Series I, Personal Correspondence-Outgoing (1853-1879)

consists of letters to family describing new home and its lot; Henry Bruce, Jr. and Eli Bruce going to look at land; steamboat and train travel; iron furnace production; arrival of Mr. Helm, new preacher from Mayslick and his slaves; description of the sites in the White Mountains in NH; family news, thank-you for Christmas presents; health; war news from TN; copy of and history of poem “The Rebel’s Dream”; the “loss” of local slaves, recruitment of negro troops, the capture of a cousin at Cynthiana, KY; President Lincoln’s assassination and fear of government reprisals against the South.