E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company is a chemical company more commonly referred to as the DuPont Company. The company was established in 1802 by Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours (1739-1817) and his son Éleuthère Irénée du Pont (1771-1834) for the production of gunpowder. The papers in this collection date from the lifetime of E.I. du Pont and document important aspects of the early history of the DuPont Company.

Gabriel Manigault (1758-1809) was a Charleston merchant, plantation owner, architect, and South Carolina state Representative. In 1805, Manigault sold part of his property in South Carolina and moved to Clifton, an estate near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. These are copies of Manigault's letters relating to members of the du Pont family.

Gertrude Ruhnka (1891-1981) was a research librarian at the Huntington Library in California. The collection contains her unpublished manuscript, "Love for life: a self-portrait of the first three generations of du Ponts in America, 1791-1834," and two letters from Ruhnka to J.B. Lippincott Company and Dr. Walter J. Heacock of the Eleutherian Mills-Hagley Foundation.

Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours (1739-1817) was a French political economist, writer, publisher, and public administrator. Victor Marie du Pont (1767-1827), the son of Pierre Samuel, was a French diplomat who later immigrated to the United States and established various trading companies before moving to Delaware. This collection contains three photocopied documents in French: a memoir by du Pont de Nemours, letter of Eustache Briux to Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord, and a letter from Victor du Pont to Talleyrand.

Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours (1739-1817) was a French political economist, writer, publisher, and public administrator. Louis Marie de La Revelliere-Lepeaux (1753-1824) was a member of the French government in the time surrounding the French Revolution, including the Estates-General, the National Convention, and the French Directory. The letter from du Pont to La Revelliere-Lepeaux concern's du Pont's son Victor, who was then serving as French consul at Charleston, South Carolina.

Samuel Francis du Pont (1803-1865) was a Rear Admiral in the United States Navy and fought in the Mexican-American War and the Civil War. Andrew Hull Foote (1806-1863) was a Rear-Admiral in the United States Navy and fought in the Civil War and contributed to several naval reforms prior to the war. This collection consists of two letters, one from Samuel Francis du Pont to Foote in regards forwarding misdirected mail, as both were commanding ships in the China Sea. The second letter is from du Pont's father to a Naval Officer about Samuel Francis du Pont's experience aboard a ship.