Autographs, letters, official documents, writings, printed matter, photographs, and other papers of prominent historical figures in the arts, sciences, and politics of the Western world. Persons represented in the collection include Honoré de Balzac, Catherine II (Empress of Russia), Albert Einstein, Henry VIII (King of England), Louis XIV (King of France), Peter I (Emperor of Russia), Auguste Rodin, and various presidents including Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and George Washington.

Subjects include American history as reflected in the letters and writings of Henry Ward Beecher, Buffalo Bill, James Fenimore Cooper, Robert Fulton, Cotton Mather, and others; seventeenth century New England represented by documents such as a petition from individuals jailed for witchcraft in Ipswich, Massachusetts, in 1692; the French Revolution as reflected in the letters and writings of Jeanne de Saint-Remy de Valois (comtesse de la Motte), Marie Antoinette (Queen, consort of Louis XVI, King of France), Honoré-Gabriel de Riquetti (comte de Mirabeau), Henri Sanson, Voltaire, and others; and nineteenth and early twentieth century theater documented by the letters, photographs, and autographs of actors including Sarah Bernhardt, Edwin Booth, Charlotte Cushman, John Drew, and Lillie Langtry.

The Miscellany series consists of Batchelder's personal papers and includes correspondence, invitations, calling cards, notes, war ration books, printed matter, and sketches.