University of Virginia Library

Eighth Annual Report of the Archivist, University of
Virginia Library, for the Year 1937-38

SOMEWHERE between the librarian and the historian (or the social
scientist, it may be argued) stands the archivist. Just what his status
is among the professionals or how it is to be arrived at in this country
has not yet been determined. That he is already here complicates the
situation but at least keeps practical considerations to the fore. By
many people of recognized intelligence he is classified with genus antiquarium
because some of his kind are known only as guardians and
preservers of ancient records from use. Like the physician emerging
from the barber's trade in colonial days, the archivist aspires to professional
dignity in his own name. In some states where he has the
title, he is virtually an artisan doing odd jobs of reference and serving
as scrivener for the legislators, or his quasi professionalism may be
that of a politician among politicians. Among county and city clerks
the title of archivist is unknown as applied to their position. In Virginia,
for example, where the county clerks of colonial and ante bellum
times were generally men of prestige and considerable culture, and
where respect for this office has been preserved in some measure, training
for the duties of office, if any, may be acquired occasionally as deputy,
but the job is chiefly one of daily routine in recording current entries.

During the last quarter of the nineteenth century social scientists and
librarians were striving for recognition among scholars and laymen.
The former, being in the teaching profession, could concentrate upon
the establishment and acceptance of their separate disciplines. History
was the first to succeed; economics and government soon followed,
with sociology bringing up the rear not without opposition and challenge
from the other three of its right to a separate existence. Librarians,
however, were mere keepers of books. Anyone with a reasonable
degree of intelligence was regarded as qualified for the position
and, in any case, training and experience were then synonymous. A
few librarians were private collectors or bibliographers or historians
or even book dealers who brought in useful information from the outside.
By means of their initiative and scholarship they breathed an air
of professionalism into their own libraries.

The American Library Association was organized in 1876 and its

growth paralleled the steady increase of libraries in size and number.[1]
By correspondence, through publications and conventions, common
problems and new ideas were discussed, and, if it became popular to
be a "joiner," yet the advantages of solidarity could not be denied.
Custodians of public libraries (most influential in sheer numbers), of
college, university, and special research libraries girded their loins for
concerted action. As professional status was gradually won, special
training was stressed, library schools were established, and degrees
conferred. The field for expansion was apparently unlimited. More
librarians were needed. With so many credits accumulated the certificate
or degree was assurance (and became prerequisite) for the job.
But such education in terms of quantity, figured in mathematical credits,
is easy prey to intellectual dishonesty (often called by a harsher
name), when the art of thinking and living in the world of books is
subordinated to the tricks of the trade.

That "politics make strange bed-fellows" is an aphorism not reserved
exclusively for the politicians. Allowance must be made for
individual differences, but the question may justifiably be asked: Who
is a Librarian?—in the finest sense of the word. Is he a cataloguer or
an indexer or a dispenser of a variety of references to the gentle public?
Both craftsmen and scholars are needed in every library and some
men may be both, but the library profession stands or falls by the well
rounded scholar whose formal training in the arts, humanities, and sciences
is merely the beginning of self education through years of experience.
To the librarian, moreover, the challenge of scholarship needs
to be especially strong because, in this age of specialization, he must
have an intelligent grasp of many fields of knowledge.

Now the query may be raised: Who is to be an Archivist? Can the
snares and pitfalls of our higher educational system, from which some
teachers and librarians are trying to extricate themselves, be avoided
in the development of this new profession? Most trained persons in
charge of archives or manuscripts to-day have entered the field by way
of library service or research in the social sciences, especially history.
The membership in the new Society of American Archivists is composed
mainly from these two professions. In their lap lies the fate of
the future archivist, his qualifications and training. It is significant,
too, that the American Library Association has a Committee on Archives

and Libraries which is studying this question.[2] Since many
archives and manuscript collections are intimately associated with libraries,
there is a distinct danger as well as advantage in applying the
practices of the latter to the former. The preservation, care, and administration
of archival material involve a technique not to be minimized
in its detail, yet not so complicated as some persons would have
us believe. The craftsmanship can be learned in a short time and in
many institutions can be executed more economically by assistants.
More important is the scholarship necessary, particularly in the social
sciences and the humanities, to interpret the background and content
of the manuscripts and relate them to documents elsewhere and to
printed works; to discriminate in the acquisition and rejection of new
material; and to decide questions of policy in making manuscripts accessible
directly, by photographic copies for use elsewhere, or by publication.

