Charles E. Goodspeed collection of autograph letters, 1660-1865, bulk 1710-1790

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Summary

Creators:
Goodspeed, Charles E. (Charles Eliot), 1867-1950 and Goodspeed, Charles E. (Charles Eliot), 1867-1950
Abstract:
Collection consists of autographs collected by Charles Eliot Goodspeed (1867-1950), a Boston bookseller, and dating from 1660 to 1865.
Extent:
1.6 Linear Feet (2 boxes)
Language:
Materials are in English.
Preferred citation:

[Identification of item]. Charles E. Goodspeed collection of autograph letters, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Background

Scope and content:

The collection consists of autographs, chiefly accounts, invoices, bills, and estate inventories relating to colonial and revolutionary Massachusetts, with individual items dealing with other New England states, New York, and Pennsylvania from 1660 to 1862. Included are cargo records of various merchant ships, bills of sale of enslaved persons, payments made by the Massachusetts colonial government to printers, scribes, tax collectors, and financial, legal, and other records relating to various companies of Massachusetts militia and the Continental Army, including enlistment records from 1776.

Also included are a 1671 letter from a recent English settler in Virginia to his "deare love" back home, a few complaints filed in Groton, Con. against individuals who violated Sabbath by "necessary traveling" and "playing and laughing", sermons and devotional poetry, including individual pieces by Samuel Philips and Cotton Mather, a letter from Mary S. Parker to George Nixon Briggs forwarding the representative from Massachusetts "three petitions for the abolishing of slavery and the slave trade in the District of Columbia signed by 225 wives and daughters of your constituents" from 1837, and other items. Also included are a few watercolors and prints, including a small watercolor portrait of a lady, by Thomas Birch, and a print of the view of the Fort Pulaski, Georgia in 1862.

Biographical / historical:

Charles Eliot Goodspeed was a Boston bookseller, author of Yankee bookseller; being the reminiscences of Charles E. Goodspeed. Goodspeed was born in Cotuit, Massachusetts on May 2, 1867. He was a member of the Club of Odd Volumes, American Antiquarian Society, Colonial Society of Massachusetts, and Massachusetts Historical Society. Goodspeed once served as a Baptist deacon. He died on October 31, 1950.

Acquisition information:
Purchased from Charles E. Goodspeed, 1922.
Processing information:

Processed by Olga Tsapina, November 2002. In 2020, Gina C Giang created a finding aid derived from a legacy summary report.

Arrangement:

Arranged in loose chronological order.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Access and use

Restrictions:

Open to qualified researchers by prior application through the Reader Services Department. For more information, contact Reader Services.

Terms of access:

The Huntington Library does not require that researchers request permission to quote from or publish images of this material, nor does it charge fees for such activities. The responsibility for identifying the copyright holder, if there is one, and obtaining necessary permissions rests with the researcher.

Preferred citation:

[Identification of item]. Charles E. Goodspeed collection of autograph letters, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Location of this collection:
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108, US
Contact:
(626) 405-2191
reference@huntington.org
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