Handwriting Examples From The 1870's

[AAAndrew]

I recently purchased a miscellaneous set of documents from around 1872-74 related to the running of the Vermont and Massachusetts Railway. I picked them up because I'm interested in old styles of penmanship. Most are not terribly interesting from a content perspective, but the variation in handwriting is quite fun. I haven't gone through them all yet, but here are three of my favorites so far.

 

This one is interesting not only because of the unusual writing that is veeerrrrryyyy spread out, but that even in 1874 the writer used the extended "s" that looks like an "f" when writing "Vermont & Mass R. R. Co."

 

 

 

 

 

 

This one, from Franklin Poor is interesting because it's a very common style of writing taught in the 1860's. It's also one of the few letters with extensive use of shading. The vast majority of the writing in the collection so far is fairly monoline.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This third is a short note to the same Franklin Poor above. (I suspect these were his letters). This penmanship is quite impressive and I love the flourishes in Mr. Chapman's signature.

 

[ItsMeDave]

I like the style in documents 1 & 3, but document 2 is what I'd like my writing to resemble.

[abstract49]

My research requires me to read - accurately and analytically - many documents from the 19th Century and early 20th Century. Few counties in Texas had typewriters for transcribing legal documents earlier than the Twenties; in some cases, they were still transcribing by hand well into the Thirties.

 

As a result, I have seen all styles and manners of handwriting. Some are beautiful to look at but not very easy to read. Conversely, some are not very pretty, but are easier to read. It's mostly a matter of figuring out some particular letters and combinations, then using context to decipher the writer's intent.

 

I have seen many examples of hand resembling the second illustration in the OP. The writers were obviously well trained, and I suppose they commanded decent wages for their skills. I can always tell when a county had less money to pay clerks by the lack of consistency and legibility in its record books. I dread assignments in several particular counties, because I am familiar with the awful, illegible transcriptions.

 

All three of the OP's examples are nice, pretty, and eminently legible. I should be so lucky in all my research.

[Boris-Ludwig]

It's nice to see this type of handwriting when style really meant something to the writers as well as the readers.

 

All three examples are interesting.

[Carrau]

Thank you for posting these interesting examples. Sample #2 is particularly pleasing to read, and I really like the way his lower case "f" appears, though I'm having difficulty figuring out how he wrote that "f" in cursive without lifting the pen-it seems he may have written more than one way or less carefully in some examples.

[AAAndrew]

Franklin Poor wrote this draft of a letter seven years later. I suspect the middle one above (marked "Copy") was written by one of his clerks.

 

I also find the contents of this letter interesting and have added it to the Wikipedia page for the Fitchburg Railroad.

 

 

[AAAndrew]

My research requires me to read - accurately and analytically - many documents from the 19th Century and early 20th Century. Few counties in Texas had typewriters for transcribing legal documents earlier than the Twenties; in some cases, they were still transcribing by hand well into the Thirties.

 

As a result, I have seen all styles and manners of handwriting. Some are beautiful to look at but not very easy to read. Conversely, some are not very pretty, but are easier to read. It's mostly a matter of figuring out some particular letters and combinations, then using context to decipher the writer's intent.

 

I have seen many examples of hand resembling the second illustration in the OP. The writers were obviously well trained, and I suppose they commanded decent wages for their skills. I can always tell when a county had less money to pay clerks by the lack of consistency and legibility in its record books. I dread assignments in several particular counties, because I am familiar with the awful, illegible transcriptions.

 

All three of the OP's examples are nice, pretty, and eminently legible. I should be so lucky in all my research.

 

 

I can only image what you get to slog through. Would love to see any interesting examples, even just a snippet of a doc would be fun.

[Dmills]

I started to teach myself Copperplate last year which led to an interest in collecting and restoring old fountain pens which then ignited a search for old documents and correspondence which displayed interesting handwriting styles. The images below are from an 1849 letter facilitating the sale of some chestnut coal which I believe referred to the physical size of the coal pieces.

 

Really interesting to see these old handwriting examples both in terms of the script styles in common use at the time and the letter subject matter itself.

 

I have a few other correspondence examples from the mid 1800's I could scan and post if anyone is interested.

 

[millertime]

This is very interesting. Thanks for posting these examples.

[putteringpenman]

This is fascinating! Thanks for sharing!

 

Where did you find these documents for purchase?

[millertime]

There is something about handwriting from the past that I find so interesting. Now, if I could just write like that.

[Dmills]

One more correspondence example written from a Martin Walsh in 1848 from Havana. The stroke width is extremely fine so I assume it was written with a steel nib.

 

Putteringpenman - I purchased both of these letters on Ebay. There seems to be 1000's of old documents up for auction on any given day - some more desirable than others however from a penmanship quality perspective.

[putteringpenman]

Putteringpenman - I purchased both of these letters on Ebay. There seems to be 1000's of old documents up for auction on any given day - some more desirable than others however from a penmanship quality perspective.

 

Dmills, Thank you for the information!

[AAAndrew]

Dmills, that one is amazing! Thanks for aharing

[millertime]

Dmills, thanks so much. I'm glad I found this thread.

[Dmills]

One more interesting hand from the mid 1800’s. A very precise almost “running hand” script with spider web fine letter strokes.

 

[abstract49]

 

 

I can only image what you get to slog through. Would love to see any interesting examples, even just a snippet of a doc would be fun.

 

I have been looking for some examples to offer, but I have to learn how to reduce file sizes [change the formats? Almost all are PDFs], because they run in the MB sizes. Even if I just cut out a slice, most would be pretty large. If I knew how, I guess an alternative would be to make a link to put in my post here.

 

I think I am fairly computer literate, as far as my work and some of my interests require, but I simply never have learned how to fit images into FPN posts.

[Boris-Ludwig]

You could do a print screen and then save it as a jpeg file.

[Dmills]

AAAndrew - most of the current versions of windows have a "Snipping" tool as one of the standard accessories. Just open up your PDF onto your screen and "snip" a small section (or the entire viewing screen if you wish) and it will save the view as a JPEG file. The file sizes for these snips are usually reasonably small - just a few hundred KB.

[Dmills]

AAAndrew – there is also a widely used and free graphics program called IrfanView. I have used it for years. This program will open PDF files and automatically convert them to JPG graphics files and allow you to resize them to any size you wish. Just tried it on a sample PDF file and it was extremely easy. I would suggest you download a copy and give it a try as we would all love to see some of your handwriting samples.

 

https://www.irfanview.com