Spring 2008 - R. Weir
reference contact: Pamela Skinner x2961

FIND BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Use scholarly encyclopedias and dictionaries, such as those below, for an overview of your topic, definitions, a list of suggested readings, and (sometimes) a lead on related primary source material.

FIND BOOKS

5 College Library Catalog

To start your subject search, click on SUBJECT BEGINS WITH and try such search terms as those listed below. Note that the "correct" subject heading isn't always obvious. If a subject search doesn't work, try a keyword search to find a few relevant titles. Then click on the subject headings on those records to conduct a more comprehensive subject search.

WorldCat
Use WorldCat to expand your search for books, theses, etc. beyond the Five-College area. Watch for items that are owned by only one library: such unique material is often not obtainable via interlibrary loan. If you plan to use interlibrary loan to request books and theses, please allow at least 2 weeks for delivery.

FIND ARTICLES

Use the databases below to identify articles and essays on your topic.

• Use the SC Links buttons within the databases below to see if Smith has the article you need either in electronic or print format
• If you identify an article from another source, use the Journal Locator to locate the article online or in print
• If you need to use interlibrary loan to requests articles, allow a week or so (though often the articles arrive within days)

The major database for American history:

America, History and Life - Lists articles, book reviews, collections, and dissertations published 1953+. Direct links to articles in J-STOR, ProjectMuse, the History Cooperative, etc.

Other possibilities:

Academic Search Premier - 1965 to present - Includes a mix of scholary and popular articles, many in full-text.

Academic OneFile - 1980 to present - Includes a mix of scholary and popular articles, many in full-text.

Humanities Abstracts - 1984 to present - Covers the core history journals.

J-STOR - Full-text articles from major history journals, among other disciplines. Coverage lags roughly 3 years behind printed version of the journal.

ProjectMuse - Full-text articles from major history journals, among other disciplines. Coverage limited to issues from the past 5-10 years.

LOCATING PRIMARY SOURCE MATERIAL

• If you would like to work with primary source materials in the original, consider using Smith's Sophia Smith Collection. Collections with substantial material relating to the Civil War:
  • Clara Barton Papers - Civil War nurse and Red Cross founder
  • Garrision Family Papers - see esp. the papers of abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison
  • Wead Family Papers - contains material on the U.S. Sanitary Commission
  • New England Hospital for Women and Children Records - includes letters by notable correspondents relating to abolition, freedmen's education, and Civil War relief
  • Ames Familiy Papers - see esp. the papers of Adelbert Ames, Civil War general and Provisional Governor of Mississippi during the Reconstruction era
  • Hudson Family Papers - notably, the papers of abolitionist and social reformer Erasmus Darwin Hudson and his journal, "Anti-Slavery Campaign" (1842-43)
  • The Countries Collection (U.S) - containing a few folders of miscellaneous items relating to the Civil War, including An Appeal For Peace, by “Women of Maryland,” and papers of the Ladies Army Aid Society, 1861-1865
• In addition to materials in the Sophia Smith Collection, there is an abundance of primary source material in Neilson Library.
• Use secondary literature for leads on primary sources.
• As you search the online catalog; watch for the words "personal narratives," "interviews," "correspondence," "diaries," "pamphlets," and "sources" as part of the subject headings. Other clues may be buried in the title, authorship, date of publication, etc.
• The form your primary source material takes will vary from topic to topic. It may be a diary, correspondence, or personal writings; newspaper accounts or editorials; or the records of an organization or religious body. It may be a law, court case, or other legal document. For some topics, there will be compilations of significant documents.
• Click here for examples.

Online 19th century publications:

African American Newspapers: The 19th Century - [click on African American Newspapers Collection] - Includes these major African-American newspapers: Freedom's Journal, Colored American, The North Star and its continuation, The Frederick Douglass Paper, National Era, Provincial Freeman, and The Christian Recorder.

American Periodical Series [APS Online]- 1740 to 1900 - Digitized reproductions of more than 1,100 eighteenth and nineteenth century newspapers and periodicals. In progress.

The Civil War: A Newspaper Perspective - [click on The Civil War Collection] - Contains articles from The New York Herald, The Charleston Mercury, and The Richmond Enquirer, published between November 1, 1860 and April 15, 1865.

America's Historical Newspapers - 1690 to 1922 - Cover-to-cover reproductions of hundreds of historic newspapers, including those from the 19th century. In progress.

Nation Archive - 1865 to present - Full run of this major news and opinion publication, including PDF page images and searchable text.

New York Times Historical - 1851 to 2004 - Digitized version, full-text.

Periodicals Archive Online - 1770 to 1995- Full text archive of hundreds of periodicals in the arts, humanities and social sciences from their first issues to 1995.

US Congressional Serial Set - 1817 to 1980 - Reports, documents, and journals of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives; constitutes a rich source of primary source material on all aspects of American history.

Washington Post Historical - 1877 to 1991 - Digitized version, full-text.

