Research and Course Guides: HIST 355 Civil War Era: Find Primary Sources

Find Primary Sources in Books

Search LibrarySearch to find primary sources in books and ebooks. When searching the catalog, you will want to use specific subject headings in your searches to single out the primary source materials. These subject headings are specialized "tag" added to the records to books by catalog librarians to provide accurate descriptions of books. Using the following subject headings in your search will help you find the source material you seek:

correspondence	personal narratives
literary collections	pictorial works
diary or diaries	songs and music
sources

Find Period Books, Magazine and Newspaper Articles

Sabin Americana: History of the Americas, 1500–1926
Sabin Americana, 1500–1926 is digital archive of books, pamphlets, serials and other works about North, Central and South America, and the Caribbean the from the time of their discovery to the early 1900s.
Civil War Era
This database of Civil War materials provides you access to nearly 2,000 pamphlets and all articles from eight newspaper titles (3 from the North, 3 from the South and 2 from border states) dating from 1840 to 1865.
New York Times (historical)
Complete searchable content of The New York Times from 1851 to 2020 including articles, editorials, advertisements, and photographs.
American Periodicals Series
With this database you have access to 1,500 magazines, newspapers and popular journal titles published in the United States dating 1741 through the 1930s.
Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers
In this database, you will find full-text content and images from numerous newspapers from a range of urban and rural regions throughout the U.S. The collection encompasses the entire 19th century, with an emphasis on such topics as the American Civil War, African-American culture and history, Western migration and Antebellum-era life.
American Antiquarian Society Periodicals
This database is a digital collection of American magazines and journals dating from 1684 – 1912.

Selected Primary Source Materials on the Web

Digital Public Library of America
The Digital Public Library of America is a searchable portal to a vast array digital collections.
Hathi Trust
The HathiTrust Digital Library brings together the immense collections of partner institutions in digital form.
Google Books
Google Books is a collection of digitized books and periodicals. If the book is out of copyright, or the publisher has given its permission, the entire text. If it's in the public domain, you're free to download a PDF copy.

Find Archival Collections

Minnesota Historical Society
Links to information on historical collections, data and primary sources.
ArchiveGrid
Includes records describing archival materials, bringing together information about historical documents, personal papers, family histories, and more.
National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections
Sponsored by the Library of Congress, the NUCMC describes archival and manuscripts collections held by repositories in the United States and its territories