Collections

This collection includes travel records, embarkation orders, pay voucher, letters written to her mother and Aunt Cora, and her own remembrances of her time spent in France.

Nathaniel's papers related to business and to the New York Life Insurance Company. There are also letters from Nathaniel to Samuel during the Civil War years. Letters to Samuel from relatives, including his sisters Effie and Fannie and his mother Jane, contain commentary on the Civil War. At different times during the war Samuel was in New Orleans, Manassas and Petersburg. There are Confederate passes among his papers. There is also an 1865 letter from Samuel to his mother about his return home. Samuel's correspondence from his friend Maurice Hurley mentions that Hurley was exiled to Canada to avoid taking the "oath to President Lincoln" in 1864. Correspondence of Nathalie Boush Asher and her husband G. Gordon Asher make up the remainder of the collection. There is also an 1893 Alexandria Female Institute report card for Nathalie. Most of her correspondence is personal letters, sympathy notes, and some letters on House of Representatives stationary. Her interest in politics is indicated by the latter plus newspapers that she saved relating to the candidacy of C.C. Carlin and E.B. White for the 1918 Virginia Eighth District election for the U.S. House of Representatives. There are several pieces of business and personal correspondence to G. Gordon Asher.

Family papers, letters, wills, and deeds of the Chapman Family of Maryland and Virginia.

This Collection contains roughly 55 letters. It includes letters written by or to Helen Mary Chapman, Helen Pearson Chapman, Arthur Leigh Southerland, and Robert Mitchell Weir along with other family and business letters.

This collection has three series: the papers of JT Ricketts, of Norris Cummings and of Helen Cummings. The Ricketts series makes up the bulk of the collection. Its main focus is on Ricketts' business records, but some personal documents are included. The business records contain financial, legal and administrative materials. They trace the rise of T. Wattson & Sons from a small bakery into an industrial "steam" bakery that supplied organizations such as the US Navy with packaged bread products. This development was made possible by the company's purchase of a cracker molding machine patent to mass produce bakery goods. Also found in the Ricketts' series is documentation of the divisive feud between Thomas Wattson and Ricketts and records relating to Ricketts' investments in Pennsylvania coal and timber lands. The Norris Cummings series consists of a few letters, accounts and printed materials. The Helen Cummings series is made up of Ricketts family genealogical materials including a family bible, correspondence to relatives and genealogical organizations and family trees.

The bulk of these papers are correspondence (letters) between Lucius Bellinger Northrop (Charleston, SC and Anne Arundel County, MD) and R. Jones, Adjutant General of the United States Army (Washington, DC). The correspondence refers to Northrop's inability to perform military duty due to his knee wound and to the desire of the Adjutant General's Office for Northrop to return to his post. Included are doctor's statements reporting on Northrop's physical condition, as well as the army's orders to release Northrop from the service in 1848. His attempts to obtain another government position and the reinstatement orders of Jefferson Davis are included in the collection, as well.