Thomas Ward travel journal

This journal was kept by Thomas Ward, Jr., and chronicles his sightseeing trip to England, Ireland, Scotland, Belgium, France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy in 1860. Entries provide a record of the voyage and a summary of each day of sightseeing.

Thomas Ward’s journal consists of daily pencil entries in a small bound volume. From June 12 to July 8, 1860, Ward gave a detailed account of events on the ship including the pastimes of passengers and crew and the death of a passenger in steerage. The remainder of the entries describe his travels and sightseeing in Europe. Many entries end with the name of his hotel written at the bottom of the page.

From July 9 to August 7, 1860, Ward’s party, consisting of several male travelers, visited cities in Ireland, Scotland, and England. They then spent the rest of August on the continent touring Belgium, France, Germany, and Switzerland. At the beginning of September, they crossed over the Alps to visit cities in Italy including Milan and Venice. On September 8, they took a steamboat to Marseilles. The dated entries end when the travelers were in Paris on September 15. Ward left approximately 80 pages blank at the end of the volume.

The front endpapers contain sketched shapes (possibly a logic puzzle), a conversion of florins to franks, a list of articles of clothing, and some arithmetic. A dried flower is pressed into the book several pages after the entries end. It appears that there used to be writing around it that has been torn out. The last few pages and the endpapers contain several sketches including a cottage, a cabin in the mountains, a house, an open book with "Thomas Ward" and "New York" written on it, faces, a windmill, and gondolas. The back endpaper also has a recipe for removing ink spots.