Autograph Letter Signed Discussing a Speaking Engagement and Involvement in “Unpopular Movements,” 1855.
New Britain: 1855. Letter measuring 8 x 5 inches, folded. Fine condition.
Letters and Manuscripts
ALS by the Author and Actor Fanny Kemble to an Editor Regarding the Publication of an Article.
London, United Kingdom: likely late 1800s. Single four page letter measuring 4 ½ x 7 inches. Frances Anne “Fanny” Kemble (1809–1893) was a British actor, writer, and later abolitionist. After her initial retirement from acting, she married Pierce Mease Butler, maternal grandson of American Founding Father Pierce Butler. Butler and.....
“Garrison and His Creed (Caption Title)” [Letter to a Newspaper Editor Defending William Lloyd Garrison in Response to an Article Written by Eli Thayer]
Brooklyn: 1893. Single page. Some tears at creases, else about fine, very good overall. A letter written by Thaddeus Hyatt to the editor of the New York Tribune, in response to a letter written by Eli Thayer on William Lloyd Garrison entitled “Garrison and his Creed.” Hyatt takes issue with.....
ALS by Abolitionist Politician Joshua Reed Giddings Concerning a Visit to Dover, New Hampshire.
Concord, New Hampshire: December 1859. Single two-page letter measuring 5 x 8 ¼ inches. A letter from Joshua Reed Giddings (1795–1864) written from Concord, New Hampshire, to A. H. Barnes, Esq., in Dover. Giddings was a prominent abolitionist, lawyer, and congressman from Ohio. He was famously censured by the House.....
Friendship Album Belonging to McKinley Stewart of the Tuskegee Institute with Inscriptions from Classmates, 1914.
Tuskegee: 1914. Oblong 8vo, decorative pebbled cloth over thin boards, 8 x 5 inches. With fourteen pages of inscriptions from fellow classmates. Some pages detached, wear and toning, good condition. An interesting book of dedicatory verse to a student in the Tuskegee Institute class of 1915, from his classmates, all.....
Collection of Material Relating to African-American Sociologist George E. Haynes, Including Correspondence and Photographs.
United States: 191–1964. Twenty-seven letters, two typed documents (totaling four pages), six photographs, and nine pieces of ephemera including two of Haynes’ heavily stamped passports. One of the typed documents and two of the letters belong to Olyve Jeter, Haynes’ second wife. Many items affixed to loose scrapbook leaves. George.....
Fundraising Letter for Black Panther Party Members' Legal Defense.
New York City: 1970. Single letter measuring 8 x 10.5 inches, one single-sided sheet. In March of 1969, eight members of the Black Panther Party (BPP) were arrested in Chicago, accused of conspiracy to incite a riot. In April, twenty-one BPP members were arrested in New York City and charged.....
Draft of a Letter by an Unknown Member of Frémont’s Circle in the Western Department Outlining the Legal Arguments for Emancipation, Addressed to Frémont during his Tenure at the Western Department: “If you grant a pass to the slave, you recognize his power to enter into a solemn compact - so doing he ceases to be a slave, and your power of rendition ceases.”
[St. Louis, Missouri]: 1861. Handwritten letter on Western Department letterhead, 9 x 5 ½ inches bifolium. Docketed on rear “Rough sketch of letter to Maj Gen JC Fremont touching the rendition of a slave.”. In the turbulent summer and autumn of 1861, the headquarters of John C. Frémont’s Western Department.....
Inventory of the Personal Effects of Jorden Turner, a Black Union Private in the 63rd United States Infantry, Who Died at Freedmen’s Hospital in Memphis in March 1865.
Memphis, Tennessee: March 18, 1865. Printed Article 95 inventory form completed in manuscript, recording the effects of Jorden Turner, Private in Captain S. A. Walker’s Company B, 63rd Regiment, United States Infantry. 8 x 10 inches. A scarce Civil War document recording the death and remaining property of Jorden Turner.....
Manuscript Order to Relieve Surgeon William Bishop of Duty at the Rost Home Colony, Issued as Special Orders No. 18.
New Orleans, Louisiana: August 29, 1866. 4to, bifolium, with text to one page and docketed verso, 7 ¾ x 9 ¾ inches. A Reconstruction-era Freedmen's Bureau medical order issued in New Orleans on August 29, 1866, directly connected to the famed Rost Home Colony in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana, the.....
Alex Haley’s Genealogical and Historical Notes on His Father’s Side of the Family, Likely for His Posthumous Novel Queen.
United States: N.d. Thirty-one pages: three typed pages with editorial marks measuring 8 ½ x 11 inches; twenty-eight pages of handwritten notes measuring 6 ½ x 8 ½ and smaller. Content warning: This description mentions sexual assault. Alex Haley (1921–1992) was an African American author, known for his bestselling.....
1870 Letter from Rev. Edward P. Smith to the Singer Sewing Company Requesting a Sewing Machine for Howard University Students.
New York City: November 1870. Single one-page letter measuring 8 x 9 ¾ inches. A letter from Reverend Edward Parmlee Smith (1827–1876), then a field secretary of the American Missionary Association, requesting a free or half-priced Singer sewing machine for the “colored young men & women” who are “working their.....
Letters to a Friend at Howard University Discussing Black Theater and Greek Life in 1920s Los Angeles.
Los Angeles, California, and Albuquerque, New Mexico: 1927–1933. Three letters totaling seven pages and one postcard. Two letters from 1927 and one from 1928; postcard appears to be stamped 1933. Letters from friends in Los Angeles to James M. Jones, who has moved away to attend Howard University. The friends.....
