Letter from Benjamin Welles to William Tudor,

One letter offering information and sources on the judge and poet Benjamin Pratt, including an article in the May 1810 Monthly Anthology and Boston Review.

Letter from Samuel Willard, Deerfield, Massachusetts, to Cephas Willard, August 4, 1813

Willard explains that his mother’s health has been well since she has been staying with the family in Deerfield, and discusses the weather and harvesting of grain and corn.

Letter from Samuel Willard, Deerfield, Massachusetts, to Susanna Willard, Belchertown, Massachusetts, November 10, 1813

Willard discusses an issue regarding ordination procedures with the council at Greenfield: “I did not think it my duty to quit the ground, but defended my rights & told them with the utmost plainness, tho’ without anger, what I tho’t of their measures.”

Quitclaim, 1745/6 January 27

Handwritten quitclaim by Ebenezer Wadsworth of Grafton as beneficiary of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 January 28

Handwritten quitclaim by Joseph Wadsworth as beneficiary of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 January 28

Handwritten quitclaim by Samuel Wadsworth as beneficiary of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 January 28

Handwritten quitclaim by Jonathan Wadsworth, Benjamin Wadsworth, Benjamin Fenno, and Abigail Fenno as beneficiaries of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 January 28

Handwritten quitclaim by Edward Langdon and Susana Langdon as beneficiaries of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 February 11

Handwritten quitclaim by Benjamin Fuller and Hannah Fuller as beneficiaries of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 February 11

Handwritten quitclaim by Timothy Tolman and Elizabeth Tolman as beneficiaries of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 February 20

Handwritten quitclaim by Jonathan Wadsworth, Jeremiah Tucker, and Mary Tucker as beneficiaries of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 March 1

Handwritten quitclaim by Grace Dean as beneficiary of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Quitclaim, 1745/6 March 8

Handwritten quitclaim by Zebediah Wentworth, Judith Wentworth, and Samuel Wadsworth, guardian of Recompence Wadsworth Stimpson, as beneficiaries of the estate of Benjamin Wadsworth, acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman.

Receipt, 1746 April 26

Handwritten receipt signed by John Barrett acknowledging payment by Andrew Bordman with money granted him by the General Court due to "his sickness since he Returned from Cape Britton" and delivered by Captain Osburn and others from the Committee of War.

Letters from Benjamin Welles to John Henry Tudor, 1799-1801

Benjamin Welles wrote these six letters to his friend and classmate, John Henry Tudor, between 1799 and 1801. Four of the letters are dated, and the dates of the other two can be deduced from their contents. Welles wrote Tudor four times in September 1799, at the onset of their senior year at Harvard, in an attempt to clear up hurt feelings and false rumors that he believed had caused a chill in their friendship. The cause of the rift is never fully explained, though Welles alludes to "a viper" and "villainous hypocrite" who apparently spread rumors and fueled discord between the two friends. In one letter, Welles asserts that "College is a rascal's Elysium - or the feeling man's hell." In another he writes: "College, Tudor, is a furnace to the phlegmatic, & a Greenland to thee feeling man; it has an atmosphere which breathes contagion to the soul [...] Villains fatten here. College is the embryo of hell." Whatever their discord, the wounds were apparently eventually healed; in a letter written June 26, 1800, Welles writes to ask Tudor about his impending speech at Commencement exercises. In an October 29, 1801 letter, Welles writes to Tudor in Philadelphia (where he appears to have traveled in attempts to recover his failing health) and expresses strong wishes for his friend's recovery and return to Boston. This letter also contains news of their classmate Washington Allston's meeting with painters Henry Fuseli and Benjamin West.