Swain Report Special: War Office 28, Regimental HQ Papers.

War Office 28, Regimental Headquarters Papers
Swain Report Special, Installment 1


This post begins a special installment of the Swain Report series: while most of David Swain's reports have provided a general finding aid to the collections they cover, this series constitutes a full catalog of all items in the War Office 28 microfilm rolls held by DLAR. The miscellaneous nature of the documents, which seem to be leftover returns and correspondence from British and Royal Provincial regiments in Canada, make composing a standard finding aid difficult. A full catalog is necessary for fully realizing the importance of these documents, which help to fill in the gaps left by other collections and provide important insights into the daily minutiae of military life, and to make them more user-friendly for researchers. We are very thankful that David has undertaken this intensive task, which has already revealed a number of interesting documents that might otherwise have been lost in the shuffle.

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British War Office 28—American Headquarters Records
Annotated List of Contents—Part 2 (Reel 1)

by David Swain

The David Library holds microfilm copies of the British War Office 28 Records, parts 2 through 10 (1775-1785), contained on 8 reels, as follows:

28.2 Letters, returns, etc (reel 1, 176 documents)
28.3 Letters, returns, etc. continued (reel 2)
28.4 Butler’s Rangers, Canadian fencibles, Royal Highland Emigrants or 84 Foot, Jessup’s Rangers (reel 3)
28.5 Royal Regiment of New York, Rogers’ King’s Rangers, Barrack Master General’s Department (reel 3, reel 4)
28.6 Engineers; garrison returns; General Hospital Department (reel 5)
28.7 Montreal; ordnance; Quartermaster-General’s Department; St. Johns; Sorel (reel 5, reel 6)
28.8 Three Rivers, petitions and memorials; Germans; Carleton Isle, Cataraqui, Oswego (reel 6)
28.9 Miscellaneous letters, memorials, order books, etc. (reel 7)
28.10 Miscellaneous returns etc. (reel 8)

Patron's Perspective: Larry Kidder on the New Jersey Militia

Today's entry was contributed by Larry Kidder, a regular Library patron and teacher at the Hun School in Princeton. Larry details his experiences in recovering the experiences of New Jersey's militia during the Revolution and shows the role that research plays in public historical interpretation.

WPTIII


Researching New Jersey Militia: Lessons Learned and Avenues Opened


by Larry Kidder


Up until about six months ago my research interests had focused on the Continental Line and I was pretty comfortable with techniques to investigate both individual soldiers and units. Taking on a project involving the New Jersey militia to obtain background information for a new interpretive program being developed by Howell Living History Farm in Hopewell caused me to rethink how to use well-known tools in new ways. My first attempts to investigate the company commanded by Henry Phillips of Hopewell Township in the First Hunterdon Regiment led me to doubt that I was going to find very much. However, with Librarian Kathie Ludwig’s encouragement, help and advice I began to make some breakthroughs and consequently I have become very excited about this research project.