This series contains historical documents acquired by William McPherson, primarily through purchase and primarily from approximately 1919 to approximately 1945. Their range and nature reveal McPherson’s eclectic interests and idiosyncratic collecting style. The substantial numbers of Spanish-language materials relating to California were directly relevant to McPherson’s research interests, and evidence a coherent collection strategy. Most of the materials, however, had no direct relevance to McPherson’s research, and were acquired for their association with powerful, influential, and well-known (at least to their contemporaries) individuals or with historic periods and events, in particular the American Revolution and Civil War; or as examples of certain types of documents, such as ship logs, financial instruments, and stock certificates, that interested McPherson.

The documents were initially processed by the staff of the Huntington Library, who placed the items in folders, arranged them into broad series (each ordered chronologically), numbered the folders from 1 to 636, and prepared a card catalog. The number of documents is considerably more than 636, since many folders contain more than one document; several folders of “scattered” miscellanea hold as many as 20 pieces each. The first 165 folders comprise the San Gabriel Mission Matrimonial Investigation Records, now a separate collection (H1964.2). While the remaining documents retain their original physical order by folder number, they have been arranged intellectually into the following subseries: