June 20, 1824 - May 15, 1825

Most of the William Wirt Papers at the Maryland Historical Society are what might best be termed personal correspondence. The earliest letters concern Wirt's youth, and deal with family and educational matters. The letters grow successively more interesting to the historian as Wirt becomes a lawyer, moves to Richmond, takes part in the political, legal, and literary life there, participates in the Burr trial, eventually moves on to Washington, the Attorney Generalship, and a presidential nomination. Most of the letters are either to and from Wirt's second wife, Elizabeth Washington Gamble Wirt, and later their children, or his personal friends. Several hundred letters are copies, the originals of which are either lost or in other libraries, made in preparation for John Pendleton Kennedy's Memoirs of the Life of William Wirt. On many of these Kennedy imposed obvious editorial changes and omissions, providing the reader with an example of nineteenth century editorial practices. The copies have been filmed with targets identifying them.

Yet the general term personal or family papers gives an incorrect image of the value of the Wirt papers. The half century from 1785 to 1835 was a period when letterwriting was considered an art. People, and especially Wirt, took great pains in writing and keeping letters. How-to-do-it books on the epistolary art were common; much of the literature, like Wirt's own British Spy, was in the form of letters. Wirt possessed real literary skill, but unfortunately for modern readers the kind of prose then in favor was flowery, filled with classical allusions, and sometimes even ostentatious. But in his letters, where he was not writing for either the public or critics, Wirt's natural grace of style, colorful description, and good humor had free rein. The result, whether in the form of letters to his wife and children or to such close friends as Dabney Carr or Peachy Gilmer, is a magnificent correspondence. His candid, often gossipy letters are filled with information on Richmond, Washington, and Baltimore; people and cases Wirt was associated with; the events, political intrigues, personalities, and topics of conversation of the day. Every phase of Wirt's varied career, as outlined in the biographical sketch, is represented in his personal correspondence. Especially valuable is the detailed portrait of court and government life of the 1820's. Here we also see the inner man, mostly unconcealed by the polite conceits of his era. Emotions, motivations, insights are lying in store for the alert reader.

But the personal correspondence contains more than just an inside view of the public man. The Wirts were deeply in love, and had a large, refined family. Mrs. Wirt also became a best-selling author, for her gift book, Flora's Dictionary, went through several editions, each more ornate than the last. Because comparatively few southern figures preserved such an extensive family record, the Wirt papers portray a kind of domestic history almost unique among ante-bellum Southerners. Family relations, child rearing, education, all are there in profusion. The children discuss their games and lessons with their father; he good-naturedly takes all they do very seriously. As the children grow up, and go to West Point or the University of Viriginia, or marry, or travel, the correspondence provides a continuing panorama of genteel society in the early national period.

The family correspondence continues after Wirt's death in 1834. Primarily that of Catharine Wirt Randall, his daughter, it presents an interesting account of the adult lives of the various Wirt children. The Wirt daughters married prominent men; Wirt's sons entered the professions. There is some interesting correspondence, first with Washington Irving, then with John P. Kennedy, as Catharine sought a proper biographer for her father.

At the conclusion of the regular personal correspondence there are some undated letters arranged by correspondent. Then there are two groups of letters from Wirt to Francis W. Gilmer (1818-1822) and Peachy Gilmer (1802-1833) respectively that have for convenience been filmed as letterbooks. They are copies, apparently made by or for Kennedy, and are written on consecutive pages which made an interfiled, normal chronological filming impossible. Following these are two genuine letterbooks, containing Wirt's professional and business correspondence for the years 1806-1816 and 1832-1834. Addressee indexes for these two letterbooks have been filmed at the beginning of each.

The remaining material, which fills two boxes, is an interesting miscellany. It begins with the various papers of the Wirts' first son, Robert G. Wirt (1805-1824). Robert was an introspective lad who had something like a nervous breakdown at West Point. The letters describing the academy and his subsequent illness are in the regular correspondence; here are filmed the boy's brief journal, essays, notebooks, and so forth. Traveling to Europe in 1824 searching for health, Robert died of what seems to have been a pulmonary disease.

The next items are of great interest but are tantalizingly incomplete. They consist of Wirt's legal, political, literary, and unpublished literary writings. Unfortunately notes and arguments for only a few cases exist in this collection. They are of course filmed, chronologically, in their entirety. Some scattered political writings, on such subjects as the Missouri Compromise, the nullification crisis, Wirt's Anti-Masonic presidential campaign, and on his opposition to Andrew Jackson and William H. Crawford, are filmed next. Drafts, fragments, several page proofs and the like relating to Wirt's published literary efforts appear next. Although in the regular correspondence there is a great deal concerning his Sketches of the Life and Character of Patrick Henry, there are in this collection no related notes or drafts.

There are, however, several unpublished essays, notes on various addresses, even some poetry. These conclude Wirt's miscellaneous writings.

Friends occasionally sent Wirt poems, and many unsolicited honors, such as memberships in college debating or literary societies, came in the mail. These items are filmed in obvious order. The collection continues with material written to or by the various members of the Wirt family. There are brief diaries, extracts from the Old Testament, assorted honors, sentimental poetry, and similar ephemera. The final group filmed has been termed an undefined Miscellaneous. It contains items ranging from an account of Wirt's life carried in the June 4, 1841, issue of The Florida Sentinel to the signature of Justice Joseph Story. The very last items consist of completely undated material best described as odds and ends.