The Marriott Library has made an exciting discovery: a facsimile of the Declaration of Independence in the Rare Books department of Special Collections. The facsimile was part of Peter Force’s American Archives, a collection of transcribed manuscripts relating to the history of the American colonies.

Force’s facsimile has a fascinating printing history and a close connection to the original engrossed (handwritten) Declaration of Independence. In 1820, John Quincy Adams, then secretary of state, commissioned Washington D. C. engraver William J. Stone to produce a facsimile of the engrossed copy of the Declaration of Independence. Stone engraved a copperplate over the course of three years and sold it to the State Department in 1823. Two hundred copies of the engraving were made on parchment and distributed to official institutions and surviving signers of the Declaration. While the exact method of transfer Stone used to create the engraving is unknown, one option includes a “wet transfer” where the original document was dampened with water so that the ink left an imprint that was used to etch the copperplate.

When American Archives was in development, Force planned to insert folded prints of the Declaration into the appropriate volumes and commissioned Stone, a friend and colleague, to make the prints from the copperplate Stone had created from the original. The Fifth Series, Volume 1 of American Archives was published in 1848 with the Stone engraving of the Declaration tipped in to the text. Each print, often referred to as the “Force printing,” was made on semi-translucent paper, inserted into the binding, and folded into the volume. Thanks to the clarity of Stone’s engraving, the facsimile is remarkably clear, giving viewers a true sense of the original, now housed in the National Archives.

“We were absolutely thrilled when we discovered this treasure,” explains Todd Samuelson, associate dean for Special Collections. “This version now represents one of the earliest available copies of the Declaration of Independence. Since it was created using an immediate transfer from the original Declaration, it is more legible than the original and is highly sought-after and valuable as an object for student research and class study.”

This facsimile is currently on display in the America in the Archives: The Many Voices of Democracy exhibition on the fourth floor of the Marriott Library. The exhibition explores intertwined stories of America and their presence in archives from pre-colonial artifacts to present-day publications. The exhibition will run from June 12, 2026-September 9, 2026.

Photo credit: Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library