Scope and Content Note
The papers of Hugh McCulloch (1808-1895) span the years 1855-1869, with the bulk of the material concentrated in the period 1863-1869. The collection consists primarily of correspondence with some speeches, reports, and other material relating to McCulloch's career as a banker and financier, as comptroller of the currency, and as secretary of the treasury. The papers are organized in bound volumes with an additional folder of unbound items.
Subjects include Reconstruction, enfranchisement of African Americans, currency, national debt, finance, politics, and the tariff. Included are letters concerning the assassination of Abraham Lincoln and a letter from the wife of James G. Blaine, written after a visit to the bedside of James A. Garfield shortly before his death. Correspondents include Edward Atkinson, James Gillespie Blaine, George S. Boutwell, William E. Chandler, Salmon P. Chase, Schuyler Colfax, Samuel Sullivan Cox, William Pitt Fessenden, John Murray Forbes, Morris Ketchum, Joseph Medill, John Sherman, John Aikman Stewart, Charles Sumner, and Robert C. Winthrop (1809-1894).