptions of battles fought and commentary on fellow military…

The Parsons family of Rye, New Hampshire consisted of the descendants of Dr. Joseph Parsons, including his son John Wilkes Parsons (1778-1849) and John's wife Abigail Garland, John's son Col. Thomas Jefferson Parsons (1804-1890), Charles Parsons (1808-1844), Major John Parsons (1816-1888), Warren Parsons (1818-1902), Julia Gove, and Abby Semira Parsons (1820-1911). Members of the family were prominant in state…

Rice Rowell Whittier (1817–1897) was a deeply religious Free Baptist Elder, subscription agent, and missionary from Deerfield Centre, New Hampshire. During the years covered in the diaries Whittier lived in Greenwood, Illinois, 1862–1870, New Orleans, Louisiana, 1870–1872 (seventeen months), Greenwood again, 1872-1884, and finally moved back home to Deerfield Centre, New Hampshire, 1884-1896. The nineteen pocket…

Salmon P. Chase (1808-1873) was born and educated in New Hampshire and went on to become Chief Justice, U.S. Supreme Court, Governor of Ohio, Secretary of the Treasury, and a founder of the Republican Party. A two page letter (1862) from the Treasury Dept. [Washington, D.C.] to Major-General Henry H. Halleck that concerns Halleck’s opening of the Cumberland River to Union navigation and discusses the lack of communication between Lincoln’s Cabinet in Washington and Union Generals in the field.

The Starkeys were farmers and school teachers in West Swanzey, New Hampshire, in the middle of the nineteenth century. After the firing on Fort Sumter, the family sent two of its men to join the Union cause in the Civil War. Isaac and his nephew Elmer fought in many of the Army of the Potomac's early battles, including those of the first and second Bull Run campaigns and McClellan's Peninsula campaign. Both were…

Thomas C. Cheney (1831-1900) was born in Derry, New Hampshire to Sally and Lyman King Cheney. Cheney enlisted as a private in the First N.H. Volunteer Light Battery, participating in virtually every major battle of the Army of the Potomac. The Thomas Carleton Cheney collection consists of 55 letters written between 1851-1885, with the bulk of them being between 1861 and 1664, four diaries from 1861 to 1864, a small…

Thomas Leonard Livermore (1844-1918) was born in Galena, Illinois and grew up in Milford, New Hampshire. During the Civil War he was a member of the 1st NH Volunteers, 5th NEw Hampshire, and 18th New Hampshire, and fought at Gettysburg. After the war, he returned to New Hampshire where he studied law and became a member of the New Hampshire bar. Livermore wrote a diary, “Days and Events,” based on his own experience…

Thornton Association of Naval Veterans of Manchester New Hampshire. 145 page manuscript record book of an association of naval veterans of the Civil War containing constitution, by-laws, and muster roll.

Levi Chapman Tuttle was born on August 3, 1835 in Nottingham, New Hampshire and died in 1914. He enlisted in the 13th Regiment New Hampshire Volunteers Infantry, Company F on August 26, 1862. He saw fighting at Fredericksburg and fifteen other battles between December 1862 and April 1865. The 13th New Hampshire Volunteers furnished the first troops and its colors were the first to enter and occupy the City of…

Walter Kittredge was born in Merrimack, New Hampshire. He was a self-taught musician who wrote over 500 songs throughout his career. His most famous song was "Tenting on the Old Camp Ground," which was sung by both sides during the Civil War. From Reeds Ferry, N.H. Walter Kittredge writes a letter, Dec. 29, 1900, to Lizzie G. Dickinson in which Kittredge writes that he has no photos of himself, but notes that she can acquire one by purchasing his book "Tenting Illustrated", which includes both…

William Badger (1823 or 1826-1897) was born in Gilmanton, NH, son of William Badger and Hannah Pearson (Cogswell) Badger. He mustered in Company D, of the Fourth Infantry Regiment of New Hampshire Volunteers on Sept. 18, 1861 as a captain. He was dismissed from service, but later exonerated and commissioned as a colonel of the regiment. However, there not being enough men he could not be mustered in. He later served…

On Nov. 28, 1863, in Nashua, N.H., 20 year old William B. Green enlisted as a private in Company G (New Hampshire), Second Regiment, United States Volunteer Sharpshooters. Near Petersburg, Va. William deserted on July 9, 1864. From Brady Station, Va, William wrote a four page letter to his mother Susan B. Green, Raymond, NH., Dec. 17, 1863. Green tells his mother about his recent arrest for desertion, his return to duty, and his desire to be assigned to the Invalid Corps. He also describes…

William Greenleaf (July 1, 1917-December 17, 1975) was born in New York, graduated from City College, New York and served in the U.S. Army from 1943-46. He earned his masters degree from Columbia in 1948 and his Ph.D, in 1955. He became a consultant for the Ford Foundation and a researcher for the Ford Motor Company History Project at Columbia. He was an Assistant Professor at Colorado State from 1956 until 1958,…

William P. Mason, of Canterbury, N.H., enlisted in Company F of the New Hampshire Twelfth Regiment on August 15, 1862 and mustered in as a Private the following month. After seeing action at the battles of Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, he was promoted to the rank of Corporal on May 1, 1865, seven weeks before being mustered out. He was born in Alton, N.H. in 1842 and died, aged only 25, in St. Charles,…