Many of the letters were written by sister-in-law Ann Barbara Norris Wurts (A.B. Wurts) requesting money and financial assistance and advice.

Other correspondents include: wife Eliza Ann Wurts Sykes; J.W. Scott; nephew L.B. Sykes; Elizabeth Dodge; John Bluxamie; niece E. A. Caufield; J.B. Augur; A.H. Livingston; John Aspinnall; Thomas H. Wells; George Schuyler; brother Nathaniel Sykes; Joseph W. Allen; treasurer, Delaware & Hudson Canal Co., Isaac N. Seymour; Cortlandt Parker; Reverend Jesse Pound (St. Matthew's, New York City); vice president, board of managers, Delaware & Hudson Canal Co. William Musgrave; Mary E. Wells; Rafael Gonzales; General William Gibbs MacNeill; J.H. Alexander; Adolf Rodewalt; R.T. Germain; president, board of managers, Delaware & Hudson Canal Co. John Wurts; Charles P. Wurts; R.B. Mason; and Edward H. Hudson.

Subjects include: family matters, land in Newark, NJ, New York and Erie Railroad contract settlement, taxes, Delaware and Hudson Canal Company stock shares, employment seekers, reports about Charles W. Lancaster's gun.

Also see Series II (Delaware and Hudson Canal Company records), Subseries I (Maurice Wurts papers) for correspondence to Sykes from John Wurts regarding Delaware and Hudson Canal Company business.