The Civil War letters in the collection are written for the most part by Larkin S. Kendrick and by various persons related to him by blood or connected to him by marriage-all of them from the community near Capernaum Baptist Church. They Include: Kendrick's wife Mary Catherine; his mother; his brother Thomas L. Kendrick (Co. H, 37th N.C. Regiment); his sister Elizabeth Ann; his brother-in-law John L. Putnam (Co. C, 15th N.C. Regiment); and another brother-in-law, Arthur Putnam (Co. C, 15th N.C. Regiment).

The letters between husband and wife are written to reassure one another. His letters have a consistent thread of deep religious belief. His very first letter (October 15, 1861) Speaks of his pleasure at having just heard a sermon and of how thankful he is that there are praying people in camp. His second letter (October 30, 1861) expresses his motive for leaving his wife and children in order to enlist in the army: duty to country and defense of liberty. His letter of March 16, 1862, expresses similar sentiments. With regard to military interest, the letters written by Thomas L. Kendrick and Arthur Putnam in September 1864 during the seige of Petersburg have substantive content.

Because of the wound to his right elbow, Kendrick's handwriting degenerated considerably. For that reason typed versions of the letters written between 1868 and 1874 have been added to the originals. Even so, it remains difficult to understand the import of the letters. In a letter written from Tennessee on May 18, 1872, Kendrick tells his wife that he means to "come home and stand my hand with the rest of the boys." Since he plans to go to Raleigh from his present location in Tennessee, he says, he doesn't expect to return home until after court. A month later on June 19, 1872, he says that he plans to take the train to France and leave the United States, for he is unable to bear the thought of being brought to court and compelled to do what he swore he would not do. After that, all trace of him was lost by his family. The timing of the departure to Tennessee at the end of 1871 and his subsequent letters coincide with the appearance of U.S. Commissioner Nathan Scoggins in Cleveland County to arrest members of the Ku Klux Klan for violations of the federal Enforcement Acts. This may be no more than coincidence, but one is left with the fact that in his brief note to Kendrick written by J. G. Hill, youngest son of Elder Wade W. Hill, on June 28, 1868, he tells Kendrick that though the radicals keep up their night meetings, still "the Ku Klux Klan has done more good than anything else that ever happened."

The miscellaneous materials in the collection include a few receipts dating from 1861 to 1867, promissory notes from 1859 to 1870, an 1862 subscription list to pay the salary of Elder Wade W. Hill as minister at Capernaum Baptist Church, an 1865 certificate exempting Kendrick from military duty outside Cleveland County, an 1878 crop lien in favor of Mary Catherine Kendrick, and an 1883 one made by her in favor of the Navassa Guano Company of Wilmington, N.C.