Court Duplicate of the Testimony of Thomas Kent, a Black Man Aboard the Brigantine Britannia When It Wrecked off the Coast of New Brunswick in December of 1834.
St. John, New Brunswick, British North America: April 1835. Three 8 x 13 inch pages, folded. Toning at folds; fine. With a clipping from the Quebec Gazette Monthly, March 1835. Little biographical information is available on Thomas Kent, save that he was a sailor aboard the Britannia and that the.....
1833 Letter from J. B. Toulmin & Son Reporting the State of the Cotton Market.
Mobile, Alabama: March 1833. Single one-page letter measuring 9 x 11 inches. J. B. Toulmin is likely John Butler Toulmin (1788–1860), a merchant in Mobile, Alabama, and the son of dissenting minister Rev. Joshua Toulmin of Taunton, England. Toulmin’s brother was Harry Toulmin, a Unitarian minister and Kentucky politician. Interestingly.....
Partly Printed Document Signed by Richard Gridley for a Loan of 600 Pounds to Gridley, Joseph Jackson, and Edmund Quincy, from Jonathan and John Amory, Likely for the Purchase of a Furnace, 1772.
Boston: 1772. Single sheet measuring 12 ½ x 8 inches. Notes in margin in an early hand, fine. Richard Gridley was an artilleryman, military engineer, and entrepreneur, who had a prolific career in several conflicts including the Revolutionary War, where he served as an engineer. Offered here is a very.....
Letter Written to George Washington at Newburgh Seeking Passage for Smallpox Doctor James Latham, the Smallpox Specialist who Treated Both Armies during the American Revolution, 1782.
Haverstraw: 1782. Single page measuring 7 x 9 inches. Trimmed at margin with very small amount of loss to text else fine. An interesting and significant letter written by Ann Hawkes Hay to George Washington in 1782, seeking passage for a family member of the loyalist physician James Latham, a......
1779 Letter of Boston Poet and Loyalist Exile Joseph Green Written from London During the Revolution: “The Door Was Then Shut, Now It Is Bolted.”
London: March 26, 1779. Autograph letter signed, Joseph Green, to Boston merchant Samuel Eliot. Folded letter datelined "London, Mar. 26th 1779," with "Rec'd 22nd Decr. 1779" docket on top flap. 7 x 9 ¼ inches, 3pp. A thoughtful Revolutionary-era letter written by Joseph Green, the Boston clergyman, poet, satirist, and.....
1884 Letter from an American in Cannstatt, Germany, Discussing Fashion, Student Culture, and Emigration of the Poor who “hardly know what butter is”.
Cannstatt, German Empire: March 1884. Single eight-page letter measuring 8 x 10 ½ inches. Quite delicate with tears at some folds, often intersecting with text. Slight odor. A letter from a man to his daughter Jennie, written from the Hotel Hermann in Cannstatt in 1884. Cannstatt was founded around 90.....
A Letter Written from Augusta, Georgia, Describing the Author’s Voyage from Boston to Augusta, Georgia in 1818.
Augusta, Georgia: January 1818. Single letter, three 9 x 16 inch pages, letters with some tape repairs and stray holes at folds, still quite legible. A letter written by Calvin Barnard to his friend Asa Holman of Bolton, Massachusetts, describing the former’s trip from Boston to Augusta, South Carolina from.....
1852 Letter from a Soldier of the 7th US Infantry, Impelled by Poverty to Enlist, Describing His Westward Journey of “700 miles on the Wild Prairie among the Indians” to His Wife and Requesting Her to “get me out of the army”.
Fort Gibson, Indian Territory: July 30, 1852. Single two-page letter measuring 9 ¾ x 7 ¾ inches, postmarked Fort Gibson. Damage to upper right corner intersecting with text; repairs with archival tape; with small portion of text continued on cover missing. A letter from James Johnson at Fort Gibson to.....
Three Letters from Frederick MacMonnies to Thomas Dewing Concerning Sculpting the Players’ Club’s Edwin Booth Monument.
France: 1910. Three letters totaling twenty-two pages, 5 x 8 inches and smaller. Folded; some with large tears at folds though entirely legible. Frederick MacMonnies (1863–1937) was an American expatriate sculptor and painter, known in the US for works including Nathan Hale and Bacchante and Infant Faun. In 1907, New.....
Three Letters to Thomas Dewing, 1902-1910.
V.p. 1902-1910. Ink on paper, each sheet approx. 9 x 7 in., 1-4 sheets each, variously paginated, one with orig. envelope. Celebrated American Beaux-Arts sculptor Frederick MacMonnies (1863-1937) studied with Augustus Saint-Gaudens and many of his best commissions emerged from his relationships with Saint-Gaudens and the architect Stanford White. He.....
1830 Letter Written from Mauritius, Describing Economic and Social Conditions on the “Ebony Isle”.
Mahébourg, Mauritius: August 1830. Single unsigned fourteen-page letter measuring 8 x 12 ¾ inches. In 1830, Mauritius was a British colony, captured from the French in 1810 during the Napoleonic Wars. It was originally a Dutch colony, and the Dutch had introduced enslaved labor to the islands. Enslaved people were.....
1851 Letter Sent from Panama City, “the wickedest place that I ever saw”, En Route to San Francisco, with a Graphic Description of the Execution of Two Men for Murder: “they was each one tied to the stake while forteen native soldiers shot [them]”.
Panama City, Panama: June 29, 1851. Single three-page letter measuring appx. 8 x 10 inches. Stampless cover marked “STEAMSHIP” and circled rate marking “40”. A letter from Henry Francis Douglass (1826–1897) while on his way to the California gold mines, sent to his wife Lydia Lillibridge (1828–1904) in Voluntown, Connecticut.....