Citing Archival Sources: best practices?

One thing i’ve always had a love-hate relationship with is the proper way to cite archival sources in footnotes and in the Works Cited list. As most of my personal research is conducted from archives, this is something very near and dear to my heart and something which would be great to have clarified.

The school library’s references sheets are silent on the subject. And one open-source ‘Endnote’-type program I used for a while, Zotero (for use with Firefox only), is insufficient. Here is what the entry box looks like:

Some of the criteria are great – number of pages is generally a good reference to have if all the documents are blending into one, an idea of the thickness of the source is easier for later retrieval. But having only one entry for author, and none for, say in the case of correspondence, the name of the recipient, is not entirely helpful. More important, there are not enough spots to mention both the specifics of one document – for example, a letter – AND the identifying information of the folder in which it is kept.

The Turabian (Chicago Style) Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, 7th edition is not entirely helpful. Section 17.6, on the usage of “Unpublished Sources” in the Notes-Bibliography Style, highlights Manuscript Collections (17.6.4):

“If possible, identify the author and date of each item, the title or type of document, the name of the collection, and the name of the depository. In a note, begin with the author’s name; if a document has a title but no author, or the title is more important than the author, list the title first.”

One such example?

“5. George Creel to Colonel House, September 25, 1918, Edward M. House Papers, Yale University Library, New Haven, CT.”

A bit more satisfactory, but still not perfect. For instance, in my undergraduate thesis on the ILO, a specific change of venue was crucial to the story I was trying to tell. Therefore, in citing the letter, I included the place where the letter was sent from, and to:

[1] Letter of M. Viple in Geneva to E.J. Phelan in Montréal, 9 July 1942, Z 1/1/1/11 (J.1).
[it was specified in my Works Cited as to where the archival collection was located]

The date information, though not listed in the Chicago manuals, did make it much easier for the reader to follow the vicissitudes of my narrative. In my current research for my mémoire, certain letters have numbered pages; i’m contemplating even citing the page of the handwritten document – is this excessive, or just helpful?

How do you cite your archival sources? Like me, were there any bits of information that you find/found pertinent to include, but which aren’t necessarily listed in the Chicago guide?