As we start the new year, let’s take a look back at a selection of accessions from 2013 in the Swem Library’s Special Collections.
Tag Archives: from fights to rights
Disease and Correspondence in the Civil War
Currently, in Swem Library’s Special Collections Research Center (Swem SCRC), I have been working on uploading a number of small collections to the From Fights to Rights Transcription Project. Some of the most interesting discussions I come across in these letters are about the various illnesses that permeated 19th century life. It is incredibly eye-opening to read these accounts of illness and disease since they give an otherwise-unknown window into peoples’ lives.
Families in the Civil War
In my current project at Swem Library’s Special Collections Research Center (SCRC), I have been working on checking the transcriptions that have been uploaded by our transcription volunteers. Although I am not currently working on a particular collection, checking transcriptions of letters written during the Civil War is an incredibly rewarding experience. As I go through the digital archives, I come across letters from an incredibly large cross-section of Americans. Some documents are written by generals and lieutenants, others are written by doctors and lawyers, and others are written by wives and sisters.