Letters, business and personal account books, canceled checks, statements of the Warren County jail and the "Whig" office, paintings, cards, invitations, compositions, prescriptions, recipes, newspaper clippings, theater programs, broadsides, pamphlets and pictures of the Crutcher and Shannon families of Vicksburg, Warren County. The collection centers around the family of Marmaduke Shannon and Levina Morris Shannon of Vicksburg. They had eleven children, four of whom died early in life. The remaining seven figure prominently in the notes, invitations and letters of the collection. They are: Emma (Mrs. William O. Crutcher, mother of Philip and William M. Crutcher); Anne (Mrs. William A. Martin); Levina (Mrs. Thomas Mount); and Mary, Alice, Grace and Marmaduke. Members of the family whose letters are contained in the collection are as follows: Edith Anderson, cousin of Philip Crutcher; Emma Shannon Crutcher (Mrs. William O. Crutcher, also addressed as Emmie and Evangeline); Philip Crutcher; William M. Crutcher; William O. Crutcher; Anne Shannon Martin (Mrs. William A.); Howard Morris, brother of Mrs. Shannon; Levina Shannon Mount (Mrs. Tom); Alice Shannon; Grace Shannon; Levina Morris Shannon; Marmaduke Shannon, Esq.; Marmaduke Shannon (also addressed as Dukey or Dukie); and Mary Shannon.

Among the items of particular interest are letters of Emma and Anne from St. Mary's Hall, Burlington, New Jersey, (1857–1858); genealogical information on the Morris, Crutcher, Shannon and Stockton families (1875 and 1894); Dabney T. Marshall's letters on prison conditions in Mississippi (1895, 1896, 1898); and a typed copy of a letter to Emma Shannon, begun by Anne and finished by Grace or Alice, during the siege of Vicksburg (1863). The collection is distributed by dates as follows: n.d., 671 items; 1826–1857, 148 items; 1858–1860, 255 items; 1860–1866, 470 items; 1866–1873, 294 items; 1873–1879, 143 items; 1897–1927, 276 items.