These are letters and papers relating to North America chiefly from the official correspondence of the Gardens and the correspondence of its two directors, Sir William Jackson Hooker and Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker. There are 2 reels of letters from Asa Gray to the Hookers, in addition to other Gray letters elsewhere in the collection. A few letters (1787) from Americans to William Forsyth, superintendent of the Royal Gardens of St. James' and Kensington.

These letters are principally to his brother John Cleaves Short, on personal, family, and general topics.

These letters refer to the exchange of various plants, to botany in general, and to the operation of Kew. There is mention as well of the plants of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Correspondence of Charles Darwin with his family, Sir William J. Hooker, Sir John W. Lubbock, William Ogle, Daniel Oliver, John Tyndall, and Sir William Ramsay, 1836-1882. (1 reel). Letters to J. Brodie-Innes, W. H. Bates, Lady Dorothy Nevill, and others (1846-1882); also letters to his wife and son and letters and papers about him (1 reel). Letters from Darwin to G. H. K. Thwaites, William B. Tegetmeier, Albany Hancock, Richard Owen, Bernhard Studer, Auguste H. Forel, J. Moulinie, A. Bohrn, Karl Christoph Vogt, François Joseph Pictet de la Rive, and others.