Liberian Government Archives I, 1828-1911
Electronic finding aid encoded by Megan
MacDonald
Project funding came in part from the Cooperative Africana Materials
Project and Title VI National Resource Centers for Africa, administered by the
Center for Research Libraries.
Summary Information
Repository
Liberian Collections
Herman B Wells Library, E660
Indiana University
1320 East Tenth Street
Bloomington, IN 47405
Phone: (812) 855-9296
Email: mdjenno@indiana.edu
https://libraries.indiana.edu/african-studies
Creator
Holsoe,
Svend E.
TitleLiberian Government Archives
I, 1828-1911
Collection No.
LCP006
Extent
6 cubic feet;
7 records cartons
Location
Liberian Government Archives I, Holsoe Collection
Language
Materials are primarily in English
Abstract
The collection consists of
correspondence, reports, records, minutes, and other miscellaneous manuscript items.
These materials are typically either
photocopies of
items from the Liberian Archives in Monrovia, Liberia, or are
typescript copies/notes created by Dr. Holsoe in the course of his
research. The collection also includes material from the research notebooks of Dr.
Peter Murdza.
Access Restrictions
The collection is open for research.
Biographical Note
Over the course of his prolific scholarly career, anthropologist Svend Einar Holsoe has
greatly advanced our knowledge and understanding of the history and culture of the
peoples of Liberia. During his
youth, Holsoe’s
family lived in Liberia for nine
years. His interest in a close study of this country and its peoples began during
his senior year in high school. Asked to write an essay on his hometown for his
senior English course, Holsoe
chose Monrovia, only to discover the dearth of material on the nation and
its people. It was at this moment, he says, that he dedicated himself to finding and
collecting printed materials on Liberia.
Unparalleled in his dedication to the preservation of documents and artifacts on
Liberia, in 1997
Holsoe donated his
collection of materials to Indiana University’s
Archives of Traditional Music, Liberian Collections
Project, Mathers
Museum, and Art Museum. A product of his years of research and relentless
materials collection,
The Svend E. Holsoe
Collection
is one of the largest and most comprehensive
deposits of resources on the West African nation. The Collection includes: copies of
Liberian Government Archive Documents between 1824-1983
; extensive genealogical records, including analyses and family trees
developed from these records; political, institutional, social and cultural surveys
from the 1980s Liberia Rural Radio Project; field
notes and oral history tapes of Vai and Bandi research; Vai script materials,
including research notes, examples and articles; and slides and photos spanning
decades and covering many geographical areas and activities. Due to looting and the
destruction of Liberia’s
National Archives during the civil war that began in 1989, the Liberian Government Archives, part of the Holsoe Collection,
contains the only extant copies of important historical and cultural documents.
During his career, Holsoe
published numerous important scholarly contributions on Liberia. As early as 1966,
Holsoe's article, “The Condo Confederation in Western
Liberia,” was published in the
Liberian
Historical Review
. Over the next thirty years, Holsoe wrote twenty-seven
articles related to Liberia for
numerous publications.
Holsoe and D.
Elwood Dunn collaborated on the first edition of
The Historical Dictionary of Liberia (1984). He followed up this major project as a co-author of
A Land and Life Remembered: Americo-Liberian
Folk Architecture
(1988). More
recently, he co-edited
African American Exploration in
West Africa
(2003).
A co-founder of the
Liberian Studies Association, Holsoe created and edited the
Liberian Studies Journal from 1968 to 1978, as well as a
Liberian
Studies Monograph Series. In 1999,
Indiana
University awarded Holsoe the Chancellors’ Medallion in honor of his unique
contributions to scholarship. In presenting the honor, Chancellor Kenneth Gros Louis
said of
Holsoe: “We know, thanks to his collecting and preserving, thanks to
his selfless donation to a public university which will make his work available to
all in what we hope will be perpetuity, that Svend Holsoe has done more than his part
to ensure that much of what constitutes the country and the cultures of Liberia will
remain, and that we, as stewards of his materials, will harvest richly from his
efforts.” Indeed,
Holsoe's scholarly legacy and invaluable collection will long remain
an indispensable source of information and inspiration to future scholars of
Liberia.
