The fonds consists of correspondence, memoranda, diaries, material by and about J.W. Dafoe, subject files, scrapbooks and miscellaneous pamphlets. The correspondence files, arranged chronologically, contain memoranda of confidential interviews on Canadian politics, trade, the economy, external affairs, defence. Often these memoranda are in the form of letters or vice versa, so the two have been filed together. The Diaries written by Grant Dexter in 1938-39 while he was in England touch on many aspects of Canadian External Affairs. Also included is a diary kept by Grant Dexter's wife Alice, outlining their life in London in 1937.
Journal, 1802-1803, and bound volume of Tables of Contents, of the lands of Blairo'er, the property of Alexander Gow, Esquire, referring to a plan of the same, made out from survey by David Smith, in 1819. .
Fonds consists of receipts for fees to attend University of Queen's College, Kingston, Ontario; class attendance certificates; invitations to both Alexander, and his sister, Jennie, to attend the Annual Reunion of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons, Kingston, Ontario.
The portion of Albert Schwenger's collection housed at Queen's University Archives is divided into two manuscript series. The first series consists of documents related to the Milne and MacKay families. The papers originate with Captain William Milne who settled in Ancaster where his daughter Anna Maria married into the MacKay family in the 1820's. His correspondence comments of trade conditions, relations in the native community after the Treaty of Greenville and European wars. Of particular note is a letter of introduction for Captain Milne written in Turkish from 1799. The second series consists of unrelated historical documents primarily from the Niagara area, but includes one British document.