Consists of Philip E. Barringer's correspondence during his years as a student at Princeton University. The correspondents are primarily friends and relatives and the letters cover topics such as trips, current events. The collection also contains one particularly scathing letter from the Rev. Alford Kelley, Class of 1886, condemning Barringer's use of the word "hell" in an article printed in the Princeton Alumni Weekly.
Philip E. Barringer was a member of the Princeton University Class of 1938. In the years after graduation he entered World War II with the 28th Artillery, eventually serving as Secretary of the Legal Division of the Allied Control Council for Germany in the later years of the conflict. He was an active participant in crafting the shared governance of post-war Germany by the United States and the Soviet Union, and following the war embarked on a career in the civil service spanning half a century, acting for many years as Director of Foreign Military Rights Affairs.