Henry Buhl Library: HIST 338: Global Military History II: Find Primary Sources

Finding Primary Sources Using Henry

Search for Primary Sources

1. Go to Henry.

2. Click on Advanced Search.

3. From this screen, add your search terms to one or more search boxes. Then, add the words primary source* to another search box.

All results will be primary sources OR include some primary source material.

How do I know if the source is all primary sources or just includes some primary source material?

The library indicates sources that are fully primary sources with a genre heading (see example here):

Sources that have both primary and secondary material are marked with the phrase "Includes primary source material" in the Notes (shown here).

Primary Source Collections Available through Buhl

Understanding U. S. Military Conflicts Through Primary Sources
Call Number: Ref E 181 .U53 2016 v. 1-4
* Covers benchmark documents in U.S. diplomatic and military history from 14 conflicts.
Daily Life Through World History in Primary Documents
Call Number: Oversz CB 69 .D35 2008
A three-volume set of sources beginning with the ancient world and continuing through to modern times. Volume 3 covers the Modern World. The sources included cover topics such as government and warfare.
Milestone Documents in American History
Includes important primary sources related to American history from 1763 to 2003.
Foreign Relations of the United States
Volumes since the Truman administration are available online from the Department of State, along with some volumes pre-Truman. 150 volumes in all. Users can browse volumes or by administration.

Veterans History Project
(Library of Congress) -- First hand accounts from U.S. Veterans representing World War I, World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Persian Gulf War and the Afghanistan & Iraq conflicts.
National Security Archive
Some highlighted document collections are: CIA's Vietnam histories; JFK and the Diem Coup; Fighting the War in Southeast Asia, 1961-1973; Gulf of Tonkin Incident, 40 Years Later; & Intelligence and Vietnam: the top secret 1969 State Department study.
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"An independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University, the Archive collects and publishes declassified documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The Archive also serves as a repository of government records on a wide range of topics pertaining to the national security, foreign, intelligence, and economic policies of the United States."

Defining Documents in American History: World War I (1914-1919)
Call Number: D 619 .W67 2014
Access to a collection of World War I primary sources.
The Times Documentary History of the War: diplomatic [v.1,2,9], naval [v.3,4,7], military [v.5,8], overseas [v.6, 10]
Call Number: STOR D 505 .T5 1917 v.1-11
“A collection of documents concerning the war in all its aspects, so arranged as to record the events of the great struggle on which the nations are now involved and the circumstances which led up to them”—Introd. [issued in weekly parts from Aug. 25, 1914-July 27, 1920]. 11 volumes in all.

Ask at the Circ/Reference Desk
World War I
Call Number: D 521 .C587 2008
Primary documents from the World War I era bring to life the causes, events and consequences of those tumultuous and violent years.
Defining Documents in American History: World War II (1939-1946)
Call Number: D 742 .U5 W67 2015 v.1-2
Provides detailed analyses of key documents produced from 1936-1947, organized under nine broad categories: The Lead-Up to War; Pearl Harbor; Domestic Aliens; Other Demographics; Foreign Policy; War and Victory; The Holocaust; Nuremberg; The Atom Bomb.
Eyewitness D-Day: Firsthand Accounts from the Landing at Normandy to the Liberation of Paris
Call Number: Oversz D 756.5.N6 G53 2004
Features interviews with more than 50 survivors, it presents the harrowing inside story of June 6th, 1944, through the eyes of the courageous men and women who actually witnessed the fighting.
Book comes with a CD-ROM. Ask for this item at the Check-Out Desk.

Eyewitness Vietnam: Firsthand Accounts From Operation Rolling Thunder to the Fall of Saigon
Call Number: Oversz DS 557.7 .E93 2006
Eyewitness Vietnam traces the history of America's longest war, illuminating its causes, battles, and aftereffects, its unfolding and unraveling.
Book comes with a CD-ROM. Ask for this item at the Check-Out Desk.
Defining Documents in American History: the Vietnam War (1956-1975)
Call Number: DS 557.4 .V54 2015
Defining Documents in American History: Vietnam War offers students a variety of tools of historical importance to study and analyze vital documents from the Vietnam War.

Defining Documents in American History: The 1950s (1950-1959)
Call Number: E 813 .A19 2016
This important resource provides students and researchers new insights into the 1950s in the U.S., through an in-depth analysis of forty important primary source documents and their lasting effect on American history.

Translations of Castro's Speeches
"This database includes speeches, interviews, etc., by Fidel Castro from 1959 to 1996. All texts are in English" (from LANIC).
Cold War International History Project
"The Project supports the full and prompt release of historical materials by governments on all sides of the Cold War, and seeks to accelerate the process of integrating new sources, materials and perspectives from the former 'Communist bloc' with the historiography of the Cold War which has been written over the past few decades largely by Western scholars reliant on Western archival sources."
Wilson Center Digital Archive
The Digital Archive is a resource where students, researchers and specialists can access once-secret documents from governments and organizations all over the world. It contains newly declassified historical materials from archives around the world—much of it in translation and including diplomatic cables, high level correspondence, meeting minutes and more.

