Collections : [College of William and Mary]

Contains one letter from A. Eliza Crane, a missionary in Iran during the nineteenth century. The letter is addressed to her mother, Julia R.W. Crane in Clinton, Oneida County, New York. Within the letter is a description of Eliza Crane's life in Oroomiah, present day Orumiyeh, Iran. She speaks of her family and the consequences of the snowy weather in Iran.

Collection contains a single diary of American woman Fanny Kean Leake Pattaon (1867-1939) during her time with the American Episcopal Mission in Kyoto, Japan. She and her husband Rev. J. Lindsay Patton (1866-1915), worked in Japan as missionaries for fifteen years starting in the late 1880s. By the time the diary was written, they had been overseas for several years and had five children, some of whom were born in Japan. The diary includes documentation about Fanny and her husband's religious activity and travel, as well as details about her every day life doing missionary work and teaching. It also has information about the Otsu Incident (an unsuccessful assassination attempt on Czar Nicholas Alexandrovich during his visit to Japan in 1891), and Russia and Japan's falling out afterwards. Fanny in fact visited the Czar the day after the Otsu Incident.

Collection contains papers documenting the family of Henry Waring Latane Lewis from Essex County, Virginia. Lewis was an episcopal minister in Essex County and often preached to African-Americans. The Collection includes papers ranging from correspondence to legal documents. Also included is a small ambrotype photograph and a list of names, possibly of enslaved individuals.

About 80 letters and a small diary of the family of Pastor Edward Hilliard, missionaries to the Tonga in the South Pacific, Melbourne, Australia, Tazmania, and Bangalore, India. The Hilliards were the first Seventh Day Adventist missionaries to the island of Tongo in 1895. Edward and his wife built a home and established a school while there. They also brought two Tongan boys into their home to train them to become future missionaries. The letters focus on the teaching the family does as their missionary outreach, describes the scenery of their locations, the poverty of the people of their locations, mission life in general.

The collection contains 1 diary written by Jane Archer Culbertson. It describes her time working as a teacher in Bangkok and her travel from San Francisco to Bangkok. The diary dates from 1890. A handwritten note entitled a Royal Sport is also included.

22 letters addressed to family members of Leavenworth, Kansas from a Methodist mission in India. Most of the area in India where Blackmar was located was in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, including Moradabad and Lucknow. Blackmar was serving as a missionary during the great famine of India from 1876-1878 and comments on the conditions of the region in great detail in her letters. In one letter she states, "All the Spring crops have failed, and unless there be rain within a few days, it will be of no use to put in grain for fall crops. There is no grain, no noting, no rice, no sugar cane, no work for all of these people... it makes the flesh creep to think of it all, what it will be to see the way blocked by wretches dying for want."

Four page letter addressed to her brother from Evangasimba on the island of Corisco off the coast of Africa. She describes her journey and extended length to sail from Boston to Africa because of the lack of winds and favorable conditions for the vessel. Despite that and a quick, but destructive tornado, the journey across the Atlantic, according to Latta, was a very pleasant one. Upon her arrival in Corisco Latta presented with a few welts or sores on the back of her hand. She thought they were from insect bites but the doctor's examination was that it was a fever within her coming to the surface. She was not as convinced but nonetheless rested as the doctor ordered in case she would fall ill. Latta's arrival to Corisco is for the purpose of serving as a missionary to the area. She indicates in her letter that she has already met a few other missionaries and is excited to begin her work.