Virginia Historical Society

The mission of the Virginia Historical Society, founded in 1831, is to collect, preserve, and interpret the commonwealth of Virginia's past for the enjoyment of present and future generations.

The Society's library, which is open to the public, includes 150,000 books and bound serials, of which 15,000 are designated rare, 5,000 maps, 1,200 newspaper titles, and eight million manuscripts that represent family and personal papers, the papers of businesses and organizations, diaries, account books, scrapbooks, albums, Bible records, and genealogical materials.

The Society began collecting artifacts from its inception, and the museum's extensive collection now includes paintings, sculpture, prints, photographs, furniture, metalwork, ceramics, costumes and other textiles, militaria, political memorabilia and other Americana, and historical objects of many kinds, including a window from Libby Prison in Richmond and a whipping post that was removed from Portsmouth jail as a war trophy but later returned to the Society. The collection also includes George Washington's wine glasses and the Confederate uniform of General R. E. Lee.

The museum collection of the Society includes a large photograph collection, consisting of 44,000 glass plate negatives and approximately 100,000 original prints, daguerreotypes, ambrotypes and tintypes. In addition, there are more than 1,500 paintings, 5,500 prints and engravings, 12,000 postcards, and 45,000 artifacts, uniforms, and weapons.

During its long history, the Society has survived several evictions during the civil war and a fire in 1865 that destroyed much of Richmond. It has been in its present location since 1959.

URL: http://www.vahistorical.org