In view of these considerations, archival training should be carried
on in universities with a well established manuscript division in their
libraries, in direct connection with graduate work in the social sciences
and the humanities, rather than in library schools. For, in contrast to
the librarian, the archivist will be essentially a specialist. The graduate
work should be on the Ph.D. level, if one must speak in terms of
degrees, for the prospective archivist will need intensive training in
original research and writing. Courses in historiography, the history
of archives, and bibliography will be helpful, primarily to enliven the
student's approach to and appreciation of these subjects, not to addle
his brain with the memorizing of titles that mean nothing more. Archival
practice can be gained by part-time experience in the university's
manuscript room, and its relations to other departments of the
library can be understood by contacts with those departments as problems
arise from time to time. In some institutions there may be opportunity
for work with visiting professors and archivists from other
universities and from the National Archives, such as Dr. Solon J. Buck
is to offer at Columbia University during the coming year. It is to be
hoped that the archives profession will escape the doldrums of trivial
courses in text-book learning and will strive to produce well read scholars
who can interpret the significance of a manuscript as well as read
the text and file it properly. Working along these lines, the Society of
American Archivists might set up some kind of agency to develop uniformity

of procedure, to appoint boards of examiners, and to serve as
a clearing-house for placing promising scholars in archival positions.

The expansion of archival activity which has accompanied the steady
growth of genuine interest in things historical in America gives promise
of new positions and the succession of trained scholars to old posts
in this field. There is an opportunity and a need for co-operation in
charting the path of professional archivists whose credentials will be
not the courses they have endured or the degrees they hold, be they
ever so worthy, but the high scholarship and genuine appreciation of
archives they have demonstrated.[3]

The problem of archival training, discussed at length because it is
so crucial, is only one of many that concern administrators of manuscripts
and archives throughout the country. The Society of American
Archivists now has committees at work on all phases of their work
from technique to public relations. Their quarterly, The American
Archivist, first issued in January 1938, under the editorship of Professor
Theodore C. Pease of the University of Illinois, provides a medium
of expression and discussion. The Society's Proceedings for
1936-37 have been issued in mimeographed form from Urbana, Illinois.
A joint meeting with the American Historical Association was
held in Philadelphia, December 29, 1937. The historians have a Committee
on Historical Source Materials whose interest in manuscripts
and original documents coincides with that of the archivists'. Mention
has already been made of the ALA Committee on Archives and
Libraries which likewise offers its co-operation. Its sessions during
the convention of the ALA in Kansas City, Missouri, June 13-16, 1938,
were devoted to the organization and preservation of manuscript collections
and archives, principles for the selection of materials for preservation,
developments in microphotography, and the progress of the
Historical Records Survey and the American Imprints Project.[4]

From intellectual movements in the United States, such as these, the
South may no longer be rightly regarded as detached or isolated. Although
one southerner who set out quite recently to "discover" the
South found no libraries worthy of comment, or overlooked them
among his notes,[5] another southern writer has beheld the new University

of Virginia Library as a symbol of a "Renaissance below the
Potomac".[6] Undoubtedly the progress of this section in education
and literature during the past decade or more has resulted in part from
the growth of libraries. The new building at the University of Virginia
was occupied and opened for use in May 1938. Meanwhile the
Virginia Legislature had granted an appropriation and the State secured
the necessary lot for a new State Library in Richmond which
will also house the state Archives, long seriously congested and not
entirely safe from fire and decay. In North Carolina a new building
has been erected, in part to provide for the State Historical Commission
which has custody of the state archives. The ever-broadening interest
in southern archives and manuscripts is reflected in the meetings
of the Southern Historical Association. Following the practice of the
preceding year, a luncheon conference on this subject was held at
Chapel Hill, North Carolina, November 19, 1937.

