History Links
DOING HISTORICAL RESEARCH ON THE WEB
The Internet has become a major tool for historians and history students. Millions of documents from photographs and court records to newspapers and personal letters have been digitized and made available to the public at no or minimal cost.
Students writing history papers or presenting on historical topics have access to a wide range of historical documents on their computers. This is of particular value for small colleges like ours. Primary documents are a key pedagogical tool and can draw students into the study of the past, engage in distant debates, and return informed about the current state of affairs.
The following is a list of respectable history websites for students and faculty to aid in research or teaching. Good history site not only provide documents, but also offer necessary historical context and archival information about the documents themselves.
A Word of Caution: You must credit any source you use to its rightful author or place of depository. Students are responsible to cite correctly any source they use or quote, whether it is web-based or not. Incorrect use may result in charges of plagiarism or copyright infringement, a violation of UVa-Wise's Honor Code. For more information, see Turabian's A Manual for Writers (section on Source Citation), or ask a professor.
AMERICAN HISTORY
History Matters (general clearinghouse)
Digital History: Using New Technologies to Enhance Teaching and Research
GENERAL DATABASES
American Memory (Library of Congress)
Vincent Voice Library (Michigan State University)
AMDOCS: Documents for the Study of American History
LIFE Photo Archive (Google)
Parallel Histories: Spain, the United States, and the American Frontier (Library of
Congress)
Historic Films Stock Footage Library / Historic Music
STATES
Ohio Memory: An Online Scrapbook of Ohio History
California Heritage Collection
Virginia Historical Inventory (VHI)
The Story of Virginia (Virginia Historical Society)
FEDERAL
US Foreign Relations (U.S. Department of State)
Presidential Speech Archive (Miller Center of Public Affairs, UVA)
The American Presidency Project
American President: An Online Reference Resource
Presidential Elections and the Electoral College (Library of Congress)
OYEZ: U.S. Supreme Court Media
U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 1817–1980
Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774–1873 (Library of Congress)
MAPS
Panoramic Maps, 1847-1929 (Library of Congress)
Atlas Index, US Military Academy Map Library
Military Campaign Maps (Library of Congress)
NEWSPAPERS
Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers (Library of Congress) This
database features many small, local papers, including SW Virginia and Kentucky)
Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn Public Library)
COLONIAL & REVOLUTION
Plymouth Colony Archive Project
Virtual Jamestown (Crandall Shifflett)
The Raid on Deerfield: The Many Stories of 1704
Colonial Connecticut Records, 1636–1776 (Univ. of Connecticut Libraries)
Salem Witch Trials: Documentary Archive and Transcription Project (UVA)
Diary, Correspondence, and Papers of Robert “King” Carter of Virginia, 1701–1732
(UVA)
James Madison Papers (Library of Congress)
Thomas Jefferson Papers (Library of Congress)
Adams Family Papers (Massachusetts Historical Society)
Papers of John Jay (Columbia University)
Benjamin Franklin: In His Own Words (Library of Congress)
Early American Newspapers: Series 1, 1690–1876
Archive of Early American Images (Brown University)
Religion and the Founding of the American Republic (Library of Congress)
Creating the United States (founding documents; Library of Congress)
The American Colonist’s Library: Primary Source Documents Pertaining to Early American History (Marquette University)
Legacy: Spain and the United States in the Age of Independence 1763–1848 (Smithsonian)
SLAVERY
The Geography of Slavery in Virginia
Liberian Letters (University of Virginia)
Slavery and the Making of America
Slaves and the Courts, 1740-1860 (Library of Congress)
Slavery in New York (NY Historical Society)
Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Collection (Cornell)
Uncle Tom's Cabin and American Culture: A Multi-Media Archive (UVA)
Atlantic Slave Trade and Slave Life in the Americas: A Visual Record
EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY
Democracy in America (University of Virginia)
Envisaging the West: Thomas Jefferson and the Roots of Lewis and Clark (Univ. of
Nebraska-Lincoln)
Lewis and Clark: Maps of Exploration 1507–1814 (UVA)
America's First Look Into the Camera: Daguerreotype Portraits and Views, 1839-1864
(Library of Congress)
The American Experience: John Brown’s Holy War (PBS)
CIVIL WAR & RECONSTRUCTION
Abraham Lincoln Papers (Library of Congress)
Selected Civil War Photographs (Library of Congress)
American Civil War Resources (Virginia Tech)
The Valley of the Shadow: Two Communities in the American Civil War (UVA)
First-Person Narratives of the American South, 1860-1920 (Library of Congress)
