Collection consists of material produced and collected by Oates. Included are personal and professional papers , diaries, letters, research notes for publications and material relating to the "Singing Ship"
Papers relating to the voyage out and settlement of Robert Mather and his wife, Ann (Benson). Many of the papers (Ml0/16-20) consist of extracts from letters from Ann Mather to her brother, Rev. Samuel Benson, and sisters Isabella Whytall and Sarah Benson (m. Hammond 1832), in UK and were probably given to their niece, Sarah Benson Mather who married George Washington Walker in 1840, after Ann Mather's death in 1831.