In planning the Alderman Memorial Library of the University of
Virginia adequate provision was made for the acquisition, care, and use
of original research materials. The entire east wing, second floor, is
given over to manuscripts and rare books, including the McGregor Collection
to be described below. In this room the manuscript collections
are filed vertically in all-steel drawers. In the adjoining locked stack
are shelved most of the letter-books, bound business records,[7] Virginia
documents, and rare newspapers, periodicals, and books. The
first floor of the east wing contains the map and microphotographic
reading room, the photographic laboratory, and the newspaper sorting
room; in the stacks on this level and deck above are the newspaper
files. The offices of the staff are conveniently located on both floors
between the stacks and the reading rooms. With an addition of fulltime
staff members beginning July 1, 1938, it is now possible to launch
a program of preparing a guide to all the manuscript collections, of
calendaring certain collections, and of making subject-author indexes
to others as time permits. It has always been the aim of the University
of Virginia Library to make its manuscripts accessible as soon as
possible after their acquisition. Although no detailed inventory has
been made of them, it is safe to approximate their number at a million
pieces. It is indeed fortunate that the outlook is promising for keeping
pace with the growth of the collection and for providing maximum
service to scholarship.

During the past year the Library has been greatly enriched by the
gift of the Robert Mercer Taliaferro Hunter (1809-1887) Papers from
"Fonthill," Essex County, Virginia. This large accumulation of letters
and accounts, as yet unsorted, will illuminate the political history
of Virginia, since Hunter, first a Whig, and after 1840 a Democrat,
was a prominent and influential personage as a member of the House
of Representatives and of the Senate of the United States, as secretary
of state in the Confederacy, and as treasurer of his own State,
1874-80. These manuscripts make possible, as never before, a full
length biography of him.[8] Nor do the papers cover only the period of
his lifetime. They include business letters of his kinsmen, James Hunter,
merchant of Fredericksburg, and William Hunter, during the last
third of the eighteenth century, with data on supplies for the American
revolutionary army, and some letters dealing with farm life in Essex
County at the turn of the twentieth century. In connection with
the R. M. T. Hunter Papers should be mentioned the few extant records
(mostly economic) of James M. Garnett, Jr., planter and lawyer,
and his son Muscoe Russell Hunter Garnett (1821-1864), Hunter's
nephew. They lived at "Elmwood," in Essex County, not far distant
from "Fonthill." At one time James M. Garnett, Jr., conducted a
school for young ladies at his home from which has survived an account
book of music tuition charged, 1825-28. The accounts of his
law practice during 1820-24 are also extant. Most significant of the
"Elmwood" records are the lists of Negroes, the charges against them
year by year, and their valuation, 1830-61. The "Ledger of Accounts
and Balances [of Muscoe R. H. Garnett] on and after the first day of
September, 1842" extends to 1864, the period during which he was successively
a member of the Virginia House of Delegates, the United
States Congress, and the Confederate Congress. In 1860 he married
Mary Picton Stevens of Castle Point, New Jersey, daughter of the
engineer and inventor, Edwin A. Stevens. Two of her personal account
books, 1840, are in the collection. The libraries of Hunter and
the Garnetts, now in the University of Virginia, will be described below.

The Maury Family Manuscripts consist chiefly of letters written to
Reuben Maury at "Piedmont" near Charlottesville during the first half
of the nineteenth century on business and personal matters. They include

