Correspondence, 1862-1864

This series consists of manuscript correspondence between "Tillie" Sterling, her husband "Will" Sterling, her mother A. V. Farquhar ("Ma"), and Will's father.

The letters are mainly accounts of day-to-day events combined with expressions of affection. Topics of discussion include military affairs (the mustering of troops, prisoners and prisoner exchanges, and changes in offers and duties), personal matters (lodgings, travel, entertaining), and subjects of general interest (enslaved people and slavery, secessionists, disease and vaccination, and unusual events).

Among the 62 items are 50 letters from Tillie Sterling to her mother, 1 letter from the mother to Tillie, 10 letters from Will Sterling to Tillie, and 1 letter from Will to his father.

Arrangement is chronological. Year of letter, when not provided, is inferred from letter content. In many cases, the inferred year of the letter is penciled in. These annotations were made prior to acquisition by the University of Maryland Libraries in 1986).