- The William Oland Bourne collection in the New-York Historical Society's Manuscripts Department includes correspondence, papers, broadsides, and unpublished manuscripts related to his work as a social reformer, editor and author in New York City during the 1850s and 60s. Through his publication, The Soldier's Friend, he sought to aid disabled soldiers by offering prizes to those who had lost their right arms in combat during the American Civil War and had learned to write with their left hands. It is the material relating to this enterprise that was selected from the collection for digitization. The selection includes letters, photographs and papers regarding the competition sponsored by Bourne's publication, The Soldier's Friend, for best specimens of left-handed penmanship by disabled soldiers., William Oland Bourne (1819-1901), social reformer, editor, and author in New York City. He was the editor of 'Soldiers Friend,' a publication hat advocated for the rehabilitation of soldiers who suffered injuries and trauma during the American Civil War. He lived and worked in New York City.
- Drafts of Major John Coffin's statements in reply to the defense of Lieutenant-Colonel George Campbell at Campbell's court martial. Major John Coffin and Lieutenant-Colonel George Campbell both served in the loyalist Kings American Regiment during the Revolutionary War. Campbell was very unpopular among his fellow officers in the regiment, and was court martialed in the summer of 1783. Among the charges levelled against him was unfair treatment of fellow officer Abraham de Peyster, who Campbell had had arrested and tried on a variety of charges earlier that year. (De Peyster was acquitted.) The court suspended Campbell without pay for six months. The enmity between Coffin and Campbell continued after the sentencing, with Coffin allegedly challenging Campbell to a duel and posting infammatory writings about Campbell in public places. Eventually the two did exchange shots with pistols, each wounding the other, but neither man was killed. Later that year Coffin moved with his family to Canada, where he spent the rest of his life.
- Draft in John Jay's hand of Federalist Number 64, originally published on March 5, 1788 in the Independent Journal. It bore the number 63 in the newspaper version, but was renumbered 64 in the first collected edition, published 22 March 1788. Comparison with the published version shows little change in the substance of the argument for the constitutional provisions for senatorial approval of treaties. Changes in organization and wording are substantial. Jay's draft speaks of "the Convention" making certain provisions while the published essay substitutes "the Constitution." Jay's justification of the election of Senators by state legislatures is omitted in the final, published paper. In answering objections to making treaties the supreme law of the land, Jay, in his draft, cites examples of British constitutional law; in his published version, the citations refer to colonial and state practice. Jay's concluding paragraph asking for a fair trial for a constitutional plan with theoretical merits is omitted in the published essay.
- Charles Sumner (1811-1874) was a United States senator from Massachusetts and a campaigner against slavery. This is a draft of a version of the speech delivered in New York on May 9, 1855, and published that year under the title "The anti-slavery enterprise." Internal evidence indicates that it was to be delivered to a Boston audience, probably on May 15, 1855. The digital collection includes the draft along with the published version (Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1855).