Guide to the Thomas W. Hyde Family Papers, 1831-1948, undated

Thomas Worcester Hyde, son of Zina Hyde of Bath, Maine, and Eleanor Davis of Jamaica Plains, was born in Florence, Italy, on January 15, 1841. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1861, and in the same year graduated from Chicago University. He raised a company for the Seventh Maine Infantry. On going into camp with his company at Augusta, Hyde was elected major. He was present with his regiment at the Siege of Yorktown, and battles of Williamsburg and Mechanicsville and all of the seven-day battles in front of Richmond. He commanded the regiment in the battles of the Second Bull Run, Crampton's Gap, and Antietam, where he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Soon after, Major Hyde was appointed Acting Inspector General of the Left Division, Army of the Potomac. He was with General Sedgwick at Gettysburg and all the battles following in which the Sixth Corps was engaged. He was promoted to lieutenant-colonel, and remained with the Sixth Corps until his three years expired, at which time he was commissioned colonel of the First Maine Veteran Volunteers. He was present at Sailor's Creek and at the surrender of Lee. He was made brigadier general in 1865. He mustered out of service and went into the iron business in Bath, his native town.

In 1873, Hyde was elected to the state senate, where he served three terms, two of which as president of the body. In 1876 and 1877, he was the mayor of Bath. He was founder and president of Bath Iron Works.

In 1866, Hyde married Annie Hayden of Bath, Maine, who was cousin to the famous opera singer Emma Eames. They had six children: John Sedgwick Hyde, born March 25, 1867; Edward (Ned) Warden Hyde, born August 9, 1868; Ethel Hyde, born August 30, 1871; Arthur Sewall Hyde, born February 21, 1875; Eleanor Hayden Hyde, born August 6, 1880; and Madelyn Hyde, born August 4, 1883.

Hyde's oldest daughter, Ethel, a talented singer, died August 27, 1899. Soon after, on the 14th of November, 1899, Thomas W. Hyde died in Old Point Comfort, Virginia, of Bright's disease. In 1904, his youngest daughter, Madelyn, died. Annie Hayden Hyde died in 1915.

Eleanor Hayden Hyde married John C. Phillips on January 11, 1908. They had four children: John C., Madelyn, Eleanor and Arthur. Her husband died in 1938, and Eleanor Hyde Phillips died in 1975.

The collection contains journals, correspondence, photographs, clippings, and printed ephemera. The journals, kept by Eleanor Hyde Phillips, span three decades, the first beginning in 1890 when Eleanor was ten years old. They include accounts of Eleanor's daily life, family vacations at Moosehead Lake and Round Pond in Maine, and trips between Bath, Boston and New York. The diaries also describe Eleanor's international travels to Europe and to destinations including Arabia, China, Egypt and Japan. The correspondence (1831-1891) is mainly between Thomas W. Hyde and Annie Hayden. Many of the letters pre-date their marriage and were written by Hayden to Hyde during the Civil War, while Hyde was a major, and then a colonel, in the Union Army. There is also a substantial number of letters written between the two during Annie's periods of sickness when she lived away from home, primarily in 1872 and 1891. The collection also includes biographical and genealogical material relating to Thomas Hyde and his family.