WSCC History LibGuide: Primary Source Collections Online

This is a list of 100 milestone documents, compiled by the National Archives and Records Administration, and drawn primarily from its nationwide holdings. The documents chronicle United States history from 1776 to 1965. These primary sources chronicle foundational and pivotal moments in U.S. history. Individual documents may be accessed by clicking their titles.

The documents presented here represent a selection of primary sources available in several ProQuest databases. The databases represented in this website include American Periodicals, Black Abolitionist Papers, ProQuest History Vault, ProQuest Congressional, Supreme Court Insight and Alexander Street’s Black Thought and Culture.

The Library of Congress is home to many of the most important documents in American history. This site provides links to materials digitized from the collections of the Library of Congress that supplement and enhance the study of these crucial documents. This site includes the most pivotal documents in U.S. history. Access documents by choosing the appropriate time period and then clicking on the title.

Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938 contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives were collected in the 1930s as part of the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) of the Works Progress Administration, later renamed Work Projects Administration (WPA). In 2000-2001, the Library digitized the narratives from the microfilm edition and scanned from the originals 500 photographs, including more than 200 that had never been microfilmed or made publicly available. This online collection is a joint presentation of the Manuscript and Prints and Photographs divisions of the Library of Congress.

This collection includes highlights from the Library of Congress American Memory collections, digitized in an easy-to-access format. The collection includes both world and U.S. historical primary documents.

Explore 901,680 items digitized from The New York Public Library's collections. This site is a living database with new materials added every day, featuring prints, photographs, maps, manuscripts, streaming video, and more.

George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams (and family), Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison. Over 185,000 searchable documents, fully annotated, from the authoritative Founding Fathers Papers projects. NOTE: This collection features letters TO and FROM the figures noted above. You can find primary sources written by the founders and their correspondents.

Project Gutenberg is an online library of free eBooks in the public domain (which means most are 95+ years old, per copyright law). Use this resource to find original works from the early 20th century and earlier. Search by author, and make sure to verify you have found the correct author before using the resource.

The Avalon Project will mount digital documents relevant to the fields of Law, History, Economics, Politics, Diplomacy and Government. We do not intend to mount only static text but rather to add value to the text by linking to supporting documents expressly referred to in the body of the text.

The Papers of Abraham Lincoln is a documentary editing project dedicated to identifying, imaging, transcribing, annotating, and publishing online all documents written by or to Abraham Lincoln during his lifetime (1809-1865). The Papers of Abraham Lincoln has arranged its documents in five chronological segments: (1) Legislative, encompassing Lincoln’s early life in Illinois to the end of his tenure in the Illinois House of Representatives (1819-March 1, 1841); (2) Congressional, from the end of Lincoln’s tenure in the Illinois House of Representatives to the end of his term in the U.S. House of Representatives (March 1, 1841-March 4, 1849); (3) Campaign, from the end of Lincoln’s tenure in the U.S. House of Representatives to his election as president (March 4, 1849-November 6, 1860); (4) Interregnum, from Lincoln’s election to his first inauguration (November 7, 1860-March 3, 1861); and Presidential, from Lincoln’s first inauguration to his death (March 4, 1861-April 15, 1865).

The papers of Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865), lawyer, representative from Illinois, and sixteenth president of the United States, contain approximately 40,550 documents dating from 1774 to 1948, although most of the collection spans from the 1850s through Lincoln’s presidency (1861-1865). Roughly half of the collection, more than 20,000 documents, comprising 62,000 images, as well as transcriptions of approximately 10,000 documents, is online.

The Early Americas Digital Archive (EADA) is a collection of electronic texts and links to texts originally written in or about the Americas from 1492 to approximately 1820, published by the University of Maryland.

This Plymouth Colony Archive presents a collection of fully searchable texts, including: court records, colony laws, seventeenth century journals and memoirs, probate inventories, wills, town plans, maps, and fort plans; research and seminar analyses of numerous topics; biographical profiles of selected colonists; and architectural, archaeological and material culture studies.

Support comes from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Research Project, and the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and Public Policy. Virtual Jamestown is a product of collaboration between Virginia Tech, the University of Virginia, and the Virginia Center for Digital History at the University of Virginia. The project received a large grant in 1999 from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The Salem Witch Trials Documentary Archive and Transcription Project consists of an electronic collection of primary source materials relating to the Salem witch trials of 1692 and a new transcription of the court records.

