Collections : [Connecticut Museum of Culture and History]

The correspondence in this collection is arranged alphabetically by name of recipient, with a few exceptions, which will be noted below.

Order books, sales records, payroll, scrapbook, correspondence, invoices, advertisements, and photographs of a Hartford, Connecticut bookbindery, founded by Fred Otto Becher. Later partner was Emil Eitel .

This collection has been divided into two series: Correspondence and Related Papers. Within each series, papers have been organized according to individual family members. Folders have been arranged chronologically by birth date from oldest to youngest, with the exception of the large number of letters produced daily between Augustine and Ella Harlow, which have been filed at the end of the Correspondence series. Within each folder, items have been arranged chronologically and most folders contain correspondence both written and received by the specific couple or family member. Items with no dates have been filed in the back of the folders.

This collection was purchased at an auction in southeastern Connecticut from a family estate along with Walker’s magician’s trunk filled with his apparatus, his puppets, books on magic and ventriloquism, his clock repair kit, and broadsides advertising his performances. The trunk and its contents and the clock repair kit are in the museum collection. The broadside and books are part of the library collection and a photographic portrait of Albert went to graphics. Albert kept a regular diary from 1856-1895, with a few missing individual volumes. In the diaries he recorded the weather, his activities such as farming, making flatware and stripping tobacco, attending or playing his fiddle for dances, fights with his father, birth, marriages and deaths in town, and comments on local politics, fires and explosions, and national events such as the death of Abraham Lincoln. The name William Griswold appears frequently in his entries before 1865, but his role in Albert’s life is not yet illuminated. The diaries after 1867 are only sparsely filled and give the impression that he eventually assumed the role of gentleman farmer. A partial transcript of the diaries is available in the collection file in the archivist’s office.

The collection chiefly consists of letters between members of the extended Danielson-Stearns family with some letters from individuals outside the family. There is small group of other document types including three school reports, three school essays, and paid bill for goods, chiefly clothing from 1878

Albert Sharp wrote detailed descriptions of his whereabouts and his battlefield experiences in 28 letters written home to family and friends from 1863-1864. With the 10th Regiment, he was present at the battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Richmond, and Deep Bottom, Virginia where he died of his wounds. A letter dated 13 January 1863 from New Bern, NC, includes a square of velvet he took from the Gunboat Fannie. His letter dated 8 May 1864 describes the Battle of the Wilderness.

The collection was purchased from a dealer in New Jersey who had tried to organize the papers by correspondent. A new order was created and the collection divided into four series: Series I Rockwell family papers, Series II Sumner family papers, Series III Godkin family papers, and Series IV other family papers.