19th century newspapers/magazines:

Neilson Library has many 19th century magazines in two call number areas, if you want to browse: periodical AP 2 (level 2 south) and 050 (level 3 south). Many of these titles are indexed in Periodicals Index Online.

Internet Sites with Primary Sources:

American Memory (Library of Congress), including:

• Abraham Lincoln Papers
• African American Mosaic: Abolition
• African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship
• African American Perspectives: Pamphlets from the A.P. Murray Collection, 1818-1907
• Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers Project, 1936-1938
• A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: US Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774-1875
• Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress
• From Slavery to Freedom: the African American Pamphlet Collection, 1822-1909
• Slaves and the Courts, 1740-1860

American Civil War Page Homepage (University of Tennessee) - Links to a variety of primary and secondary sources relating to the Civil War. Note the section on documentary records.

Documenting the American South (University of North Carolina) - A collection of sources on Southern history, literature and culture from the colonial period through the first decades of the 20th century.

Harriet Jacobs: Selected Writings and Correspondence (Yale University) - Selected papers of this noted 19th-century African-American author, abolitionist, and reformer.

Making of America (University of Michigan) - A digital library of primary sources in 19th century American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction; includes books as well as articles from Debow's Review, Ladies Repository, Southern Quarterly Review, Southern Literary Messenger, etc.

Official Records (The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies)

Race and Slavery Petitions Project (University of North Carolina, Greensboro)

Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Collection (Cornell University)

US Historical Census Browser (University of Virginia)

Valley of the Shadow Civil War Project (University of Virginia) - Digital archive of primary sources that document the lives of people in two locales, one Northern (Franklin County, Pennsylvania ) and one Southern (Augusta County, Virginia), during the Civil War.

EVALUATING AND CITING SOURCES

• Remember to cite your souce, when either quoting directly or paraphasing. In other words, cite your source whenever you present an idea that isn't your own.
• Websites must be cited in your notes/bibliography, too; if you cut and paste - or
  paraphrase - from a website, cite the webpage.
• When in doubt, cite your source.
• Remember to include a context for each quotation/paraphrase. Who said it? Why does it matter? How does this support or contradict the argument you're making?
• Use Chicago Manual of Style for your papers for this class. Click here for the online version.
• Or use the Landmarks Citation Machine, which offers quick citation help for Chicago as well as other styles.

For help with your writing, remember the writing services available at the Jacobson Center.

Evaluating internet resources (Univ. of Maryland)

Using Primary Sources on the Web: Evaluating Primary Source Websites (Instruction & Research Services Committee, Reference and User Service Association History Section, American Library Association)

REFERENCE DESK HOURS

Click here for Neilson Library reference desk hours.

CONTACT THE REFERENCE LIBRARIAN

Contact Pamela Skinner, the instructor for your library session: pskinner@email.smith.edu

CONNECT TO HST227 WEB SITE

Use your Student ID number to login to Moodle to access course documents and communication tools.

YOUR FEEDBACK

Click here to provide feedback on this library session.

EXAMPLES OF PRIMARY SOURCES

Source	Call Number
Black Abolitionist Papers. 5 v.	E 449 .B624 1985
Davis, Jefferson. The Papers of Jefferson Davis. [in progress]	E 467.1 .D2596
De Leon, T. C. Four Years in Rebel Capitals : An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy, from Birth to Death ; from Original Notes, Collated in the Years 1861 to 1865.	973.782 D377f
Holstein, Anna Morris Ellis. Three Years in Field Hospitals of the Army of the Potomac.	973.776 H742t
The Ideology of Slavery : Proslavery Thought in the Antebellum South, 1830-1860.	E 449 I26 1981
Inside the Confederate Government; the Diary of Robert Garlick Hill Kean, Head of the Bureau of War.	MH
Kate: The Journal of a Confederate Nurse.	973.776 C912 1959
The Lincoln Mailbag: America Writes to the President, 1861-1865.	e-book at Smith; print at AC
Miller, Leo. The Great Conflict, or, Cause and Cure of Secession. ["Delivered at Pratt's Hall, Providence, R.I., on the evening of Sunday, Dec. 8, 1861..."]	AC/Arch-SpecColl File E 440.5 M5
Northern Editorials on Secession. 2 v.	973.68 P419n
An Oral History of Abraham Lincoln : John G. Nicolay's Interviews and Essays.	E 457.2 .N67 1996
Recollections of Alexander H. Stephens; his Diary Kept when a Prisoner at Fort Warren, Boston Harbour, 1865.	973.7 St4Z
The Reconstruction Amendments' Debates; the Legislative History and Contemporary Debates in Congress on the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments. [Selections from the Congressional globe and the Congressional record, covering the years 1849 to 1875]	342.739 Av55r
Southern Pamphlets on Secession, November 1860-April 1861.	E 458.1 S68 1996
Southern Unionist Pamphlets and the Civil War.	E 487 .S75 1999
United States Sanitary Commission. History of the United States Sanitary Commission, Being the General Report of Its Work During the War of the Rebellion. 1866.	Science E 631 A34

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