a few letters on the War of 1812, with an account of the British
pillage of Tappahannock, Va.; letters from Ann Maury in New York
revealing sectional feeling on the eve of the Civil War, and from M.
F. Maury, an Episcopal clergyman in Kentucky; communications from
the British legation in Washington, D. C., regarding Matthew Fontaine
Maury (1806-1873); and the British passport of Maury, 1862, who
went to England that year as special agent of the Confederate government.
The William Cabell Rives (1793-1868) Collection, 1861-62, is
composed of fifty-odd letters of Rives to his family regarding war conditions
and of General A. P. Hill and a few others to Rives of a similar
nature. To the Grinnan Papers[9] have been added some letters and
contracts of A. G. Grinnan on the sale, hire, and insuring of slaves; a
printed circular of Franklin Slaughter, underwriter and general insurance
agent of Fredericksburg, Virginia, on slave insurance rates for
one or three years; and two letters of 1865 regarding Grinnan's petition
for removal of civil disabilities under the Confiscation Act. His
cousin, Mildred Glassell Covell, who married a northern man and lived
in New York State, owned slaves and other property in Virginia which
Grinnan had administered before the war. A score of her letters to
him during 1866-68 reveal their attempts to secure a settlement of
claims against the United States for wood cut on her farm in Fairfax
County by the army.

Most letters and reports of Federal soldiers during the Civil War
are to be found in northern libraries. The University of Virginia,
however, has acquired six official orders and letters of the Thirty-Eighth
Regiment, New Jersey Volunteers, at Fort Pocahontas and Fort
Powhatan, Virginia, 1864-65; seven letters of New Jersey soldiers
written to their families from Camp Cadwallader, 1862, from Fredericksburg,
1862-63, and from Fort Powhatan, 1864-65; and six of
Maine soldiers from Fort Jackson, 1861-62, and near Yorktown, 1862.
The reaction of the man in the ranks to the turmoil around him is strikingly
revealed in the letter-book of John Leavitt of Maine. Into a discarded
account book he copied the letters of his sons George W. Leavitt
of Brooklyn, New York, who served in the Fifth New York Volunteers
and lost his life in the Second Battle of Manassas, and Joseph
of the Fifth Maine Volunteers who was wounded at the Battle of Spotsylvania,
May 10, 1864. The letters are followed by the father's touching
narrative of his visit to Mansion House Hospital, Alexandria, Virginia,

where he attended his son and witnessed his death in July. The
fleeting, but realistic, glimpses of hospital conditions and war tragedy
are especially revealing.

The John A. Quitman (1789-1858) Manuscripts confirm through
official documents the various stages in his distinguished career—certificates
of his commissions in the Mississippi militia and the United
States army (e. g., his major-generalship during the Mexican War),
as chancellor of Mississippi, judge of the High Court of Errors and
Appeals, presidential elector in 1848, Worshipful Grand Master Mason
of Mississippi, member of the Aztec Club of the City of Mexico,
etc. There are also a few other Masonic manuscripts, a pew-title from
the vestry of Trinity Church, Natchez, and a copy of military orders
of volunteers in the Army of Texas, May to July, 1836. His interest
in American expansion to the south is suggested in letters to him during
the 'fifties on "a plan for aiding the revolutionists in Mexico," "for
the protection of slave property in [Texas]," and in asking for his support
and leadership in fitting out "an expedition [in Mexico] to assist
the inhabitants of Cuba in throwing off the yoke of Spanish oppression".
One curious document is entitled "Craniological Indications of
the head of Gen. Quitman according to the principles of Neurology—
By Jos. R. Buchanan". In view of the biographical value of this collection,
it is pertinent to remark that no detailed life of Quitman has
been published since 1860.[10]

Among recently acquired manuscripts pertaining to the University
of Virginia the Harrison-Tutwiler Collection, 1831-62, warrants some
emphasis. These are letters of Gessner Harrison (1807-1862), professor
of ancient languages in the University, to his intimate friend
Henry Tutwiler (1807-1884), who held the same chair in the University
of Alabama, 1831-37. Since they had been fellow students at Virginia,
Harrison wrote at length about the institution and its problems
and about his family as well. His piety and deep religious conviction
are also clearly portrayed. Miscellaneous University items include two
letters by William G. Pendleton, proctor, 1835 and 1836; twenty-one
volumes of lecture notes on various courses taken by William R. Aylett,[11]
1850-54; Dr. Daniel S. Morgan's (1810-1863) student notes on

the lectures of Professor Robley Dunglison on physiology, 1829-30;
Muscoe R. H. Garnett's notes on Professor Charles Bonnycastle's lectures
in mathematics, 1838; records of the Student Police, 1935-38;
and copies of the bills of the Little Congress, student organization begun
last year for debates on vital public questions.

