DESCRIPTION OF CIVIL WAR DOCUMENTS
FROM THE SLIFER-WALLS COLLECTION

The close connection between the Slifer family and Bucknell University began in 1854 when Eli Slifer was first elected to the Board of Curators of the University at Lewisburg (renamed Bucknell University in 1886). Five children of Eli and Catharine Slifer subsequently attended various divisions of the institution. This bond continued throughout the 20th century. During nearly 130 years, five generations of Slifers have earned degrees at Bucknell, a long tradition now extending into the 21st century. Timothy Wheeler, great-great-great-grandson of Eli Slifer, is currently a Bucknell student majoring in East Asian Studies. After spending this academic year abroad at the Institute for the International Education of Students in Tokyo, Japan, he plans to graduate with the Class of 2001.

John Abbet Walls (Bucknell Class of 1898, before finishing his education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Science by Bucknell, 1931), and Dorothy Walls McCormick (graduate of the Bucknell Institute, Class of 1905), collected, collated, and donated the Slifer-Walls Collection to The Ellen Clarke Bertrand Library in 1954. These donors were direct descendents of the key figures whose papers document one of the most critical eras in Pennsylvania history.

The Slifer-Walls Collection comprises twenty-five cubic feet of material from the years 1800-1950, with the greatest number of items related to the antebellum and Civil War years dating from 1853 through 1870. One hundred and thirty-three items selected from the collection have been reproduced as digital images and transcribed for electronic accessibility. The most historically significant materials in the collection are the papers of Eli Slifer. His papers include official materials from 1854-1867, literary and oratorical manuscripts of various periods, and personal correspondence with his wife Catharine. The earliest of their letters was sent in 1853, the last in 1870.

Eli Slifer served as Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania under Governor Andrew Gregg Curtin during the crisis of the American Civil War. Slifer's official papers and correspondence reveal the nearly overwhelming burdens carried by those responsible for decision-making in the midst of national turmoil. Letters sent to the Governor during his frequent, often lengthy, absences from Harrisburg, demonstrate that Slifer handled all affairs of state, particularly the most stressful issues determining the fate of Pennsylvania's volunteer militia troops. Letters to Catharine show Slifer in private moments, disheartened by Union losses, fearful for the safety of his family and neighbors in Lewisburg, and tender in his emotional expressions of love. Undated and post-war manuscripts detail the political, cultural, and spiritual beliefs of Eli Slifer.

The tumult of war, as well as business, marital, and political bonds, tied the Slifer, Walls, and Cameron families together. Eli Slifer, John Walls, and William Cameron founded the Lewisburg Dimes Savings Institution in 1853. Another enterprise they formed together was the Lewisburg Gas Company, which began operations in 1859.

The life-long friendship between Slifer and Walls culminated in the happy, successful marriage of their children, Anna Frick Slifer and William Cameron Walls. The ceremony was held at the Slifer home, Delta Place, on November 19, 1878. One of the sons of Anna and William, Eli Slifer Walls, followed in the footsteps of his uncle, Augustus Walls, and became a physician. Their only daughter, Dorothy, later preserved many family papers.

With the formation of a new party under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln, Eli Slifer and the Camerons were linked politically. Totally committed to Republican ideals, they worked to provide economic prosperity for Pennsylvania. A letter to John Walls expresses Slifer's gratitude for Walls' support and that of William Cameron in State financial matters.

A number of other significant items were selected from the collection, including correspondence, dated 1861 through 1864, between John Walls and his son Augustus, a surgeon in the Union Army. These letters portray the terrible realities faced by men in battle. Eli Slifer pays poignant tribute to those men in a post-war manuscript speech delivered at the gravesites of local soldiers. The 1894 presentation of a new American flag by Anna Slifer Walls, to the few remaining survivors of the militia company named in her father's honor, stands as a final memorial.

There are additional relevant materials in the Slifer-Walls Collection. One series is a grouping of autograph notes and signed telegrams. These notes and telegrams are from northern officials concerning the Conference of Loyal Governors held at Altoona, Pennsylvania, on September 24, 1862. Other materials from the collection were used for photographic enhancement and research. Images reproduced from the photograph album of William Cameron Walls are included in many portions of the web site. Research was based on his typescript memoir, newspaper clippings and genealogical sources.

There are parallel resource collections among the manuscript holdings of the Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections. The first is the Slifer-Dill Collection. Andrew Hemphill Dill, founder of a law partnership with prominent Lewisburg attorney J. Merrill Linn, married Catherine Spyker Slifer, daughter of Eli and Catharine Slifer, in 1864. Dill served as a State Senator before he was appointed United States Marshal for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania by President Grover Cleveland in 1887. Edwin G. Dill, a grandson of Eli Slifer, donated the Slifer-Dill Collection to Dickinson College in 1951.

The papers of Andrew Gregg Curtin, an alumnus of Dickinson College, date from 1842 to 1893, and relate directly to both the Slifer-Dill Collection at Dickinson College, and the Slifer-Walls Collection at Bucknell University.