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This collection contains materials dated 1784-1934. It includes correspondence, legal papers, and accounts, chiefly 1830-1892, of Benjamin S. Ewell, professor at the U.S. Military Academy, Hampden-Sydney College, Washington and Lee College, and the College of William and Mary (which he served as acting president, 1848-1849, and president, 1854-1888). Letters from Ewell during the Civil War when he was assistant adjutant-general to Gen. Joseph E. Johnston are included as well. Among the correspondents are members of the Tyler, Ewell, Campbell, and Brown families of Virginia and Tennessee. The collection also contains the memorandum book on the Ewell family by Elizabeth S. Ewell.

Correspondence, 1794-1887, of the Burwell-Catlett family of Virginia, North Carolina, Alabama, and Mississippi. Includes letters of Mary Cole Turnbull Burwell and her children including Armistead Burwell, Benjamin Powell Burwell, Frances King Burwell Catlett, Robert Burwell, William T. Burwell (at the United States Military Academy), Charles Blair Burwell, and concerning these children and her other children Elizabeth Margaret Burwell Putnam and Anne Burwell Garland.

The collection, 1833-1897, mostly consists of letters written to and by James Duncan Graham. Many are to and from his children (William Montrose Graham, Salvadora Graham, James Duncan Graham, Margaret C. Graham and Richard Worsham Meade Graham) and concern their education, health and his concern that they accommodate themselves to the social customs of the time. Two of his sons attended the United States Naval Academy (one also attended Racine College). The other attended the United States Military Academy. Letters also concern Graham's engineering projects, his connection with scientific societies and donations to libraries, the Mexican War, the decision of the family to remain loyal to the Union and the cultural interests of the family (opera and music in particular) and the family portraits done by G.P.A. Healy.