John Mead Gould was a Union Army officer and bank teller, of Portland, Maine. Correspondence, diaries, official papers, clippings and other printed materials, and other papers relating to Gould's service with the 1st Maine Infantry Regiment and its successors, the 10th and 29th Maine regiments, during the Civil War. Gould served as the regiments' official historian and was extensively involved in post-war reunions and veterans' claims. Subjects include Civil War campaigns and wartime and Reconstruction conditions in South Carolina, and the career of zoologist Edward Sylvester Morse. Also includes the diaries of Amelia Jenkins Twitchell Gould, 1860-1865, who taught a freedmen's school in Beaufort, S.C., and diaries written by Samuel McClellan Gould, a Presbyterian minister, 1841-1845, 1890-1895. Other materials include photocopies of letters, 1906-1926, from veterans of Gould's Civil War regiment, mostly giving news about the deaths of former members, and a photocopy of an autobiographical and genealogical narrative by Gould and two photographs.
This rich collection contains correspondence, diaries, official military papers, clippings and other printed materials, drafts of writings, photographs, and other papers documenting John Mead Gould's experiences in the Civil War, his activities in veterans' organizations, and his work as historian of the lst, l0th, and 29th Maine Regiments.
The correspondence in the collection relates in part to Gould's service in the 1st Maine Regiment and its successors, the 10th Maine Regiment and the 29th Maine Regiment and contains descriptions of the situation in Washington, D.C., 1861; guard duty on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad at Relay, Maryland, 1861-1862; the battle of Winchester, 1862; the battle of Cedar Mountain, 1862; two fragments from field notes on the Maryland campaign and the battle of Antietam, 1862; the Red River expedition, 1864; operations in the Shenandoah Valley, 1864; and occupation duty in Darlington, South Carolina, 1865.
There is family correspondence, especially for 1864; correspondence relating to Gould's attempt to establish a lumber business in South Carolina, 1866-1867; correspondence with other veterans after the war concerning Gould's history of the three regiments, validating pension claims, and veterans' organizations; correspondence of Adelthia Twitchell and Amelia Jenkins Twitchell, who went from Maine to teach freedmen in Beaufort, South Carolina, 1864-1865; and letters relating to the early career of the zoologist, Edward Sylvester Morse, a close friend of Gould's.
Legal papers in the collection include commissions, discharges, furloughs, pensions, and papers from the superior provost court, Darlington, South Carolina, 1865-1866. Rolls and reports of the lst-l0th-29th Maine Regiment, 1861-1869, form the official papers of those units and concern supplies, finances, furloughs and other service records. The records of 65 consecutive reunions of the lst-l0th-29th Regiment veterans, 1869-1933, include lists of personnel, minutes, and obituaries.
The letters written by Gould during the war, which he called his "journal," were bound into several volumes by his family. Although these are not with his papers, a long series of memorandum diaries by Gould remains in the collection. These little volumes begin in 1854 at Bethel Academy and continue until 1874, when Adelthia (Twitchell) Thompson and William E. Harward died. Along with Gould's Civil War diaries there is the diary of a Levi Johnson, Company B, 29th Maine Regiment, in South Carolina, 1865. The collection also contains the diaries of Gould's wife, Amelia Jenkins (Twitchell) Gould, 1860, 1862-1863, 1864-1865; diaries written by Samuel McClellan Gould, a Presbyterian minister (Gould's uncle), 1841-1845, 1890-1895; and diaries written about excursions to Antietam, Cedar Mountain, and other battlefields of the Civil War, 1884-1912.
Printed materials include clippings, broadsides, and pamphlets, many from the Civil War era. Accounts of Civil War prisons appear in the clippings as reminiscences. Casualties are reported in clippings directly after the Civil War battles in which the regiment fought. Broadsides contain poetry, veteran materials, and political brochures. The pamphlets pertain to veterans' activities.
There is a substantial series of photographs of the men of the lst-10th-29th Maine Regiment in the war and at various reunions. Materials added to the collection in 1988 include photocopies of letters, 1906-1926, from veterans of Gould's Civil War regiment, mostly giving news about the deaths of former members, and a photocopy of an autobiographical and genealogical narrative by Gould and two photographs.