The Papers of John Graeme, Jr., 1870-78 and 1885, who was editor
of the Richmond Evening News in 1868-69,[12] tell of his attempts to
get his dictionary of synonyms ("Word Finder," he called it) published
by Lippincott, Henry Holt, and others. There is also a letter
from General J. D. Imboden,[13] 1878, in reply to a request for financial
aid. From Abingdon, Virginia, come the manuscript recollections of
the Reverend Mr. Lewis F. Cosby of the town and its residents before
and soon after the Civil War. Although not written until ca. 1900 or
later, his description and location of houses have proved to be accurate
by comparison with contemporary official records. To the John
Warwick Daniel Collection[14] has been added some original poetry
written by the senator. An autograph letter of General R. E. Lee recommending
a leave of absence for Leigh Robinson, December 19, 1864,
has been received. The genealogical collection has been augmented
by two typewritten volumes on "Davis Families of the Southern
States," by C. B. Heinemann. Three scrapbooks of Rowland Greene
Tyler, brother of the scholar Moses Coit Tyler, contain clippings on
events of the 1880's, 1890's, and early 1990's.

The economic and social historian will be interested in some of the
business records presented to the University Library. The Robert
Latham (d. 1852) Collection of letters and vouchers, 1841-47 and 1852,
shed some light upon the problem of the printing trade in the small
town of that period. Latham was editor and printer of the Abingdon
(Virginia) Banner[15] and died insolvent. Comments on politics as well
as on printing equipment will be found in the letters, and a list of accounts
in Washington County, Virginia, with The Banner, 1847. The
Dickinson Manuscripts from Franklin County, Virginia, 1822-58, are
thirty miscellaneous items salvaged from a large accumulation long
neglected and decayed—bills, receipts, letters concerning the mercantile

business, tobacco marketing, the Kanawha salt works, politics, and
life at the University of Virginia in 1848. A variety of business affairs
are discussed in letters (mounted in a letter-book) to R. L. T.
Beale, lawyer in Westmoreland County, Virginia, from his clients and
others, 1854-56. A glimpse of war needs is afforded in the volume of
accounts paid by Joseph M. Seay, agent for the Confederate States of
America, for saw-mill operations in Shenandoah County, Virginia, for
the government, 1861-62. From Caroline County, Virginia, come
twelve volumes of general merchandise accounts running intermittently
during 1821-27, 1855-70, 1885-1906, and one volume of fertilizer accounts,
1901-04; from near Riceville, Pittsylvania County, a mercantile
ledger of 1770; from Essex County a similar one dated 1804-08;
and from Ayletts, King William County, the country store records of
Walker, Lamb & Company, 1882-90 (14 vols.). Three other occupations
are represented in the account book of George Keister, tanner, of
Blacksburg, Virginia, 1837-40; in a physician's business record for
1840-42, 1846-53 (2 vols.), in Caroline County; and in the Montgomery
Hotel Register of Guests, Christiansburg, Virginia, 1859-60, including
accounts of individuals during 1860-66.

Not infrequently official records of towns and counties come to light
in collections of private papers. In this manner the University Library
has acquired the tax records, 1857-59 (3 vols.), and fee book, 1857-60,
of Joseph M. Seay, sheriff of Caroline County; likewise similar records
from Pittsylvania County, 180—(?), 1818, and totals of tax returns,
1834-36. A Federal archive thus obtained is the "Account of
the Mails Received at the Post Office at Peytonsburg, County of Pittsylvania,
State of Virginia . . .," 1851-64.[16] This temporary disappearance
and chance re-appearance of archives in other hands constitute
one of the vexatious problems of archivists and one of the unpredictable
variables in the so-called science of archives.

