Bishop of the Michigan Diocese of the Episcopal Church, 1906-1923, and advocate of the "social gospel" views of Walter Rauschenbusch. Papers consist of correspondence, notebooks on labor and social issues, and biographical material.
The papers of Charles D. Williams, Episcopal bishop of Michigan, include correspondence concerning personal and church affairs and the social gospel movement, including correspondence with Walter Rauschenbush, Samuel Mather, and Lucretia Garfield; also sermons and addresses, 1885-1923, journals of European trips, 1896, 1917, and 1921, notebooks on social and labor problems, material on the 1908 forest fire at Metz, Michigan (Presque Isle County), and material on the Trinity Cathedral, Cleveland, Ohio in 1898; biographical writings by his sons, Benedict Williams, his wife Lucy V. Williams, and his secretary, Charles O. Ford; letters of condolence from fellow clergy, including Reinhold Niebuhr; also photographs.