Defining Documents in World History: The Middle East (141 BCE - 2017)
Call Number: DS 62 .M54 2018 v. 1-2
This new 2-volume set spans the history of the region and includes a variety of documents from several eras.
The Torture Papers: the Road to Abu Ghraib
Call Number: Oversz DS 79.76 .T676 2005
The Torture Papers document the so-called 'torture memos' and reports which US government officials wrote to prepare the way for, and to document, coercive interrogation and torture in Afghanistan, Guantanamo, and Abu Ghraib. These documents present for the first time a compilation of materials that prior to publication have existed only piecemeal in the public domain.
Voices of the Iraq War
Call Number: Oversz DS 79.766 .A1 V68 2016
Uses first-person accounts of the war and primary source documents to provide readers with an understanding of the causes of successes and failures in Iraq and how these events contributed to the volatility of the Middle East in the early 21st century.

Contemporary Middle East
Contains primary source documents from 1917 to the present day.

Newspapers & Press Coverage, Battlefield Footage, & other Correspondence

Search Across Multiple Titles

History Commons (formerly Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new window
Collection of primary and early sources for American history, including historical newspapers and county and regimental histories. In particular, it contains important resources for the study of African American history, the Civil War, American regional history (including Pennsylvania).
GALE Primary Sources (Newspapers) This link opens in a new window
Full-text coverage of The Sunday Times (London, UK : 1822-2006), and The Times (London, UK : 1785-2014), and a collection of 19th-century U.S. newspapers
New York Times (1851-current) (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
Searchable full text of the complete run of the New York Times, including full page and article images (1851 - current)
Coverage dates: 1851-current

Individual Journals & Magazines

Time Coverage: 1923 - Present.
Vital Speeches of the Day Coverage: 1934 - Present.
US News and World Report Coverage: 1990 - present.

Battlefield World War II: Great European Battles of WWII
Call Number: DVD 3052-3054
Battlefield World War II: Great Sea Battles of WWII
Call Number: DVD 3055-3057
Battlefield World War II: Invasion!
Call Number: DVD 3049-3051
Battlefield Russia: The Eastern Front
Call Number: DVD 3058-3060
Korean War in Color
Call Number: DVD 772
Features : Marilyn Monroe in Korea, soldier home movies from the front, timeline, gun camera compilation, Korean War Veterans' Memorial, biographies of Truman, MacArthur and Eisenhower, photo slide show, interactive menus, declassified footage and more.
Battlefield Vietnam: From Dien Bien Phu to Peace with Honor
Call Number: DVD 3046-3048
Battlefield Vietnam : Tet!
Call Number: DVD 3043-3045

Looking for the writings of military personnel and/or government officials?

Here's what's available at the library:

Primary Source Websites

Internet Modern History Sourcebook
A section of this site is dedicated to primary sources from the Scientific Revolution.
Hanover Historical Texts Project
A collection of primary sources covering World, European, and American history from ancient times through the 20th century (from Hanover College History Dept.).

Internet African History Sourcebook
Contains information and primary sources on ancient Africa and the history of various African countries (from Fordham University).
Internet Russian Revolution History Sourcebook
Contains information and primary sources on the Russian Revolution, from the beginning of the Tsarist state through Stalinism (from Fordham University).
The Korean War and its Origins: 1945-1953
Access memos, messages, reports, and other primary sources related to the Korean War (from Harry S. Truman Library & Museum).

19th Century British Pamphlets
Access several collections of British pamphlets (available via JSTOR).
EuroDocs: Online Sources for European History
Includes "selected transcriptions, facsimiles and translations" documenting European history from ancient through modern times (from Brigham Young University).
Gallica
Gallica is the digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale de France and its partners. Online since 1997 and is updated every week thousands of news and now offers access to more than 2 million documents. Site can be translated into English, but documents will be in original language.
German History in Documents and Images
"A comprehensive collection of original historical materials documenting German history from the beginning of the early modern period to the present." Oral histories, letters, speeches and other documents related to Nazi Germany are included in the collection.
Imperial War Museums
Provides access to primary and secondary sources relating to wars the U.K. was involved in, starting with WWI.
Internet Russian Revolution History Sourcebook
Contains information and primary sources on the Russian Revolution, from the beginning of the Tsarist state through Stalinism (from Fordham University).
Spanish-American War in Pictures
Features 68 motion pictures, produced between 1898 and 1901, of the Spanish-American War and the subsequent Philippine Revolution (from the Library of Congress).
World of 1898: The Spanish-American War
Provides “information about Cuba, Guam, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Spain, and the United States is provided in chronologies, bibliographies, and a variety of pictorial and textual material from bilingual sources” (Library of Congress).

Making of America (Cornell)
Primary sources in American social history primarily from the antebellum period through reconstruction.
Making of America Books (University of Michigan)
Primary sources in American social history primarily from the antebellum period through reconstruction.
Papers of the War Department, 1784-1800
This "project, will ... mak[e] some 55,000 documents of the early War Department many long thought irretrievable but now reconstructed through a painstaking, multi-year research effort available online to scholars, students, and the general public."
Spanish-American War in Pictures
Features 68 motion pictures, produced between 1898 and 1901, of the Spanish-American War and the subsequent Philippine Revolution (from the Library of Congress).
US Army Education & Heritage Center
Access images, photographs, audio, motion pictures, personal papers, military publications, pamphlets, oral histories, and more from the history of the US Army. Civil and Korean War photographs are included in the collection.
World of 1898: The Spanish-American War
Provides “information about Cuba, Guam, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Spain, and the United States is provided in chronologies, bibliographies, and a variety of pictorial and textual material from bilingual sources” (Library of Congress).