List of Acquisitions

List of Acquisitions by the Archives of the Underhill Society of America, 1999-2006

  1. 19th century and possibly Underhill related (donated in 1999 by Caroline Jenkinson through Gloria B. Tucker)
  2. Framed fragments of the commission pendant and hull of the Destroyer Escort U.S.S. Underhill (donated in 1999 by N. Robert Underhill)
  3. Bible of Mrs. S. D. Underhill (donated in 2000 by Andrew Hawley through Gloria B. Tucker)
  4. Framed artist’s conception of Captain John Underhill at the First Muster in Massachusetts Bay, painted by Ralph Fournier (donated in 2001 by N. Robert Underhill)
  5. Framed color graphic of the Destroyer Escort U.S.S. Underhill (donated in 1989 and deposited in 2001 by N. Robert Underhill)
  6. Papers of George T. Underhill, Jr., including some related to his mother and his father, past President George T. Underhill, Sr. (donated in 2001 and 2003 by George T. Underhill, Jr.)
  7. Three maps of the Underhill Burial Ground (donated in 2001 by Gloria B. Tucker)
  8. Photo album of Oyster Bay and vicinity, consisting of photocopies of more than 100 photographs from the late 19th century to ca. 1950 (donated in 2001 by Tullio Donisi through Gloria B. Tucker, who labeled the photographs)
  9. Genealogical Papers of Leta Ludlam Schoelles, a former Genealogist of the Underhill Society (donated in 2001 by Francis Aproy Ludlam Uhlendorf)
  10. Papers of Harriet Streek, Treasurer of the Underhill Society of America, 1995-2001 (deposited in 2001 by Harriet Streek through Gloria B. Tucker)
  11. Miscellaneous Papers of Carl J. Underhill, Genealogist of the Underhill Society (donated in 2001 by Carl J. Underhill)
  12. Framed albumen print of Nicholas Underhill (1793-1881), taken circa 1870-1881 in his War of 1812 or militia uniform (purchased in 2003)
  13. Memorial stone to John Taylor and Capt. John Underhill erected by Myron C. Taylor and Willard Underhill Taylor (donated in 2003 by Warwick Potter)
  14. Framed genealogy of Capt. John Underhill’s English ancestry, “Extracted from the Records of the College of Arms London,” dated 26 March 1929 (donated in 2004 by Marjorie Strang through Samuel Underhill Mitchell)
  15. Copy, proofs, and plates for Underhill Genealogy, Vols. VII-VIII (donated in 2004 by Carl J. Underhill)
  16. Photographs of John Garrett Underhill, Sr. (6th President of the Underhill Society of America), and his son, John Garrett Underhill, Jr. (9th President) (donated in 2005 by Jeanne Underhill McDonald through Carl J. Underhill)
  17. Kathleen G. Velsor, Brother & Me: Thomas Jackson & the Underground Railroad . . . Westbury & Jericho many generations ago: A Historical Novel (Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y.: Rosalie Ink Publications, 2005), with the author’s signed inscription on the half-title page (donated in 2006 by Kathleen G. Velsor, through Gloria B. Tucker)
  18. Papers of Phebe Alice Apgar, Treasurer of the Underhill Society, 2001-2005 (donated in 2006 by Phebe Alice Apgar, through Samuel Underhill Mitchell)
  19. Gloria Bayles Tucker, “The Village of Oyster Bay” (2005), a 56-page, illustrated essay describing the buildings in the village of Oyster Bay (donated in 2006 by the author)
  20. George Sidney Underhill Collection, consisting principally of the Bayley Family Bible Record and 19th-century correspondence of the donor’s family (donated in 2006 by George Sidney Underhill)
  21. Papers of George T. Underhill, Jr.: box 5, consisting of personal, family, business, and genealogical papers, correspondence, photographs, and artifacts, ca. 1957 to 2005 (donated in 2006 by George T. Underhill, Jr.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

MYRON C. TAYLOR

Myron C. Taylor (1874-1959), descended from Captain John Underhill through his mother, Mary Morgan Underhill, was a prominent New York attorney, banker, and businessman. As head of the Finance Committee of the board of directors of U.S. Steel, and subsequently as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer from 1932 to 1938, Taylor modernized the corporation and enabled it to survive the rigors of the Depression. In 1937 he revolutionized labor relations in the steel industry when he negotiated an agreement with John L. Lewis, who had begun a drive to unionize steelworkers. The following year Taylor left his post as Chairman (though he continued to serve on the Finance Committee of the board) to devote himself more fully to the relief and humanitarian activities he had begun earlier in the decade. During the Thirties, Taylor became a supporter of the New Deal and President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who in 1939 appointed this Episcopalian as his personal representative to Pope Pius XII with the rank of Ambassador, a post he continued to hold under President Harry S. Truman until 1949. A generous benefactor of the Underhill Society, in the late 1920s and early 1930s Taylor financed research on the life of Captain John Underhill and on the origins of the Underhill family in Warwickshire, sub-vended the publication of the first four volumes of The Underhill Genealogy, and played a central role in the Society’s affairs from that time until his death.

Pope Pius XII receives the special envoy to the Vatican, Myron C. Taylor, who presented a letter from President Franklin D. Roosevelt on Feb. 27, 1940. AP

FDR’S INSTRUCTIONS

Instructions of President Franklin D. Roosevelt to Myron C. Taylor as his personal representative to Pope Pius XII; undated but probably issued ca. 23 December 1939, when Taylor accepted the appointment. Reproduction in Myron C. Taylor Scrapbook No. 2, Myron C. Taylor Papers, Underhill Society of America.