Most noteworthy among the materials deposited in the University
Library this year are the iron works records of William Weaver
(d. ca. 1863) of Rockbridge County, Virginia, 1825-78 (80 vols.).
These consist of journals, ledgers, provision books, slave labor accounts,
a letter-book, and an ore book of the Bath Iron Works, Buffalo
Forge, Union Forge, and Etna Furnace in Rockbridge and Botetourt
counties. Weaver was one of the most prominent and successful iron-masters
in the Valley of Virginia and a pioneer in scientific agriculture.

This collection also contains a farm journal and some grist mill records
of Spring Mills, operated in conjunction with the iron industry.[17] Another
important deposit is the original Journal of the Commission which
located the Virginia-Tennessee boundary line in 1858-59; the daily entries
were made by Leonidas Baugh of Abingdon, one of the Virginia
commissioners.[18] The manuscript folio volume was originally used as
the Regimental Order Book of G. R. McClellan during the Mexican
War. From southwestern Virginia also comes a narrative of pioneer
days and experiences in that region of William Ingles, Sr., written ca.
1830 (?).[19]

As indicated above, the Alderman Memorial Library is well equipped
to carry on the work in microphotography begun several years ago. In
keeping abreast of the rapid changes and new devices in this field, all
institutions will be greatly aided by the new Journal of Documentary
Reproduction, "a quarterly review of the applications of photography
and allied techniques to library, museum and archival science," first
published in the winter of 1938.[20] The University of Virginia has
added to its equipment a Recordak projector and an Argus Microfilm
Reader for reading film in the same manner as with other projectors
or for projecting the image on the wall. Sessions on microphotography
are scheduled now at almost all national and regional library meetings,
where the latest models of all equipment can be examined and expert
advice can be obtained. That the subject is of international interest is
evidenced by the demonstrations given this year at the Paris Exposition.

A considerable number of manuscript records have been microfilmed
in the University of Virginia Library during the past year. The Civil
War pocket diary (7 vols.) of Lieutenant L. T. Nunnelee, C. S. A.,
begins in August 1862 and touches upon many of the major campaigns
—Antietam, Fredericksburg, Gettysburg, the Valley, etc.—throughout
the conflict and upon his furloughs in Pittsylvania County and Lynchburg.
In the first volume the diary is preceded by recollections of his

experiences during the first year of the war, including his witnessing
from shore the battle between the C. S. S. Virginia and the U. S. S.
Monitor and other ships in Hampton Roads.[21] Several volumes of
official town records of Virginia have been photographed: of Waynesboro,
the oldest extant Minutes of the Council, 1888-1912, the charter
and general ordinances of 1898, real estate owners of 1896-97, registers
of voters for 1902-11; of Basic City (incorporated in 1890 and consolidated
into Waynesboro in 1924), Minutes of the Council, 18901908,
and Police Docket, 1906-12; of Abingdon, Minutes of the Trustees,
1789-1861, including an early plat of the town. Among the volumes
of Waynesboro archives was found a semi-official record also
copied—Minutes of the Trustees of Waynesboro Academy and Town
Hall, 1832-1915, with several unrecorded decades.

The Minute Book of McCabe Lodge, No. 56, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, Abingdon, Virginia, 1853-57, was photographed mainly
because it reveals the origin of Martha Washington Female College in
that town. Other film copies include the Record Book of the Thalian
(Debating) Society, Dane Law School, Harvard University, 1845-46,
which accompanied the secretary when he returned to Virginia; correspondence
between Judge Henry St. George Tucker, Beverly Tucker,
and others, 1813-45; the Minutes of the Virginia Democratic State
Central Committee, September 1925-37, and original list of delegates
to the state convention of 1936;[22] "Trigg and Allied Families," a typewritten
genealogy compiled by Sue Pelham Trigg, 1938; and several
articles written by W. E. MacClenny, local historian, on Nansemond
County, Virginia, and vicinity—"The Part Taken by Nansemond
County, Virginia, in the American Revolution" (35 pages typewritten);
a few historical sketches of churches;[23] and an account by Mrs.
Emma McGuire Ferguson of "The Occupation of Suffolk by the Yankees"
(16 pages typewritten). The Library has also acquired photostatic
copies of the Charles W. Dabney transcripts of William H. Ruffner's

(1824-1908) correspondence, diary, and papers dealing with many
aspects of public education during and after his service as Virginia superintendent
of public instruction, 1871-82. There are notes on Ruffner's
projected history of education in Virginia, letters from John B.
Minor,[24] speeches on various occasions, and sketches of William H.
Ruffner and his father, Henry Ruffner (1790-1861), written in 1900.

