Collections : [West Virginia and Regional History Center]

The compiled service records of Confederate prisoners of war who were released from prison camps upon signing a loyalty oath and volunteering for service in the Union Army. The ex-Confederates who comprised the First through Sixth U.S. Volunteer Infantry Regiments were recruited at first from the prison camp at Pt. Lookout, Maryland but later also from Rock Island, Alton, Camp Douglas, and Camp Morton in Illinois, and from Camp Chase in Columbus, Ohio. Although initially serving near combat theaters of the Civil War, it was deemed that these popularly nicknamed "Galvanized Yankees" should not have to face fighting their former comrades in arms. Consequently, they were transferred early on to the northwestern frontier where they served as escorts and guards for settlers from the native inhabitants (Plains Indians). The records are arranged by regiment number and thereunder alphabetically by soldier's surname. The records contained therein relate solely to a particular soldier and are of two general types. The first kind consists of card index abstracts of entries on rolls or in books such as muster rolls, hospital rolls, or descriptive books. The second type consists of copies of original personal papers such as medical reports, enlistment papers and orders. Reel 65 consists of personal papers of soldiers with insufficient proof of service to justify a regular compiled record, those rejected for service for various reasons, and those attached to one of the regiments such as physicians or chaplains.

Indentures, deeds, court papers, land grants, letters, church notices, tax and other receipts, bills, notes and other materials concerning the Bluestone River area in Summers County, West Virginia, especially the Josiah Meadows and Robert Lilly families. Includes a Church of Christ minute book kept by Thomas Lilly, 1802-1817; a land grant to Jesiah Meador signed by Governor James P. Preston, 1809; and a letter from William Sellergrit Lilly from upper Louisiana Territory telling of earth tremors, sickness, and expected Indian trouble. Places mentioned include Mercer, Raleigh, Montgomery, and Giles counties, and Sinking Creek.

Published and unpublished manuscripts, correspondence, and speeches of Virgil A. Lewis (1848-1912), the first state historian and archivist and a former state superintendent of schools. Subjects include the exploration, Indian wars, and settlement of Western Virginia; the Tory insurrection in the Valley of Lost River, 1781; the West Virginia new state movement; Masonry in West Virginia; Andrew S. Rowan; and various West Virginia authors. Correspondents include: George W. Atkinson, Waitman Barbe, Danske Dandridge, William M.O. Dawson, Granville D. Hall, Hu Maxwell, Mrs. Alexander McVeigh Miller, and Melville D. Post. See Scope and Content Note for contents list.

Papers of a Morgantown lawyer and state legislator. Includes political correspondence of William Moreland addressing issues ranging from abortion to coal mining with a majority of the papers regarding the operation of state bureaucracy and the importance of organized labor in West Virginia. Addendum of 2010/10/29 includes Moreland's World War II (WWII) service records, family genealogy, and family photographs. Addenda of 2011/03/21 and 2011/06/20 include papers of William Moreland, and papers of his father and grandfather, James R. Moreland and Joseph Moreland. Addendum of 2014/06/12 includes some papers and many artifacts. Addendum of 2016/07/27 includes drawings of properties in Monongalia County and political campaign and other material. See "Scope and Content Note" for details. Addendum of 2017/05/22 contains two scrapbooks of clippings documenting Moreland from 1933-1970. There are additional addenda.

History of the Haymond family, pioneer residents of the Palatine tract in Marion County, West Virginia. Eight letters written by William Haymond to his nephew Luther Haymond recall frontier life in the Monongahela, Tygart, Ohio, and Kanawha valleys, 1780-1793. Subjects include the settlement of Morgantown, Clarksburg, Williamstown, the Palatine tract, and Coburn's Fort; land surveys in Harrison County; trapping and hunting; road surveying; and Indian warfare.

Letters, legal papers, and accounts of William Parker, Hampshire County, West Virginia. Included also are scattered papers of John P., Benjamin, and James Parker and Company. Letters originate from Virginia; Greene County, Illinois, 1859; and Pleasant Hill, Dallas County, Alabama, 1849. Subjects include doctors' fees; election of 1851 in Berkeley, Jefferson and Morgan counties, and Frederick County, Virginia; prices of farm produce; and observations of Virginians newly settled in Illinois and Alabama in the middle of the nineteenth century.

Sketch of a western Virginia pioneer who left Loudon County, Virginia when his mother and stepfather emigrated (ca.1816) and settled in Mercer's Bottom in Mason County. The sketch was written by one of the subject's children and has anecdotes about Neale's boyhood, parents, and frontier farming. This family history contains a life story of Nancy Maria Smith Neale, William's mother, a woman of vision and independence.

Correspondence, business and legal papers, notebooks, speeches, historical essays, genealogical records, clippings, and printed material of a Buckhannon lawyer, state jurist, member of Congress (1927-1929), and West Virginia Secretary of State (1933-1948). The collection also includes papers of O'Brien's father, Emmett J., a member of the state's first Constitutional Convention; letters from O'Brien's brother, Lieutenant A.L. O'Brien, 1874-1887, a West Point graduate serving at forts Assinniboine, Belknap, and Spokane in the Montana Territory and Washington State; letters of Henry M. White, O'Brien's brother-in-law, and a lawyer with the Immigration Bureau and the Federal Trade Commission; a diary of a trip to Texas in 1907; and genealogical records of the Joseph Hall, William Norris, O'Brien, and Jacob Reger families. Subjects include West Virginia Wildlife League; Methodism in Upshur County; an expedition in pursuit of Sitting Bull; the Rush Holt contested election of 1934; the McAdoo-Smith contest of 1924; the Townsendites; presidential election of 1936; state politics; pioneer history of West Virginia; and the Vandalia Company.