The Lincoln Reading Room
Local Information
The Lincoln Reading Room, located on the first floor of the Seeley G. Mudd Library, is home to an outstanding collection about Abraham Lincoln, Slavery, the American Civil War, and Reconstruction. The collection is comprised of the Robert S. French collection, the Keville Larson collection, and gifts from many other generous donors.
The French Collection, donated by Robert S. French (LU '48), includes more than 1,500 items, with an emphasis on Lincoln.
The Larson Collection, given by Keville Larson (LU '20), contains some 400 items dealing with the Civil War more generally.
All these items are cataloged in LUCIA, the online library catalog. Materials from the collections may be used in the library, but may NOT leave the library.
See a librarian for more information.
Internet Resources
- Abraham Lincoln Books
The full text of 26 books, digitized by the University of Illinois and the Open Content Alliance.
- Abraham Lincoln Papers
An Introductory Release of 2,200 documents from the first General Correspondence Series (about 6,500 images) with annotated transcriptions by the Lincoln Studies Center, Knox College, was made available to the public on February 12, 2000, the anniversary of Lincoln's birth.
- Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum
The official Web site of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, Illinois.
- American Civil War: Letters & Diaries.
Full-text of "approximately 32,000 pages of letters, diaries and memoirs" from the American Civil War. LU access only
- American Civil War Homepage
An excellent resource from the University of Tennessee.
- Antietam on the Web
An impressive collection of documents and resources about the Battle of Antietam, Wednesday, September 17, 1862.
- CivilWar@Smithsonian
"dedicated to examining the Civil War through the Smithsonian Institution's extensive and manifold collections."
- Civil War Resources on the Internet: Abolitionism to Reconstruction (1830s-1890s)
Useful chronological organization of links from Rutgers University Libraries.
- A Civil War Soldier in the Wild Cat Regiment: Selections from the Tilton C. Reynolds Papers. Comprising 164 library items, or 359 digital images, this online presentation includes correspondence, photographs, and other materials dating between 1861 and 1865.
- Civil War Soldiers and Sailors System
A database of basic information about black soldiers who served in the Union forces during the American Civil War.
- Selected Civil War Photographs
From the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.
- Gettysburg Address Exhibit
From the Library of Congress. - Letters From an Iowa Soldier in the Civil War
The correspondence of Newton and Hannah Scott.
- Lincoln/Net
The "Abraham Lincoln Historical Digitization Project" at Northern Illinois University.
- Lincoln North
The Joseph N. Nathanson Collection of Lincolniana at McGill University
- Civil War Diaries
Photographs of Civil War diary pages from the Augustana College Library Special Collections
- The Valley of the Shadow: Living the Civil War in Pennsylvania and Virginia.
A hypermedia "research report" by Edward Ayers at the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities (IATH).
- Civil War Women: Primary Sources on the Internet
Diaries, letters, and photographs from Duke University.
- "We'll Sing to Abe Our Song!"
"Sheet Music about Lincoln, Emancipation, and the Civil War from the Alfred Whital Stern Collection of Lincolniana includes more than two hundred sheet-music compositions that represent Lincoln and the war as reflected in popular music." From the Library of Congress American Memory Collections.