Scope and Content
Five boxes of materials, 1828-1911, that range
chronologically from Liberia’s
colonial period under the American Colonization
Society through the end of Arthur Barclay’s term
as the fifteenth president of Liberia. The
collection consists of correspondence, reports, records, minutes, and other
miscellaneous manuscript items. These materials are typically either
photocopies of items from the Liberian Archives in
Monrovia,
Liberia, or are
typescript copies/notes
created by Dr. Holsoe
in the course of his research (however, there are some manuscript notes and, in at
least one case, photographs of documents).
The collection is divided into three main sections to reflect the three branches of
Liberian government: Executive, Legislative, and Judicial. The Executive Branch is
further broken down by executive department, with the Presidential materials under
the heading “Executive Mansion;” the Legislative by House, Senate, and General (for
those materials deriving from, or going to, both Houses); and the Judicial by
geographic area and then by court. The organization is intended to reflect the
inventory of the Liberian Government Archives as established by
Dr. Holsoe and
Tom W. Schick (see bibliography).
Because so much of the correspondence comes in the form of Letterbooks or Letter
Despatch Books, items of correspondence can be found in many different places. For
example, someone looking for Presidential correspondence will find much of it under
Executive Mansion General Correspondence, but there will also be materials to be
found in the Despatch Books of the Department of State or of the Treasury
Department.
Researchers using the Holsoe Collection Liberian Government Archives will find many
items of interest: there is a wealth of correspondence, both intra- and
extra-governmental, and the cabinet minutes and Legislative materials provide great
insight into the workings of government. Of particular note are the Legislative
materials from 1871-1872 covering the impeachment of
President
Roye and members of his cabinet; there are also court records from
Montserrado
County during the same period that cover related trials. The court
records from Maryland
County contain a wealth of information concerning wills and estates,
giving one a glimpse into the possessions and livelihood of early Twentieth Century
Liberians. Other notable items include Arthur Barclay’s office
diary from 1909; correspondence relating to the “Regina
Coeli” affair (1857-1858); and the Native Shipping
Bureau Correspondence, which consists primarily of ledger books detailing the
traffic in native labor in the late Nineteenth Century.
Administrative Information
Acquisition Information
Obtained as part of the collection donated by Dr. Svend Holsoe.
User Restrictions
All research at the Liberian Collections Project is
by
appointment only.
See collection Guidelines for further information
about photocopy requests and permissions for publication:
http://www.onliberia.org/access.htm
Preferred Citation
[item], Holsoe Collection - Liberian Government Archives I,
Bloomington,
IN: Liberian Collections, Indiana University
Libraries, 2008
Copyright Transferred
Copyright interests for this collection have been transferred to the Trustees of
Indiana University. For more information, contact the Indiana University
Liberian Collections
Processing InformationProcessed by Donald Force, Chris Eaton, John Russell, Curtis Ashton.
Completed in 2008.
- [HT] = Holsoe Typescript
- [PC] = Photocopy of Original (or of microfilm)
- [MS] = Manuscript Notes
Series:
Executive
Subseries:
Executive Mansion
Box 1
General Correspondence
1839-1871
HRW Johnson Letterbook, Oct 1833 - Apr 1884
[PC]
170 pp.
View item(s)
HRW Johnson Letterbook, Apr 1884 - July 1884
[PC]
183 pp.
View item(s)
HRW Johnson Letterbook, June 1884 - Oct 1884
[PC]
141 pp.
View item(s)
HRW Johnson Letterbook, Aug 1884 - Dec 1884
[PC]
101 pp.
View item(s)
HRW Johnson Letterbook, Feb 1885 - Feb 1888
[HT]
93 pp.
View item(s)
HRW Johnson Letterbook, Dec 1887-May 1892
[HT]
63 pp.
View item(s)
Cabinet Minutes
View item(s)
January-April
1838
Aug 1894-Nov
1904
[HT]
15 pp.
February-August
1905
Presidential Commissions, Grand Cape Mount,
1882
[HT]
8 pp.; 10 pp.
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Grand Bassa Co.,
1884
[HT]
1 pp.
