Biography/History:

Henry Bascom Collins, Jr., was born on April 9, 1899, in Geneva, Alabama. He was the son of Henry Bascom Collins, Sr., and Anna Sophie Nevell Collins. At some point, the family settled in Columbia, Marion County, Mississippi. From 1918 to 1919, Collins served as a private in the United States Army. After his army service, Collins enrolled at Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi, earning a bachelor of arts degree in 1922. Three years later, Collins received a master of arts degree from George Washington University in Washington, D.C. In 1931, Collins married Carolyn Walker of Fitchburg, Massachusetts. They had a daughter, Judith Ann. Henry Bascom Collins, Jr., died on October 21, 1987, in Campbelltown, Pennsylvania.

Collins began his archaeological career in 1922, serving as an assistant on a National Geographic Society expedition to Pueblo Bonito, New Mexico. During this time, Collins also worked at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (1923) and at the United States National Museum, Division of Ethnology (1924).

In 1925 and 1926, Collins’s archaeological work centered on Mississippi and Louisiana, including the Choctaw territory. Beginning in 1927, Collins’s focus shifted to the study of the Bering Strait, Alaska, area. His subsequent work provided the first conclusive evidence that native peoples had migrated from Siberia to Alaska via the Bering Strait land bridge. In 1967, Collins retired and was named archaeologist emeritus of the National Museum of Natural History, Department of Anthropology. For his contributions to American archaeology, Collins received an award from the Society of American Archaeology in 1984.

Scope and Content:

This collection is comprised of photocopied correspondence of Henry Bascom Collins, Jr., of Mississippi and Virginia. The letters, primarily incoming, date between 1923 and 1958 and span roughly half of Collins’s professional archaeological career. Primary correspondents are Albert Godfrey Sanders, James Alfred Ford, and Moreau Browne Congleton Chambers.

Most of the 1926 correspondence is between Collins and Albert Godfrey Sanders, a professor of languages at Millsaps College, Jackson, Mississippi. At the time, Sanders was working with Dr. Dunbar Rowland of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History on the translations of French for the Mississippi Provincial Archives series. Sanders solicited Collins’s research assistance. Collins also proofread some of Sanders’s translations, especially those that related to the Choctaw Indians. Included in Collins’s responses are his comments on some of the translations, as well as the results of his research. Also included with the correspondence is a proposal, circa 1926, possibly written by Collins. It outlines possible archaeological fieldwork in Mississippi and Louisiana.

The correspondence between 1927 and 1929 contains letters from James Alfred Ford and Moreau Browne Congleton Chambers. At the time, Chambers and Ford were doing archaeological survey work in Mississippi under the auspices of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Collins’s replies offered advice to the two archaeologists, such as the preferred supplies for mending pottery (plaster of Paris and Amberoid). Collins also gives his opinions on Ford’s and Chambers’ interpretations of the sites they found.

In the summer of 1930, Collins was director of a Smithsonian expedition to St. Lawrence Island, Alaska. The correspondence from this year reflects Collins’s work in getting the expedition together, including arranging for James Alfred Ford to join him as a field assistant. The bulk of the correspondence between 1931 and 1958 documents Collins’s relationship with James Alfred Ford. Ford came to specialize in the archaeology of the Lower Mississippi Valley. Many of his letters to Collins concern Ford’s work in the establishment of the prototype of the prehistoric chronological sequence of the Lower Mississippi Valley using ceramic shards. In his replies, Collins offered advice, ideas, and critical analysis of Ford’s work.

Series Identification:

1. Correspondence. 1923-1958; n.d. 23 folders.

   Box 1, folders 1-23