Historical New York Times Project—The Civil War Years, 1860–1866
Finding Precedent: The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson
GILDED AGE & PROGRESSIVE ERA
California as I Saw It: First-Person Narratives of California’s Early Years, 1849–1900
(Library of Congress)
The Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory (1871)
Mark Twain in His Times
The Haymarket Affair Digital Collection (Chicago Historical Society)
1896: The Presidential Campaign. Cartoons & Commentary
George Percival Scriven: An American in Bohol, The Philippines, 1899-1901 (Duke)
The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire: March 25, 1911
The Samuel Gompers Papers
Dime Novels and Penny Dreadfuls (Stanford University)
Emergence of Advertising in America: 1850–1920 (Duke University)
U.S. Steel Gary Works Photograph Collection, 1906–1971 (Indiana University
DEPRESSION & WORLD WAR II
New Deal Network (Columbia University)
American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers’ Project, 1936–1940
(Library of Congress)
America from the Great Depression to World War II: Photographs from the FSA-OWI, 1935–1945 (Library of Congress)
William P. Gottlieb: Photographs from the Golden Age of Jazz (Library of Congress)
Famous Trials (University of Missouri, Kansas City)
Phillip Morris Advertising Archive
AFRICAN AMERICAN
Africans in America (PBS)
In Motion: The African-American Migration Experience (Schomburg Center for
Research in Black Culture)
Images of African Americans from the 19th Century (Schomburg Center for
Research in Black Culture)
The African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship (Library of Congress)
African-American Perspectives: Pamphlets from the Daniel A. P. Murray Collection, 1818–1907 (Library of Congress)
NATIVE AMERICAN
American Indians of the Pacific Northwest (Library of Congress)
Images of Native Americans (Bancroft Library, UC Berkeley)
Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties (Oklahoma University)
History of the Cherokee (Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma)
AMERICA AT WAR
Mexican-American War and the Media
Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures (Library of Congress)
"Summons to Comradeship": World War I and II Posters and Postcards
Naval Historical Center (U.S. Dept. of the Navy)
EUROPEAN HISTORY
ANCIENT
Ancient Mesopotamia: This History, Our History (University of Chicago)
Internet Ancient History Sourcebook (Paul Halsall)
Vindolanda Tablets Online (Roman Britain)
MEDIEVAL
Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts (National Library of the Netherlands)
Internet Medieval Sourcebook (Paul Halsall, Fordham University)
Medieval Sourcesonline (Manchester University Press)
The Labyrinth: Resources for Medieval Studies (Georgetown University)
Biblioteca Ambrosiana (University of Notre Dame)
Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index
Index to Medieval Medical Images
De Re Militari: Online Resources for Medieval Military History
Epistolae: Medieval Women's Latin Letters (Columbia University)
ORB: The Online Reference Book for Medieval Studies
Bodleian Library Broadside Ballads (University of Oxford)
EARLY MODERN
The Galileo Project (Rice University)
Liberty, Equality, Fraternity: Exploring the French Revolution (GMU)
The Avalon Projects: Documents in Law, History, and Diplomacy (Yale)
MODERN
ActivePaper Archive (British Library)
Austrian Newspapers Online (Austrian National Library)
Gallica Digital Library (National Library of France; English available)
Karlsruhe Virtual Catalog (integrated German libraries)
Verhandlungen des Deutschen Reichstags (German Parliament Protocols)
Zeitschriften und Zeitungen (German periodicals; University of Heidelberg)
"Summons to Comradeship": World War I and II Posters and Postcards
Yad Vashem (Holocaust Studies)
WOMEN' HISTORY
Diotima: Materials for the Study of Women and Gender in the Ancient World
Internet Women's History Sourcebook (Fordham)
Women's Travel Writing, 1830-1930 (Univ. of Minnesota)
The Victorian Women Writers Project (Indiana University)
Living the Legacy: The Women’s Rights Movement, 1848–1998 (National Women's
History Project)
Gifts of Speech: Women's Speeches from Around the World (Sweet Briar College, VA)
Women's Library: Suffrage Banners Collection (Arts and Humanities Data Service)
African American Women Writers of the 19th Century (New York Public Library)
Votes for Women: Selections from the National American Woman Suffrage Association Collection, 1848–1921 (Library of Congress)
INTELLECTUAL /RELIGIOUS
Christian Classics Ethereal Library
Project Wittenburg (Martin Luther and Lutheranism)
Internet Islamic History Sourcebook (Paul Halsall)
Marxist-De Leonist Literature Online
Marx & Engels Internet Archive
Daniel De Leon Internet Archive
WORLD HISTORY
African Voices (Smithsonian)
Historic Australian Newspapers, 1803-1954 (National Library of Australia)
ICON: International Coalition on Newspapers (digitization projects)
World History Sources (George Mason University)
