COLLECTION GUIDES

1637-1891; bulk: 1758-1799

Guide to the Collection

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Representative digitized documents from this collection:

Restrictions on Access

Portions of this collection are available as microfilm and color digital facsimiles. In those cases, use of the originals is restricted.


Collection Summary

Creator: Belknap, Jeremy, 1744-1798
Title: Jeremy Belknap papers
Dates: 1637-1891
Bulk Dates: 1758-1799
Physical Description: 11 document boxes, 72 volumes (1 in XT), 2 folders, and 2 oversize boxes
Call Number: Ms. N-1827
Microfilm Call Number: P-380 (some vols. only)
Catalog Record:

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Repository:
Massachusetts Historical Society
1154 Boylston StreetBoston, MA 02215library@masshist.org

Abstract

This collection consists of the papers of Jeremy Belknap, Congregational clergyman, historian, and one of the founders of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Biographical Timeline

4 June 1744
Born in Boston, Mass.
1762
Graduated from Harvard College.
1762-1766
Taught school in Milton, Mass., and Greenland, N.H.
1766
Ordained to the ministry of the Congregational Church.
1767
Began writing The History of New Hampshire.
15 June 1767
Married Ruth Eliot.
1767-1786
Pastor, Congregational Church, Dover, N.H.
1773
A Sermon on Military Duty published.
1775
Chaplain to American troops, Cambridge, Mass.
1784
Volume 1 of The History of New Hampshire published.
1787-1798
Pastor, Federal Street Church, Boston, Mass.
1791
Volume 2 of The History of New Hampshire published.
24 Jan. 1791
Founding of the Massachusetts Historical Society.
1792
The Foresters published.
Volume 3 of The History of New Hampshire published.
A Discourse, Intended to Commemorate the Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus published.
1794
Volume 1 of American Biography published.
1795
Dissertations on the Character, Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, and the Evidence of His Gospel published.
1798
Volume 2 of American Biography published posthumously.
20 June 1798
Died in Boston.
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Sources

Additional detailed information on the life of Jeremy Belknap can be found in Clio's Consort: Jeremy Belknap and the Founding of the Massachusetts Historical Society, written by Louis L. Tucker, director of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and published by the MHS, 1990.

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Collection Description

The Jeremy Belknap papers include both his personal papers and historical documents collected for his research and writing.

The correspondent most heavily represented in the collection is Belknap's friend and bookseller, Ebenezer Hazard. Other Belknap correspondents include Abigail Adams, John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Benjamin Smith Barton, Joseph Stevens Buckminster, John Eliot, William Ellery, Benjamin Franklin, Gideon Hawley, David Howell, John Jay, James Madison, Samuel Miller, William Dandridge Peck, Timothy Pickering, John Pintard, Benjamin Rush, Stephen Van Rensselaer, Earl of Warwick, George Washington, Josiah Waters, Noah Webster, John Wentworth, and Paine Wingate.

Names represented in the historical documents collected by Belknap include Jonathan Belcher, Joseph Dudley, Jeremiah Dummer, Henry Newman, Samuel Penhallow, William Pepperrell, William Shirley, Peter Warren, and John Winthrop.

Belknap's other papers include diaries, sermons, notes, drafts and manuscripts of his writings, correspondence with publishers, commonplace-books, memoranda books, genealogical and meteorological records, notes and journals of his study of the Oneida Nation, and materials related to his service as a minister and the founding of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Also included is a small collection of papers of Mary Hartford, a Black woman who resided with the family since childhood.

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Arrangement

The main body of the collection remains arranged by an early classification system used by the Massachusetts Historical Society. The collection has not been rearranged because most of the items are individually cataloged in the MHS manuscript catalog. Many items in this collection have also previously been cited in publications by this old classification system. The arrangement is somewhat arbitrary and does not represent any systematic, chronological, or thematic arrangement of the materials. (Two exceptions to this arrangement are the letters between Belknap and Ebenezer Hazard, which constitute 161.E, 161.F, and 161.M, and the historical documents relating to the Louisbourg Expedition during the French and Indian War, which can be found in 61.B and 61.C.)

There are several sets of old call numbers by which the collection is arranged: 61.A-C; 161.A-M; 013.9; A.1, A.2, and A.3. The main body of the collection falls into the volumes numbered 161 and 61, and for this reason, these have been placed first in the collection. Items with the remaining call numbers have been arranged by format and then by subject or date with an awareness of the old call numbers. In many cases, items in the collection have had more than one number over time due to changes in the cataloging and storing of the manuscript collections. Where known, these numbers are all listed.

While much of the collection remains tipped into volumes, some parts have been disbound and stored in acid-free folders and boxes. These boxed materials remain in their sequential numbered series despite being physically arranged in a different format. 61 and 161 contain the bulk of the loose manuscripts, but are not necessarily arranged in chronological order and overlap in dates among the several volumes. Historical documents can often be found in the same volume or box as Belknap's contemporary materials.

161.G is the John Davis papers. The location of 161.H is unknown.