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Sinoe Co.,
1896-1911
[PC]
3 items
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Anglo-Liberian Boundary,
1903
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Franco-Liberian Boundary,
1908
[PC]
1 item
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Franco-Liberian Boundary,
1911
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Liberian Commission to Europe,
1907
View item(s)
Presidential Commissions, Maryland Co.,
1910-1911
[PC]
17 items
View item(s)
Miscellaneous Items
"Extracts on the Disturbances in the Interior...1900"
[HT]
6 pp.
View item(s)
Plan of Settlement for Liberian Development Company,
1907
View item(s)
"Report of G. Stanley Padmore..."
Nov 1, 1910
[PC]
44 pp.
View item(s)
Subseries:
State Department
General Correspondence
1872-1899
Executive, State Department, Assessment of 1879 & Cabinet Minutes, 1879-1885
View item(s)
Executive, State Department, Assessment of 1879 & Cabinet Minutes, 1879-1885
View item(s)
Box 3
Foreign Correspondence
Domestic Correspondence
1874-1875 , Letterbook
Legislative Correspondence
Box 4
1888-1895
[HT]
4 pp.
Miscellaneous
Miscellaneous
3 items
re: slave ship "Quail"
1860-1861
1 item
"Liberian Load, 1871"
View item(s)
Legislative & Executive Correspondence, 1891-1897
View item(s)
Subseries:
Treasury Department
General Correspondence
1873
Subseries:
Interior Department
Native Appellate Court Records
Subseries:
Justice Department
Subseries:
War Department
Subseries:
County Governments
Superintendent's Correspondence
Series:
Legislative
Subseries:
Senate
Minutes
1852-1870 , undated
1853-1954
Subseries:
House of Representatives
Series:
Judicial
Subseries:
Territory of Grand Cape
Mount
Probate and Monthly Court Records
Index to Probate & Monthly Court, 1905-1914
[MS]
4 pp.
View item(s)
Subseries:
Grand
Bassa County
Court of Quarter Sessions and Common Pleas
Records
Subseries:
Maryland
County
Court of Common Pleas and Quarter Sessions
Records
Justice of the Peace Records
Hearing before the Justices of the Peace at Harper, Nov.
1, 3, 4 1899
[PC]
10 pp.
View item(s)
Subseries:
Montserrado County
Correspondence, 1892
Monthly and Probate Court Records
1874-1877
Court of Quarter Sessions and Common Pleas
Records
November
1871-February 1872 , Part 1
[PC]
81 pp.
View item(s)
Box 6
November
1871-February 1872 , Part 2
[PC]
80 pp.
View item(s)
November
1871-February 1872 , Part 3
[PC]
80 pp.
View item(s)
November
1871-February 1872 , Part 4
[PC]
63 pp.
View item(s)
March
1893-September 1894
Subseries:
Sinoe
County
Court of Quarter Sessions and Common Pleas
Reports
Supreme Court, 1860-1906
Series:
Miscellaneous
Deed Book, Montserrado
County,
1865-1969
General Correspondence, G.W.
Gibson, 1870
[PC]
5 pp.
General Correspondence, J.W. Tucker,
1874
[PC]
21 pp.
Items Relating to the "Regina Coeli" Affair
[PC]
92 pp.
View item(s)
Franco-Liberian Agreement, 8 December
1892
[HT & PC]
8 pp.
View item(s)
Franco-Liberian Agreement, 8
September 1909
[PC]
6 pp.
View item(s)
Unidentified Historical Manuscript (incomplete), post-1904
[PC]
20 pp.
View item(s)
Articles of Agreement Between Republic of LIbera and American
Colonization Society,1848
5 photographs
Series:
Box 7
Unprocessed Materials
Bibliography - Print Sources
Dunn, D. Elwood, et
al.
Historical Dictionary of Liberia, Second Edition.
London:Scarecrow Press, .
Holsoe,
Svend.
Liberian Government Archival
Documents
(Unpublished Manuscript, 1995)
Liebenow, J.
Gus.
Liberia: The Evolution of Privelege.
Ithaca, N.Y.:
Cornell University Press,
1969.
Liebenow, J.
Gus.
Liberia: The Quest for Democracy.
Bloomington, Ind.:
Indiana University Press,
1987.
Schick, Tom W. "A Catalog of the National
Archives of the Liberian Government."
History in Africa31976: 193-202
Bibliography - Electronic Sources
http://www.onliberia.org/Liberia.htm