Early History Branch
Research Materials Available
The Branch has extensive collections of microfilms and photostatic
copies of documents on the American Revolution and the War of 1812. Materials
must be used during business hours. Materials may not be borrowed or sent
out on interlibrary loan.
American Revolution
- Private papers of Continental and State Navy officers, including Joshua
Barney, John Barry, Seth Harding, Elisha Hinman, John Paul Jones, Hector
McNeill, Samuel Tucker, and Abraham Whipple.
- American and British admiralty court records; state archival records
of state navies; letter books and ledgers of American merchants, privateer
owners, navy agents, and politicians.
- An extensive collection of journals and logs of Royal Navy ships from
the Public Record Office and the National Maritime Museum, as well as several
logbooks of Continental and State Navy ships and of American privateers.
- North American and British newspapers.
- British Colonial Office records and British Admiralty records, including
admirals' dispatches, from the Public Record Office; French records from
the Archives de la Marine and the Archives du Ministre des Affaires Etrangres,
Correspondance Politique; and Spanish records from the Archivo General de
Indias, Seville, the Archivo Historico Nacional, Madrid, and the Archivo
General de Simancas, Valladolid.
War of 1812
- Correspondence between the Secretary of the Navy and naval officers,
from the National Archives, Record Group 45
- Official correspondence of British military and naval officers, from
the British Public Record Office, London, England
- Official correspondence of British military and naval officers serving
in Canada, from the National Archives of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
- Private papers of American and British naval officers, including Isaac
Chauncey, Sir Alexander F. I. Cochrane, John H. Dent, Sir Henry Hotham,
Isaac Hull, Pulteney Malcolm, Charles Morris, Oliver Hazard Perry, and John
Rodgers.
Last update: 1 October 96