Found 12 collections related to Memoirs

Harry P. Wilkinson (Henry Porteus Wilkinson, 1874-1949), of Brooklyn, New York, served in Company G of the 47th Regiment of the New York National Guard, federalized for service in the Spanish-American War. He enlisted May 2, 1898, and mustered out as a sergeant on March 31, 1899. After the war he worked as an electrical crane operator at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The voyage of the 47th Regt. U.S.V., signed H.P. Wilkinson, is a manuscript narrative (9 leaves) covering the regiment’s voyage to Puerto Rico in October 1898, and the early weeks of its service there. The account begins with the regiment’s march to the troop ship Manitoba at Newport, Rhode Island on October 7, ending on an unspecified date at barracks in Carolina, Puerto Rico. He recounts their uncomfortable voyage to Puerto de Ponce and their encampment nearby. On October 22 they sailed for San Juan on board the transport Chester, embarking and disembarking troops along the way, with stops including Arroyo, Humacao, the island of Vieques, and Fajardo. The 47th saw no action, but the voyage on the Chester was marked by the fatal shooting of a soldier named Butler of Company H. less

Charles E. Pierce (1842-1907), a farmer from Oneida County, New York, served as a private in Company I of the 146th New York Infantry from 1862 to 1865 during the American Civil War. The Charles E. Pierce cash book, 1853-1879, contains a narrative of his capture at the Battle of the Wilderness in May 1864 and imprisonment at Andersonville, Georgia and Florence, South Carolina; records kept at Camp Parole Hospital, most likely by W. L. Cooper and Pierce as chief ward masters, 1865; Pierce's post-war cash accounts, and his genealogical notes. The volume was previously used by the mercantile firm of Orme, Wilson & Co. of Loudon, Tennessee, and individually by its partner R. T. Wilson, 1853-1863. The volume is accompanied by a letter written by Pierce at Camp Parole to his mother, 1865 May 21; a form letter from a veterans' association dated 188-; his admission ticket to the Soldiers' Reading Room in Philadelphia, and a few clippings relating to the Civil War. less

Grant Thorburn was a Scottish-born New York City nurseryman and author. The collection consists mainly of letters and letter fragments from his friend William Carver, a mutual acquaintance of Thomas Paine, with a loose poem by Carver on Nature and Her Laws, and miscellaneous holograph writings by Thorburn. Letters concern Carver's poverty and troubled life in New York; his efforts to find a publisher for a sketch of Paine's life; and his atheism, disputed in Thorburn's copy of a letter he wrote to Carver, and a memorandum of a conversation with him. There are also two letters discussing family and business matters; Thorburn autographs and a letter fragment; and several receipts for purchases from G. Thorburn & Son, seedsmen and florists in Manhattan. Writings by Thorburn are: Pocahontas, 1852 (her story, inspired by a visit to Yorktown in 1848); Life of Thomas Paine, No. 1, 1852; his unfinished autobiographical History of Lawrie Todd, 1862, with lithograph portrait; Grant Thorburn Sinior's (sic) Manuscript No. 2, undated; Churches and Meetinghouses in New York, undated; and Anecdote of George Watson, undated. Also present is an 1849 manuscript, "Hints to Doctors, Quacks, and Grave-Diggers" by Lawrie Todd (Thorburn), a vituperative attack on the skill of physicians during epidemics, and the personal and political character of William Cobbett, his business competitor, and Thomas Paine. The name Lawrie Todd also appears as Laurie Todd. less

Recollections of a resident of New York City from 1835-1905, describing stage lines, oil lamps and lamplighters, markets, theatres, museums, eating places, hotels, parks, yachting, steamships, fire companies, church-going, shops, residences of prominent persons, draft riots, riot of 1871, cost of tropical fruits, chimney sweeps, etc. Brief comment upon suburbs, Long Island, Westchester county, and New Jersey less

Prominent Massachusetts merchant Samuel Lawrence wrote these reminiscences of his childhood and early life in Groton and Boston while in Stockbridge in March 1875. The reminiscences cover the years 1803-1844 and mention James Madison, Noah Webster, the Marquis de Lafayette, Samuel Morse, Henry Clay, Rufus Choate, John Brown, a visit of Charles Dickens' and his wife to the Lawrence home, John James Audubon, the Agazzis, the War of 1812, disputes about nullification, and other matters. The reminiscences also include accounts of the early days of the Republic, heard from Lawrence's father, a soldier of the Revolution, and others less

