The Atkinson-Lancaster Papers have been divided into nine parts. The first part consists of Atkinson family papers, from the children of John⁴ through the children of John⁷, 1795-1924. They are arranged by generation in chronological order, with material by offspring of siblings not in the direct line of John Atkinson grouped under their parents. The material is a mixture of letters and legal papers, mostly deeds. It is very scanty until one reaches papers by the children of John⁶. Since three of his sons became physicians and a fourth son a lawyer, the accounts of their training is interesting.

John⁸ Atkinson’s material is of special value. It extends from 1844, when he graduated from high school in Newburyport, to his death in 1888. The loose letters are mostly to his children. The business letters in two letter press books, which cover 1850 to 1853 and 1876 to 1888, are so blurred as to be almost illegible. Most of the other letters are business letters written to him in India. Bills and receipts are complete for 1853 only and show exactly what it cost a prosperous young merchant of 25 to live in Calcutta. There are partnership agreements with American merchants both in India and at home. The travel journals are of particular interest. John⁸ sailed as supercargo on at least five voyages. He kept a formal log of the sailing part of each voyage, and also a separate account of many of his adventures ashore. His first voyage was in 1845-6 from Boston to Calcutta and return in the ship Mount Vernon. His second was in 1846 in the bark Zenobia, from Georgetown, D.C. to Rio Grande, South America (far southern Brazil) with flour and cloth to exchange for hides. In 1847 he traveled on the ship Albatross to Mauritius and Calcutta with a cargo of ice. On this voyage he kept not only a log, but two very amusing accounts of stays on the island of Mauritius, where the arrival of the first ice in months was the signal for a burst of party-giving, and Saint Helena, where he and his friends were almost devoured by bedbugs and visited Napoleon’s residence and tomb.

In 1850-51 he traveled from Boston to Madras and Calcutta and return in the ship Asia. In 1851 he went out again from Boston to Bombay and Calcutta in the ship Berkshire. Other materials include an elaborate memo on Indian trade goods.

His wife Elizabeth Ann Lancaster Atkinson left letters, brief travel diaries of European trips and odd dance cards and valentines stretching from 1840 to her death in 1914. John⁸’s brothers and sisters left little written material in this collection. His youngest brother, James White Atkinson, left an anguished letter written in installments while he was dying of an infected leg on the long voyage home in 1855.

The Lancaster material, which stretches from 1807 to 1878, consists mostly of deeds and papers concerning the settlement of estates. Daniel Moody Lancaster produced most of it, including a book of the 1839-41 accounts of his stage coach line.

The Cook material is more varied than the Lancaster. It includes long letters by Caleb Cook, Junior describing his voyages and asking for news of Salem and a pathetic copy of his last note dictated on his death-bed to the Dutch consul in Indonesia. Susan Elizabeth Cook Roberts generated considerable material, most of it from the end of her long life, concerning the house on St. Peter Street in Salem. Benjamin Cook and his offspring wrote despairing letters explaining why they could not pay off the mortgage held first by John⁸, then his widow.

The fourth sub-division consists of papers by the three off-spring of John⁸ Atkinson: Lizzie Daniel Rose, Maud Lancaster and John⁹. Lizzie’s forty-five folders of letters, which cover the years 1862-1925 have little by her once she outgrew childhood. There a few letters by her fellow female doctors but they do little to shed light on the experience of being a female M.D. at the turn of the century. Maud wrote little. As her disease progressed her notes deteriorated. John’s only adventure was a trip to the Azores in 1891. Otherwise he stayed home with his women, taking meticulous care of financial and legal matters and entering every transaction in a series of large ledgers.

Records of the financial dealing of John⁸ and his offspring in this country make up a fifth category of material. Real estate holdings were of great concern. First was the property in West Newton, Mass. It was a country estate until Commonwealth Avenue was pushed through in 1897. Shortly thereafter John⁹ built a gas station and two stores and opened a sand pit on the land to provide income. John⁸ received the Minnesota land when he lent money to a man who promptly went bankrupt. It proved to be of little value to him – most was rented out as pasture to cover the taxes. Other small land holdings were equally without useful return. There is a good deal of printed material concerning John⁸’s efforts to obtain redress for the loss of his ships caused by the Alabama.

The Lancaster material, which stretches from 1807 to 1878, consists mostly of deeds and papers concerning the settlement of estates. Daniel Moody Lancaster produced most of it, including a book of the 1839-41 accounts of his stage coach line.