The Federalist, commonly referred to as the Federalist Papers, is a series of 85 essays written by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison between October 1787 and May 1788. The essays were published anonymously, under the pen name "Publius," in various New York state newspapers of the time. This web-friendly presentation of the original text of the Federalist Papers (also known as The Federalist) was obtained from the e-text archives of Project Gutenberg. Any irregularities with regard to grammar, syntax, spelling, or punctuation are as they exist in the original e-text archives.

Richard Hakluyt was an English writer. He is known for promoting the English colonisation of North America through his works, notably Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America and The Principall Navigations, Voiages, Traffiques and Discoueries of the English Nation.

Studies of Americans' responses to Nazi Germany's murder of six million Jews, Roma, and other "enemies" have long been limited to a handful of questions. Why wasn't Auschwitz bombed? Why didn’t the US government rescue hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees? This section explores a wider range of themes, adding rich primary sources and historical context to the surrounding debates. Americans and the Holocaust provides a panoramic portrait of politics and society in the US from the early 1930s to the years immediately following World War II.

The Virtual Jamestown Archive is a digital research, teaching and learning project that explores the legacies of the Jamestown settlement and "the Virginia experiment." As a work in progress, Virtual Jamestown aims to shape the national dialogue on the occasion of the four hundred-year anniversary observance in 2007 of the founding of the Jamestown colony.

The Tennessee Virtual Archive (TeVA) is a digital repository of the Tennessee State Library & Archives providing open access to thousands of photographs, documents, maps, postcards, film, audio and other records relating to the history and culture of Tennessee.

Features documents from early China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. An initiative of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University, Asia for Educators (AFE) is designed to serve faculty and students in world history, culture, geography, art, and literature at the undergraduate and pre-college levels. It contains hundreds of primary source documents from various historical periods.

Developed by the Roy Rosenzwieg Center for History and New Media (RRCHNM) in collaboration with the World History Association, World History Commons combines new content with resources from digital world history projects developed by RRCHNM from 2003 to 2018, along with materials from the Global History Reader from Warwick University and Monash University.

Project Gutenberg is an online library of more than 75,000 free eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related content today. Since then, thousands of volunteers have digitized and diligently proofread the world’s literature. The entire Project Gutenberg collection is yours to enjoy. All Project Gutenberg eBooks are completely free and always will be.

Dozens of documents for most periods of Greek History. EuroDocs Creator: Richard Hacken, European Studies Librarian,
Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, USA.

This website has primary sources along with some explanatory notes. Primary sources appear in RED. Be sure to scroll to the bottom to look at the citation for the primary source. There is a search box at the top right where you can search keywords for your topic.

Online version of Dhammika's 1993 translation of King Aśoka's edicts. The edicts were inscribed on rocks and pillars and proclaim Aśoka's reforms and policies which have influenced both Buddhism and Indian history. Includes links to Buddhist centers throughout Asia and sources for Indian history.

Welcome to The Internet History Sourcebooks Project, a collection of public domain and copy-permitted historical texts presented cleanly (without advertising or excessive layout) for educational use. Primary sources are available here mainly for use in high-school and university/college courses. From the outset the site took a very broad view of the sources that should be available to students and as well as documents long associated with a "western civilization" approach to history also provides much information on Byzantine, Islamic, Jewish, Indian, East Asian, and African history. You will also find many documents especially relevant to women's history and LGBT studies.

The Avalon Project will mount digital documents relevant to the fields of Law, History, Economics, Politics, Diplomacy and Government. We do not intend to mount only static text but rather to add value to the text by linking to supporting documents expressly referred to in the body of the text.

A digital teaching and learning tool for the college classroom and beyond. Using Experiencing History, instructors and students engage directly with primary sources related to the Holocaust. Instructors can set up customized courses to create customized learning experiences featuring original diaries, letters, oral histories, art, and other materials. These sources were carefully selected, translated, and contextualized by Holocaust scholars.

An ancient text, credited to Chanakya (Kautilya), that provides detailed information about Mauryan governance, administration, economy, and diplomacy.

On the Internet Archive. English translation from 1877.