Dates: 1844-1867
This collection consists mostly of letters from members of the Truman and Holmes families residing in Kentucky to members of the same families residing in Missouri. Most of the letters were received or written by Anderson Shipp Truman and his wife, Mary Jane Holmes Truman, the paternal grandparents of Harry S. Truman.
Size: Less than one-half of one linear foot (about 170 pages).
Access: Open.
Copyright: Mary Ethel Noland donated to the U.S. government her copyright interest in all unpublished writings in this collection.
Processed by: Erwin J. Mueller (1971); Cassie Mundt (2008).
[ Top of the page | Administrative Information | Biographical Sketch | Collection Description | Series Descriptions | Folder Title List ]
|
1816 (February 16) |
Anderson Shipp Truman born |
|
|
1821 (March 25) |
Mary Jane Holmes born |
|
|
c. 1845 |
Mary Jane Holmes left Kentucky with her widowed mother and younger sister, and settled in Jackson County, Missouri |
|
|
1846 (August 13) |
Mary Jane Holmes and Anderson Shipp Truman were married in Christiansburg, Kentucky (They subsequently settled in Jackson County, Missouri) |
|
|
1878 (February 15) |
Mary Jane Holmes died |
|
|
1887 (July 3) |
Anderson Shipp Truman died |
The papers of the Truman and Holmes families consist mostly of letters between various Truman and Holmes relatives in Kentucky and Truman and Holmes relatives who moved to Missouri. The letters are supplemented with annotations provided by Mary Ethel Noland, a granddaughter, and Mrs. Herbert H. Haukenberry (Ardis Ragland), a great granddaughter of Mary Jane Holmes (Truman) and Anderson Shipp Truman.
In 1846, Anderson Shipp Truman, Harry S. Truman’s grandfather, married Mary Jane Holmes in Christiansburg, Kentucky, and the couple soon moved to Jackson County, Missouri. Most of the letters in the collection were written or received by Anderson or Mary Jane. Their correspondents included Anderson’s brothers, Edmund A. Truman, William W. Truman, and John T. Truman, and Mary Jane’s sisters, Elizabeth Holmes Bird, Sarah Holmes Chamberlain, and Catherine Holmes Clayton.
The letters contain stories from the homesteads as family members write to one another. Marriages and children are addressed as well as Mary Jane Holmes’s cheeses, which all the relatives bragged about. The family members also discuss their farms, as brothers John and Anderson S. Truman write about crops, prices, and their slaves. Family deaths are also discussed, as the brothers write about the deaths of their parents, William Truman and Emma Grant Shipp Truman.
The family also discusses historical events such as the Civil War, President Lincoln’s death, and President Andrew Johnson’s veto of the Freedmen’s Bureau bill.
Related collections at the Truman Library include the papers of Mary Ethel Noland. The Library also has an online oral history interview with Mary Ethel Noland.
|
Container Nos. |
Series |
|
|
1 |
CORRESPONDENCE FILE, 1844-1867 Letters accompanied by annotations. Arranged chronologically. |
CORRESPONDENCE FILE, 1844-1867
Box 1
- Elizabeth Holmes Bird to Mary Jane Holmes, April 6, 1844
- Sarah Elizabeth Ford to Mary Jane Holmes, June 24, 1844
- Sarah Elizabeth Ford to Mary Jane Holmes, February 25, 1845
- Sarah Elizabeth Ford to Mary Jane Holmes, February 24, 1846
- Nancy Tyler Holmes to Mary Jane Holmes, July 24, 1846
- Anderson S. Truman to William W. Truman and Mary Jane Truman, September 16, 1846
- Sarah Holmes Chamberlain and Mary Ann Chamberlain to Mary Jane Truman, December 3, 1846
- James Clayton to Catherine Holmes Clayton, 1846
- John T. Ricks to Anderson S. Truman, January 18, 1851
- Unknown to Unknown, February 12, 1853
- Nancy Elizabeth Bird to Mary Jane Truman, June 30, 1858
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, January 15, 1859
- Sarah Ford to Mary Jane Truman, June 12, 1859
- Milford Truman to Anderson S. Truman, August 5, 1860
- Sarah Ford to Mary Jane Truman, October 28, 1860
- Edmund A. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, November 4, 1860
- Martha Clayton to Mary Jane Holmes, January 13, 1861
- John T. Truman to Brother and Sister, February 1, 1861
- Edmund A. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, May 26, 1861
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, October 8, 1861
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, December 26, 1863
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, July 10, 1864
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, September 19, 1864
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, January 15, 1865
- Sarah Holmes Chamberlain to Nancy Tyler Holmes, January 23, 1865
- L. Best to Margaret Ellen Truman, April 2, 1865
- Margaret Holmes to Mary Jane Holmes, April 17, 1865
- Mary Ford to Mary Jane Truman, June 9, 1865
- Catherine Holmes Clayton to Mary Jane Truman, June 10, 1865
- Mary Ford to Mary Jane Truman, July 19, 1865
- Mary Ford to Mary Jane Truman, September 3, 1865
- John Higbee to Margaret Ellen Truman, September 12, 1865
- Catherine H. Clayton to Mary Jane Truman, December 24, 1865
- John T. Truman to Anderson S. Truman, February 27, 1866
- L. Best to Margaret Ellen Truman, May 5, 1866
- Catherine Holmes Clayton to Mary Jane Truman, September 25, 1866
- Anderson S. Truman to Mary Jane Truman, November 25, 1866
- Anderson S. Truman to Mary Jane Truman, November 30, 1866
- Catherine Holmes Clayton to Mary Jane Truman, August 11, 1867
- Fragment of Letter, No Date
- Annotations to Letters Prepared by Ethel Noland and Ardis Haukenberry