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Acquisition Information

The majority of the papers were donated by Elizabeth Belknap, daughter of Jeremy Belknap, in 1858. Many of these items contain book plates and notes indicating this donation.

The volumes of tipped-in papers known as 61.A-C were donated by Jeremy Belknap, presumably at the time of the founding of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Folders 161.K and 161.L were donated by Mrs. Jules Marcou in 1886 and 1887, as well as some of the loose manuscripts (including genealogical material), which can be found in Box 5.

Philippe Marcou donated most of the volumes now located in Boxes 6 and 7, as well as most of the items now interfiled in Box 5, in 1919.

Charles Deane donated 35 manuscript copies of letters from Jeremy Belknap to Ebenezer Hazard (in Folder 161.M) in 1880.

Mrs. William W. Frances and John I. Coddington donated a small booklet entitled "Articles communicated to Jeremy Belknap for his History of New Hampshire" in memory of Edward Goodwin Wesson in March of 1938. This item can be found in Box 5.

Mary Lincoln Eliot donated a small collection of letters from Jeremy Belknap to John Eliot (1777-1786) in May 1922. These letters (013.2) are now in Box 5.

A small collection of papers (eight items) related to Belknap's ministries were purchased in April 1991 and can be found in Folder 13 in Box 5.

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Restrictions on Access

Portions of this collection are available as microfilm and color digital facsimiles. In those cases, use of the originals is restricted.

Other Formats

Many of the volumes in this collection have been microfilmed. Use the table below to locate microfilm copies of individual volumes.

Portions of this collection are available as color digital facsimiles.

Volume Location
61.A, 013.9 P-380, Reel 1
61.B, 013.9 P-380, Reel 2
61.C, 013.9 P-380, Reel 3
161.A, 013.2 P-380, Reel 4
161.B, 013.2 P-380, Reel 5-6
161.C, 013.3 P-380, Reel 6-7
161.F, 013.5 P-380, Reel 8-9
A.1.8 P-363, Reel 2; P-380, Reel 10
A.1.9 P-363, Reel 2; P-380, Reel 10
A.1.10 P-380, Reel 10
013.9i, A.1.16 P-380, Reel 11

Some of the items in this collection have also been published. Correspondence between Ebenezer Hazard and Jeremy Belknap has been published in Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 5th series, vols. II-III. Belknap's journal of his trip to Dartmouth College has been published as Jeremy Belknap's Journey to Dartmouth in 1774, edited by Edward C. Lathem (Hanover, N.H.: Dartmouth Publications, 1950).

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Detailed Description of the Collection

Expand all

III. Volumes in cases, 1758-1798

This series contains the diaries of Jeremy Belknap, 1758-1798, and his writings and notes on various topics, as well as drafts of his works The History of New Hampshire and American Biography. Of particular interest are his observations about the Oneida Nation, including a personal journal he kept after visiting the Oneida in 1796.

The volumes which follow do not appear in exact order according to their old shelf numbers. A rough order, where possible, was used to keep related volumes together, i.e. The History of New Hampshire and American Biography materials. Some of the volumes have been microfilmed.

Close III. Volumes in cases, 1758-1798

V. Miscellaneous manuscripts and volumes, 1724-1891

This series consists of miscellaneous essays, journals, correspondence, poems, memoranda books, account books, and other papers of Jeremy Belknap. Larger items have been removed to oversize materials. Also included in this series are photocopies of records related to the Sons of Liberty, 1766-1770. The originals of the Sons of Liberty records are housed in oversize.

Close V. Miscellaneous manuscripts and volumes, 1724-1891
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Preferred Citation

Jeremy Belknap papers, Massachusetts Historical Society.

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Access Terms

This collection is indexed under the following headings in ABIGAIL, the online catalog of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Researchers desiring materials about related persons, organizations, or subjects should search the catalog using these headings.

Persons:

Belknap family--Genealogy.
Belknap, Joseph.
Dudley, Joseph, 1647-1720.
Dummer, Jeremiah, 1681-1739.
Eliot, John, 1754-1813.
Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790.
Hazard, Ebenezer, 1744-1817.
Pepperrell, William, Sir, 1696-1759.
Shirley, William, 1694-1771.
Washington, George, 1732-1799.
Webster, Noah, 1758-1843.

Organizations:

Arlington Street Church (Boston, Mass.).
First Church (Dover, N.H.).
Massachusetts Historical Society.
Society for Propagating the Gospel among the Indians and Others in North America.

Subjects:

Account books--1748-1812.
Account books--1829-1855.
Commonplace-books.
Congregational churches--Clergy.
Historians.
Louisbourg (N.S.).
New Hampshire--History.
Oneida Indians.
Poetry.
Sermons--1762-1798.
Slavery--Massachusetts.
United States--History--French and Indian War, 1755-1763--Campaigns.
Weather.

Collection processed by Sherry Wilding-White and Brenda M. Lawson, May 1991.

Revised 1 May 2023

Encoded by Susan Martin, December 2006

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