Noble D. Preston was a Captain in the 10th New York Cavalry. This manuscript volume includes reminiscences of his service in the Civil War, biographical sketches of Lieutenant Philip D. Mason and others, military medals, cavalry bugle calls, war songs, family records, and a genealogy of his wife, Ann Hasseltine Sanford Preston less

The Francis Effingham Pinto recollections cover the period from 1823 to 1856, with discussion of Pinto's early life in New Haven, Connecticut and New York City; service as Lieutenant, 1st N.Y. Volunteers during the 1846 campaign in Mexico; travel to California in 1849, with events en route via Panama, and description of San Francisco, gold mines, trade, partnerships, marriage, fires, and The Vigilance Committee; and his return to New York via Nicaragua in 1856. The recollections were written between 1894 and 1902. Typed carbon copy, 212 pages with index less

Adam W. Spies (1800-1891), the son of Mary Bergh and John Spies, was a hardware and military goods merchant in New York City. He was employed by the firm of C. & J. D. Wolfe, and was their agent in England in the 1820s. In 1834 he established A. W. Spies & Company, later Spies, Kissam & Company, retiring in 1866. He acquired extensive landholdings in New York City, upstate New York, and numerous other states, including Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New Jersey, and Wisconsin, among others. In 1832 he married Sarah Ann Morrison (d. 1883), daughter of John C. Morrison of Monmouth County, New Jersey. Spies was a founding member of the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor.The Adam W. Spies real estate and genealogy scrapbook is primarily a record of his real estate transactions, containing numerous manuscript plat maps, many in watercolor with extensive annotations; a few printed maps; listings of properties, taxes and assessments; and legal notes. Holdings in Manhattan and Williamsburg, Brooklyn are especially well documented. Genealogical materials include charts and notes concerning the Spies, Morrison, and Bergh families, and autobiographical accounts, with advice to grandchildren, recalling his career, his service as a volunteer fireman, and life in Manhattan prior to the building of the Erie Canal and Croton Aqueduct. The volume also contains pasted clippings, certificates and receipts, cut silhouettes of Spies, and a few sketches, notably a watercolor street view by Spies of his father’s place of business in Manhattan as depicted in 1808. There are some miscellaneous letters and notes relating to family and real estate matters, some loose, including a genealogical inquiry to his son-in-law John W. Cochrane dated 1907. A few of Spies’s genealogical entries are updated to 1930. The scrapbook has multiple and duplicate paginations, with gaps: Index, p. 1-48, 50-58, [3 p.]; property maps with index, p. 0-100; and additional genealogical and autobiographical material, p. 133-143; 137-138, 139 (2 leaves), 142-155. Text and maps are separately indexed. less

Mary de Camp Banks Moore (b.1878) was the daughter of Gen. Robert Lenox Banks, Secretary and Assistant Treasurer of the New York Central Railroad, and Mary de Camp Corning, widow of Edwin Weld Corning, who was the nephew of Erastus Corning, President of the New York Central Railroad. She was born and raised in Albany, N.Y. In 1901 she married Maurice Moore; they resided in Lynchburg, Va. The Mary de Camp Banks Moore papers consist of her personal papers and her genealogical research on the De Camp, Carmer, Lenox, Banks, and allied families. Personal papers, 1896-1949 and undated, consist of her writings, including a notebook of personal reminiscences written 1913 recording her early life in Albany prior to her marriage in 1901, and notes on the early life of her mother, Mary de Camp Banks (b. 1843); personal correspondence, with some Banks family notes; and ephemera, including certificates and invitations. Also present are photographs, including cabinet cards, cartes-de-visite, and tintypes, of Mary de Camp Banks Moore, family members and friends,and residences. Genealogical research materials, 1857-1950 and undated, compiled by Mary de Camp Banks Moore circa 1910-1950, contain correspondence regarding her research on the De Camp, Carmer, Lenox, Banks, and allied families, as well as late 19th century De Camp family correspondence; genealogical research scrapbooks on her maternal grandfather, U.S. Navy Rear Admiral John de Camp, and her maternal great-grandfather, Samuel G. J. De Camp, a U.S. Army surgeon during the Civil War; as well as notes and clippings. less