Scope and arrangement
This is a synthetic collection consisting of manuscripts and typescripts and correspondence, as well as a photograph portrait. The manuscripts and typescripts include portions of stories, reviews, plays, poems, and a statement by M. V. T. Lawrence relating to the author. The correspondence includes letters, dating from 1870 to 1901, from the author to May Pemberton, Thomas Edgar Pemberton, the literary agency A. P. Watt and Son, and others, as well as letters relating to the author, dating from 1885 to 1886, between various correspondents, including Charles Francois Gounoud, Yolande Van de Velde, A. P. Watt and Son, and others. There are letters written to Harte from Thomas Hardy, William Ingram for The Illustrated London News, and A. P. Watt and Son, dating from 1879 to 1891.
The Bret Harte collection of papers are arranged in three series: