Born in Long Meadow, Massachusetts in 1848, Wolcott attended both Yale and Harvard, graduating from Harvard in 1875 with a law degree. Later in that same year he settled in Black Hawk, Colorado, serving for a time as a school teacher there before moving to Denver and establishing his own law firm. In 1889 he became a U.S. Senator from Colorado, and was reelected in 1895. While in the Senate, Wolcott was a leading advocate for the coinage of silver. In 1897 President McKinley appointed him chairman of a commission sent to Europe to report on international bimetallism. Wolcott made an unsuccessful attempt at securing the restoration of a two-metal system of monetary exchange between the United States and Great Britain, France and Germany. After his political career had ended, Wolcott returned to Denver and again practiced law. He died while vacationing in Monte Carlo in 1905. A portion of the correspondence in this collection consists of letters between Wolcott and President McKinley dated between January and November of 1897.