The Huntington’s early American historical collections are important resources for the study of the Colonial and Revolutionary periods, the drafting of the Constitution, and the Civil War. Among the holdings are hundreds of autograph letters written by George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, as well as the manuscript of Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography. The Huntington can also claim the largest collection of autograph manuscripts of Abraham Lincoln west of Illinois. In conferences, seminars, and lectures, curators and visiting scholars discuss their subjects in depth.

Civil War
A Misplaced Massacre: Struggling over the Memory of Sand Creek
In the early morning of November 29, 1864, with the fate of the Union still uncertain, part of the First Colorado and nearly all of the Third Colorado volunteer regiments, commanded by Colonel John Chivington, surprised hundreds of Cheyenne and Arapaho people camped on the banks of Sand Creek in southeastern Colorado Territory. More than 150 Native Americans were slaughtered, the vast majority of them women, children, and the elderly, making it one of the most infamous cases of state-sponsored violence in U.S. history. […Learn More]