ARCHIVIST OF THE HALL OF RECORDS 25
Through the courtesy of Miss Elizabeth M. Annan and Miss
Amelia H. Annan, we were permitted to microfilm a large collection
of diaries, letters, account books and other documents mainly relating
to their ancestor, Clotworthy Birnie. The diaries were begun by Birnie
when he boarded a ship in Belfast, Ireland to sail to America. After
a brief visit in Baltimore, he bought a farm in the Taneytown area.
For 28 years, he meticulously recorded his daily activities until his
death in 1838. He also maintained an extensive correspondence both
in this country and abroad. The incoming letters were carefully pre-
served and have been microfilmed. Birnie was related to the Scott
family and the Collection includes a poem written and signed by
Francis Scott Key and a receipt for a clock bought by Dr. Upton Scott
of Annapolis. The clock has been handed down to the Annan sisters.
We were deeply saddened to learn of the death of Mrs. Janie
Revell Moss, who served as a member of our Repair Room staff from
1937 until she retired in 1949 at the age of seventy. She was
descended from the Sands family and had lived in the Sands House
in Annapolis, which is generally believed to have been built in 1680.
The Moss Collection listed below was deposited by Mrs. Moss's
daughter, Mrs. Margaret Moss Dowsert, who was appointed admin-
istratrix of the estate. The collection comprised mainly diaries, letters
and other family papers. Of particular interest are four letters written
in September and October of 1864 to Mrs. Jane Sands by her cousin,
George W. McAluree, then a prisoner of war at Camp Chase, near
Columbus, Ohio. He requested clothing and photographs of the family.
In another letter, Capt. R. Lamb of the U. S. Forces informed Mrs.
Sands that prisoners could "receive from near relatives, one change of
under clothing and one suit of outer clothing of gray or some dark
mixed color of inferior quality. All excess of clothing is contraband."
Mrs. Lois Green Carr, another former member of our staff, very
kindly permitted us to make a microfilm copy of her dissertation. This
study is the fruit of many years of painstaking research and should
prove very useful to searchers interested in the structure of county
government in the royal period 1689-1709-
Mr. William H. Work, the distinguished Chief of the Division
of Archives and Manuscripts of the Pennsylvania Historical and
Museum Commission, discovered among the records of the Comptroller
General of his State, a Maryland militia enrollment list dated June 21,
1776, which had inexplicably found its way there. In the belief that
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