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The Gray family papers document the family relationships of William and Eckley Gray, while serving in the Union Army, and Lucy Doan Gray, William's wife and Eckley's mother, as she managed the family farm in New Salem, Illinois.

The papers of William and Eckley Gray present an unusual view of side-by-side service of a father and son during the Civil War. As a junior officer and enlisted man, respectively, the Grays present strikingly different personalities, the stable and directed father paired with his unstable and seemingly rudderless son. Information on military aspects of the war is relatively scarce in the Gray papers. However, the collection provides excellent insight into the effect of the war on family relationships, hinting obliquely at some of the long term effects that the war had on some of its participants.

In a sense, the heart of the collection is the letters written by Lucy Gray. More than anything, the anguished tone of her letters stands out, as she pleads with the men to return home and assist the family and farm, or as she complains about the Eckley's profligacy, drinking and gambling. The tension between mother and son, and his occasional, half-hearted efforts to patch things between them take on a particularly tragic tone given the apparent aimlessness of his later life and his death by drug abuse.

Among the more interesting individual letters in the collection are three letters from Eckley to his mother, one describing a night-time bombardment at Vicksburg (1863 July 9), another discussing the anti-Lincoln attitudes of the soldiers of the Veterans Reserve Corps (1864 October 10), and an extraordinary letter (July 19, 1864), bemoaning Lincoln's latest call for troops and his apparent inhumanity.

The Gray Family Papers include a manuscript receipt book dating circa 1840s-1860s, which belonged to William Gray. The recipes are largely medicinal, including entries for treatment of influenza, Dr. Thomas Hopes remedy for cholera morbus, a powder of mandrake, plaster for a lame back, Beeches Black salve, saline laxative, Beeches emetic, anti-billious powder, lotion for "Falling of the hair & Impetigo," a treatment that "cured Mr Gess's boy of Epilepsy of five years Standing The boy is 9 years old," mild counter-irritating linaments, ipicac, lotion for "falling of The hair and all scaly Eruptions," paste for piles, Dr. White's Toothache Drops, diaphoretic powder, a treatment "for Secondary Syphilis," and a treatment for cholera. Opium is an ingredient in multiple recipes. Non-medical recipes include an entry for making gunpowder from sawdust and several short recipes for corn bread and tea bread.

This collection comprises 28 American manuscript recipe books dated from 1793 to 1959 with the bulk dating from the nineteenth century. One of the books contains portions in German, while the rest are in English. Most regions of the United States are present, with the Northeast and Southern States best represented. Desserts represent the bulk of the recipes, cakes being the most popular. Some recipes include attributes to friends, family, or cookbooks, and some contain notes on quality of the dish. Directions for making medicinal remedies and practical household needs (such as cleaning product recipes or advice on fabric care) may also be included. Many volumes contain handwritten or printed inserts.

This collection comprises 28 American manuscript recipe books dated from 1793 to 1959 with the bulk dating from the nineteenth century. One of the books contains portions in German, while the rest are in English. Most regions of the United States are present, with the Northeast and Southern States best represented. Desserts represent the bulk of the recipes cakes being the most popular. Some recipes include attributes to friends, family, or cookbooks, and some contain notes on quality of the dish. Directions for making medicinal remedies and practical household needs (such as cleaning product recipes or advice on fabric care) may also be included. Many volumes contain handwritten or printed inserts.

All or most of the known authors of these recipe books appear to be by women. A man, James Campbell, authored the accounting portion of the Campbell receipt book and a male writer may have created the Manuscript Recipe Book, [1838]. Emma Hinricks Hilken is the only one known to have resided outside the United States when writing her recipe book (she resided in Frankfurt, Germany, for several years following her marriage). The women range in age from teenagers to the elderly and represent a variety of social backgrounds. Most of the recipe books were written or compiled in the second half of the nineteenth century, with some extending into the early twentieth. Approximately one-fifth of them were written in the first half of the nineteenth century or earlier.

See the box and folder listing below for a complete descriptive list of the recipe books present in this collection.

This 18-page volume has a wallpaper cover, and it contains a variety of practical, household, and medicinal recipes. The entries pertain to printing on fabric, sheet music engraving, improvements in photography, several types of matches, adhesives, different kinds and colors of ink, hair removal, removal of freckles, soaps, pomatum and hair oil, wart salve, rouge, prevention of hair falling out, a pimple cure, blacking, white gunpowder, and more. The currently unidentified compiler drew a few entries from 1840s to 1860s published books and serials, such as Scientific American, James Booth's Encyclopedia of Chemistry, The Homestead, The Golden Rule, The Dollar Newspaper, and others. While the purpose of the volume is not explicitly clear, a few entries are for large quantities and others have notes on the difference between costs of raw materials versus sales revenue, suggesting that the compiler may (or may not) have been a huckster, peddler, or perhaps a manufacturer or wholesaler of these products.

This 18-page volume has a wallpaper cover, and it contains a variety of practical, household, and medicinal recipes. The entries pertain to printing on fabric, sheet music engraving, improvements in photography, several types of matches, adhesives, different kinds and colors of ink, hair removal, removal of freckles, soaps, pomatum and hair oil, wart salve, rouge, prevention of hair falling out, a pimple cure, blacking, white gunpowder, and more. The currently unidentified compiler drew a few entries from 1840s to 1860s published books and serials, such as Scientific American, James Booth's Encyclopedia of Chemistry, The Homestead, The Golden Rule, The Dollar Newspaper, and others.

The purpose of the volume is not explicitly clear, though a few entries are for large quantities and others have notes on the difference between costs of raw materials versus sales revenue, suggesting that the compiler may (or may not) have been a huckster, peddler, or perhaps a manufacturer or wholesaler of these products.

Please see the box and folder listing below for a table of contents for the volume.