Among accessions in the field of cartography seven Civil War battlefield
maps have been received, issued by the United States War Department—three
of Gettysburg on July first, second, and third, respectively
(1876, new edition 1883); one of Gregg's and Stuart's cavalry
operations at Gettysburg the third day of the battle (1880); and three
of the Peninsular Campaign from Yorktown to Harrison's Landing
(1862). A map of the Virginia Central Railroad, 1852, and one of
Florida, 1887, may be mentioned in passing and three copies of old
maps: (1) Jacob Stauber's (Stover) map of the proposed colony of
Georgia, 1731,[25] (photostat); (2) a map of Louisa County, Virginia,
signed "D. Yancey, Jan. 28th 1804"[26] (microfilm); (3) "Map of Suffolk
[Virginia] and Vicinity . . . just previous to the siege of Gen.
Longstreet, in Spring of 1863. Compiled and drawn by Capt. E. A.
Curtis, 112th N. Y. S. Vols., Co. D"[27] (photostat). New filing cases
have been installed in the map room and classification and arrangement
are proceeding apace.

The newspaper collection, most of which was in temporary quarters
for several years, is now distributed throughout two decks of the
stacks, with considerable room for expansion. A card index arranged
by state, city, and title is well advanced, showing the date of every issue
in the collection. A recent count of the bound volumes of newspapers
totaled nearly two thousand, but they represent scarcely one-fourth
of the grand total. The following acquisitions may be of interest:
the Portsmouth Old Dominion, November 1838-October 1839;
the Staunton Spectator, 1837-39, 1848-50, 1865-1907 (almost complete),
and Vindicator, 1866-68, 1870-87, 1889-95; the Harrisonburg
News, 1904-10; the Luray Courier, 1884-1909 (scattered); the Bridgewater

Enterprise, 1879, and Herald, 1884-85, 1894-1906. In the case
of the Luray and Bridgewater papers, it is quite likely that these es
are the only ones extant. Scattered numbers of the English newspaper
of Yokohama, the Japan Weekly Mail, 1891-99, span a critical period
in Far Eastern foreign relations. The Library has subscribed to the
Yale University project for making microfilm (positive) copies of the
Maryland Gazette, Annapolis, 1745-1820, from the file in the Maryland
State Library. The first of these film copies arrived recently.

Broadsides and pamphlets in large number have swelled the Library's
ephemeral material, some of recent date from printers' offices in the
State, others in manuscript collections, especially in the Hunter Papers.
The private library of Muscoe R. H. Garnett, begun by his
grandfather James M. Garnett (1770-1843) at "Elmwood" and continued
by the son and grandson, was generously given to the University
of Virginia by Mrs. J. Clayton Mitchell, daughter of Muscoe Russell
Hunter Garnett. In the same manner the University became the
recipient of the library and papers of R. M. T. Hunter.[28] Both these
libraries contain valuable collections of United States government documents
especially from the second and third quarters of the nineteenth
century, and some Virginia documents and pamphlets—many of which
have filled serious gaps in the University's files. Both libraries are rich
in ante bellum material covering a wide range of subjects rather than
in rare imprints, but the Garnett library has special significance as an
entity. It ceased to be a "live" collection when, not long after Garnett's
death in 1864, "Elmwood" was closed, never to be used again as
a permanent residence. The library thus "embalmed" for over seventy
years and now maintained as a special collection in the Virginia Browsing
Room of the new building, preserves in a unique way something
of the spirit and culture of the old Virginia planter class.

