William Gilmore Simms's collection of scrapbooks represents one of the most significant, but least accessible, resources for the study of the writer. Housed as a part of the Charles Carroll Simms collection in the South Caroliniana Library at the University of South Carolina, there are nine volumes of scrapbooks, each comprised of works of numerous genres from throughout Simms's career.[1] While the majority of the included works are Simms's own, the scrapbooks also features writings by others, as well as works of uncertain authorship. Prior to digitizing these volumes, access to them ...

In 1825, a nineteen-year-old Simms published his first major work, Monody, on the Death of Gen. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, and thus took his initial step toward establishing himself as one of the leading literary voices in Charleston.  His work at this time, and especially in this long poem, pointed to intellectual concerns that would follow him throughout his literary career.  Monody was published during one of Simms’s first periods of sustained literary labor, his acting as editor of the Album: A Weekly Miscellany, a magazine first published on 2 July 1825, and then every Saturday for the rest ...