The inventory includes letters, 1851-1861, and accounts, 1840-1866, of Rufus King Fitzhugh and his wife Henrietta Ellen (Baytop) Fitzhugh of Stanardsville, Greene County, Virginia. Most letters to Henrietta are from her mother Lucy Taliaferro (Catlett) Baytop, and her sisters Rowena, Lucy Ann, and Eugenia, all of Springfield, Gloucester County, Virginia. The collection also includes letters from her sister-in-law Mary F. Fitzhugh of Fredericksburg, Virginia.

The letters relate various aspects of nineteenth century farm life, such as men and women's separate responsibilities on the farm, illnesses and treatments, childbirth and its complications, and social activities. There are comments on slaves, tensions between the slave states and the federal government and the abolitionists, and the eventual Civil War. Letters to Rufus King Fitzhugh are generally from business associates or his brother George Fitzhugh, of Port Royal, Virginia. Both his letters and business accounts offer insight into his affairs, such as land speculation, mining for coal, slaves as investments, as well as deeds, receipts of purchase and payment of property, and tax receipts. An undated item records his property in Jackson County, Arkansas, that was destroyed by the Union Army.