TRUMAN’S CITATION

The certificate accompanying the award of the Medal of Merit honored Taylor “for extraordinary fidelity and exceptionally meritorious conduct, ”and was issued by President Truman“ in accordance with the order issued by General Washington at Headquarters, Newburgh, New York, on August 7, 1782, and pursuant to Act of Congress.” From Myron C. Taylor Scrapbook No. 2, Myron C. Taylor Papers, Underhill Society of America.

TAYLOR-PIUS XII

Undated photograph of Myron C. Taylor and Pope Pius XII. In 1927 Taylor and his wife, Anabel Stuart Mack Taylor, acquired the Villa Schifanoia, a Medici estate in the hamlet of San Domenico, within the old Etruscan city of Fiesole, just north of Florence, which they donated to the Pope in 1946 for the purpose of establishing a school of fine arts for American women.

Vatican to Open Pius XII Archives

Pope’s actions during World War II, Holocaust going under scrutiny

Frances D’Emilio
Associated Press

VATICAN CITY – Declaring that the church “isn’t afraid of history,” Pope Francis said Monday he has decided to open up the Vatican archives on World War II-era Pope Pius XII, who has been criticized by Jews of staying silent on the Holocaust and not doing enough to save lives.

Describing that criticism as fruit of “some prejudice or exaggeration,” Francis told officials and personnel of the Vatican Secret Archives that the documentation would be open to researchers starting March 2, 2020.

The move could speed up Pius’ path to possible sainthood, a complex process that in Pius’ case bore the weight of questions of what he knew and did about Nazi Germany’s systematic killing of Europe’s Jews.

Pius was elected pope on March 2, 1939, six months before World War II erupted in Europe. He died on Oct. 9, 1958, at the Vatican summer residence at Castel Gandolfo, near Rome.

The Vatican usually waits 70 years after the end of a pontificate to open up the relevant archives. But the Holy See has been under pressure to make the Pius XII documentation available sooner and while Holocaust survivors are still alive.

“The church isn’t afraid of history,” Francis told the archive staff.

He said the Pius papacy included “moments of grave difficulties, tormented decisions of human and Christian prudence, that to some could appear as reticence.”

Instead, Francis said, they could be seen as attempts “to keep lit, in the darkest and cruelest periods, the flame of humanitarian initiatives, of hidden but active diplomacy” aimed at possibly “opening hearts.”

Francis words appeared to echo the long-held Vatican defense of Pius, which maintains that the Italian pontiff used behind-the-scenes diplomacy to try to save lives.

Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pius XII, gained diplomatic experience in the period after World War I, serving the Holy See in postings in Munich and Berlin in Germany.

In Jerusalem, the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial commended Francis’ decision, expressing the expectation that “researchers will be granted full access to all the documents stored in the archives.”

Those hailing the decision to open the archives also saw usefulness in dealing with current challenges of anti-Semitism and religious persecution and not just deepening understanding of the past.

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin called opening the Vatican archives “particularly important in these days of ongoing anti-Semitic attacks, the rewriting of history and attempts to deny the Holocaust.”

Rabbi Arthur Schneier, a Holocaust survivor who has led a New York synagogue in New York since 1992 and received a papal knighthood four years ago for his activism promoting religious freedom, said “the archives will reveal what was done and what could have been done in the face of Nazi tyranny, particularly the persecution of the Jews that led to the Holocaust.”

The archives “might also be a useful instrument on how to deal with dictators of our day who disregard human life, human rights and inflict suffering on their people,” said Schneier, who heads the Appeal of Conscience Foundation, which advocates for religious freedom and human rights.

Vatican archivists had already started preparing the documentation for consultation back in 2006, at the behest of Francis’ German-born predecessor, Benedict XVI.

For decades, Jewish advocates had lobbied for access to the documentation to help answer the long-standing question of whether Pius did all he could to save lives during World War II.

In New York, Rabbi David Rosen, the international director for interreligious affairs at the American Jewish Committee, called Francis’ decision “enormously important to Catholic-Jewish relations.”

He noted in a statement that he had raised the issue with Francis and his predecessors in meetings.

“It is particularly important that experts from the leading Holocaust memorial institutes in Israel and the United States objectively evaluate as best as possible the historical record of that most terrible of times – to acknowledge both the failures as well as the valiant efforts made during the period of the systematic murder of 6 million Jews,” Rosen said.

Monsignor Sergio Pagano, in charge of the Vatican Secret Archive referred in comments Monday to the thousands and thousands of files, letters and other material to be made available.

Writing Monday in Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, Pagano said the archives “spoke, speak, and, I hope, will speak to researchers and to historians of an almost superhuman work of Christian humanism” amid mid-20th century events “that seemed determined to annihilate the very notion of human civilization.”

Defenders of Pius’ wartime actions have noted that some convents and other religious institutes in Italy helped hide Jews, including during the Nazi occupation of his native Rome.

It was during Benedict’s papacy that the Vatican in 2009 formally recognized the “venerable” qualities of Pius, an early step along the possible path to sainthood.

Historians will also be keen on examining documents from Pius XII’s papacy in the years after the war ended in 1945.

In 1983, the Vatican dismissed as “absolutely absurd” a claim in a Jewish magazine that the Vatican aided Klaus Barbie and other high-ranking Nazi war criminals in their escape from Europe, along with legitimate refugees, after the war.