The gift of the library of the late Tracy W. McGregor to the University
of Virginia by the trustees of the McGregor Fund is an event
of far-reaching significance to research in Virginia and the South. Of
the 12,500 items mostly in the fields of American history and English
literature, more than 5,500 are rare books and pamphlets, including a
special collection of works by and about the Mathers of colonial New
England. Among the rare imprints are John Eliot's Indian Bible
(1663), an almost complete collection of the original issues of the Jesuit
Relations, 1634-73, the works of Captain John Smith (1608) and his

A Map of Virginia (1612), a second folio of Shakespeare, and writings
of Americus Vespucius, Richard Hakluyt, Samuel de Champlain,
and others. The McGregor Fund and the University will provide
funds for the expansion of the collection; the rare books and manuscript
room will be altered to house it more fittingly. With this library
and the growing collection of manuscript and printed material on Virginia
and the South, it has been asserted, "the Alderman Library has
become in the field of American history, a center of research of national
scope".[29]

Apropos of the subject of rare imprints, the University of Virginia
is co-operating in the national compilation of early American imprints
in institutions and private hands under the directorship of Dr. Douglas
C. McMurtrie of Chicago. During the process of recataloguing the
University Library a card record of all such imprints is being made by
student assistants under the National Youth Administration. The McGregor
Collection has, of course, greatly augmented the number of
items to be listed. This project is a part of the program undertaken by
the Historical Records Survey of the Works Progress Administration.
It is hoped that the imprint work can be begun in other Virginia libraries
soon. The collection of old music, mentioned in the archivist's
preceding report,[30] has grown rapidly; some of it has been sorted and
temporary author and composer cards made. The group of Confederate
music imprints bids fair to become worthy of recognition outside
Virginia and the South. How the music collection as a whole is to be
catalogued is as yet undetermined.

In 1936 the Historical Records Survey began its arduous task of
listing all state and local archives of Virginia which the archivist of the
University had undertaken previously to a limited extent.[31] The University
as sponsor of this WPA project has now published the first volume
in this series—Inventory of the County Archives of Virginia, No.
21. Chesterfield County (viii, 229 pages). The text of the inventory
is preceded by an historical sketch of the county, articles on uniformity,
housing, care, and accessibility of the records, and an essay on "The
Evolution of County Government in Virginia,' by the archivist. Detailed
chronological and subject indexes facilitate the use of the volume.
The state director of the HRS, Miss Elizabeth B. Parker, and
her staff in the Richmond office are to be congratulated on their careful

and thorough work of checking the detailed data and of editing the
volume. That the series of which it is a part will contribute immeasurably
to the better appreciation of Virginia's priceless archives and
to the advancement of research, cannot be gainsaid. The Virginia
State Library and the University Library have been designated as two
of the ninety-odd depositories throughout the country for similar
printed and mimeographed inventories from all states.

As the University Library is only one of many agencies in Virginia
fostering research and the interest of the general public in historical
matters, so it continues to stress the value of co-operation toward a
common goal. The preservation of historical materials and the intelligent
administration of them in one library represent a gain for all which
is multiplied when the cause of scholarship is the prime consideration.[32]
There will always be competition too, as long as librarians and their
ilk are human, but institutions of learning depend upon one another
so much to-day that they must ban rivalry of the cut-throat kind. Historical
activity of a high calibre in Virginia, like that of the United
States Park Service in the peninsula and elsewhere, the McCormick
Historical Association in restoring part of the McCormick homestead,
and the recent portrait exhibit in Abingdon by the Washington County
Historical Society, is in evidence and warrants encouragement elsewhere
by research libraries.

In conclusion, grateful acknowledgments for material assistance in
the year's work are extended with pleasure to Professor and Mrs. Carroll
Mason Sparrow of the University, Mr. Ralph M. Brown of Virginia
Polytechnic Institute, Miss Ethel B. Baugh of Abingdon, Mr. W.
E. MacClenny of Suffolk, and Mr. James M. Lewis of Tappahannock,
Virginia. The countless favors of the University Library staff are always
appreciated, and especially the daily counsel and encouragement
of Librarian Harry Clemons. It is also a pleasure to announce the appointment
of Dr. W. Edwin Hemphill as acting archivist for the year
1938-39 while the archivist is on leave.