The Horn Papers are a published set of forged, colonial era manuscripts from western Pennsylvania and northern Virginia discovered and publicized by William F. Horn of Topeka, Kansas, in the 1930s. It is still unknown who created the forgeries. This collection includes the three volumes of The Horn Papers published in 1945 by the Greene County Historical Society. The collection also includes ephemera related to the initial sale of and critical response to the volumes from historians and the public, and transcriptions of the forged historical diaries and correspondence. Digital reproductions of this collection are available online.
Language
English
.
Author
Angela Manella.
Publisher
ULS Archives & Special Collections
Address
University of Pittsburgh Library System Archives & Special Collections Website: library.pitt.edu/archives-special-collections Contact Us: www.library.pitt.edu/ask-archivist URL: http://library.pitt.edu/archives-special-collections
Existence and Location of Copies
Digital reproductions of the collection are available online.
History
The Horn Papers hoax began in the 1930s when William F. Horn, of Topeka, Kansas, contacted the Washington Observer and the Democrat Messenger in western Pennsylvania, to inquire whether they had any interest in publishing essays based on manuscript material in his possession. Horn's family was originally from western Pennsylvania, and he claimed to have discovered and transcribed deteriorating eighteenth century manuscripts around the turn of the nineteenth century.
The documents in Horn's possession included the diaries of Jacob Horn, and his son, Christopher, that detailed their lives as farmers in western Pennsylvania from 1735 to 1779. He also described fifty pages of court dockets from what is now West Virginia from 1772 to 1779; had these manuscripts been authentic, they would have represented the earliest known English court west of the Alleghenies. Horn's collection also contained miscellaneous court orders, and maps of the Ohio region. In all, the manuscript collection represented a shocking wealth of information about the frontiers of southwestern Pennsylvania and northwest Virginia. Horn also produced a number of artifacts referenced in his materials, including a cross he later presented to the head of an historical society.
In the 1930s and 1940s, Horn visited western Pennsylvania, and became a local celebrity, leading tours of historic sites and assisting local researchers. In 1945, the Greene County Historical Society of Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, published The Horn Papers in three volumes. The transcriptions were edited by A. L. Moredock and J. L. Fulton of the historical society; neither had previous experience with historical transcription. Moredock and Fulton acknowledged that some honest mistakes were made in their published transcriptions.
In 1946, historian Julian P. Boyd publicly accused Horn of forgery in the American Historical Review. A resulting investigatory committee found that the documents had been falsified. A number of factors led to this conclusion. For example, the transcription indicated a number of anachronistic words and phrases such as "hometown" and "race hatred." There were also a number of biographical anomalies; for instance, manuscript authors referred to the actions of individuals they would have known were dead. Also, many manuscripts were stylistically similar, despite being attributed to different authors. The style of the writing was decidedly nineteenth century, suggesting that the materials William H. Horn found may have been forged by an earlier, unknown family member.
There seems to have been no motive for the forgeries. Aside from his local celebrity, Horn made no monetary gain from the published histories, and never tried to sell any manuscripts or transcriptions.
Scope and Content Notes
The collection contains the three volumes of The Horn Papers published in 1945, printed ephemera related to the initial sale and response to the volumes, and transcriptions of the forged Horn diaries and forged correspondence.
Arrangement
The papers are arranged into three series.
Series I. The Horn Papers, Vols 1-3, published 1945
Series II. Printed Ephemera
Series III. Transcriptions
Access Restrictions
No restrictions.
Acquisition Information
Gift of John Casey after 1945.
Custodial History
This collection was located in the Darlington Memorial Library in the University's Cathedral of Learning until 2007 when it was moved to the ULS Archives Service Center for processing, storage, preservation and service. However, it remains in the custodianship of the ULS Special Collections Department.
Preferred Citation
Horn Papers, 1938-1946, DAR.1946.01, Darlington Collection, Archives & Special Collections, University of Pittsburgh Library System
Previous Citation
Horn Papers, 1938-1946, DAR.1946.01, Darlington Collection, Special Collections Department, University of Pittsburgh
Copyright
No copyright restrictions.
Processing Information
This collection was processed by Angela Manella in April 2007.
Bibliography
Winks, Robin W. "The Case of the Men Who Weren't There: Problems of Local Pride" in The Historian as Detective: Essays on Evidence. New York: Harper and Row, 1968/69.
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