Letter by an Illinois Democrat Denouncing the Emancipation Proclamation, Wendell Phillips, and the Suspension of Habeas Corpus: “I said fight all of you Negro loving ones, I am not of that class”.
St. Augustine, Knox County, Illinois: September 29, 1863. Autograph letter signed, A. J. Rausern, four pages, 5 x 8 inches. A forceful anti-emancipation letter sent from western Illinois during the second year of the Civil War. Written nine months after the Emancipation Proclamation took effect and only weeks after the.....