Scope and Content Note
The papers of Jabez Lamar Munroe Curry (1825-1903) consist of diaries, correspondence, an autograph collection, printed matter, clippings, memorabilia, notes and memoranda, legal papers, accounts, lectures and sermons, essays, scrapbooks, a manuscript of an autobiography, speeches and articles, and miscellaneous material. The collection spans the years 1637-1939, with the bulk of the material concentrated in the period 1866-1903. The papers are organized into two parts. Part I is composed of a Correspondence and General File. Part II consists of four series: Correspondence , Autographs , Diaries , and Miscellany .
Included in the Autographs series are correspondence and letters (many to Curry himself) from United States presidents; Confederate statesmen; Spanish noblemen, royalty, and writers; and American and European artists, clergyman, diplomats, educators, historians, jurists, literary figures, military men, reformers, scientists, and statesmen. Among the signatories are John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, Benjamin Franklin, Albert Gallatin, Washington Irving, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Johnson, James Madison, Luis de Onís, James K. Polk, Richard Rush, Daniel Webster, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, and Roger Williams.
Reports, journals, writings, printed matter, and other material in the Miscellany series are organized mainly in bound volumes designated as Record Books A to G compiled by Curry. Subjects in the collection concern topics such as the Peabody Education Fund, the John F. Slater Fund for the Education of Freedmen, the Southern Education Board, Curry's studies on Civil War history and the civil government of the Confederacy, and diplomatic matters in Spain.
The Diaries and much of the correspondence relate to Curry's career as an educator, diplomat, and Baptist minister. Correspondents include William Aiken, James Burrill Angel, Thomas F. Bayard, William Ashmead Courtenay, William Maxwell Evarts, Hamilton Fish (1808-1893), Melville Weston Fuller, Moses Coit Gilman, Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Samuel A. Green, Henry R Jackson, Theodore Lyman, James D. Porter, Eben S. Stearns, Alexander H. H. Stuart, Moses Waddel, and Robert C. Winthrop.