“A play entitled Uncle Tom’s Cabin is now being played at the Museum it represents all the scenes in the popular work of Mrs Stowe… Of course you heard of the great fire on Merrimack Street a few nights since.
 Last night about five oclock in the evening a fire broke out in P.O. Richmond’s Button Mill and was burnt to the ground…
by every shining mountain Nebraska shall be free…”

W/ ORIGINAL ENVELOPE  -  Discussing: UNCLE TOMS CABIN, NEBRASKA BILL, FREE-SOILERS, GREAT FIRE IN LOWELL
In Beautiful Condition.  Blue-lined paper. Measures 8" x 12.5", Fold marks, Fine.
Envelope shows light wear.
Addressed to:Mrs. Francis D. Anderson, West Windham, N. Hamp. 
Stock Room February 17, 1854

Click here for the full transcription
Price: 125.00

“…He told me before I left that in case of conflict between the two sections, it was certain that Jeff Davis would take Washington which proposition I demurred to & still do,
 though I had no idea the capital could be put in so much danger as it has been.

I am getting very anxious for the show to begin for the government to commence active operations. 
The little affair at St. Louis pleases the people & if the mob attacked the soldiers nobody will cry over their supplying with cold lead.
Last Sabbath  at 5 o’clock I entertained the people of Williston by a half hours lecture on talk on the religious condition of the blacks …The church was partly well filled & the audience seemed interested. 
I bless my stars now ever time I am called on for a speech that I practiced talking to the negroes…”

PROSTITUTION DURING THE CIVIL WAR ERA IN PORTSMOUTH, NH

“I am still staying in this God-forsaken place
…what keeps of a shower of fire and brimstone from this place I am at a loss to know
for if this place existed with all present inequity at the time of Sodom and Gomorrah, I think the latter place would have been spared.”

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PORTSMOUTH, 1862.  During the Civil War, George R. Carleton to his wife, Susan [Tripp Carleton.¹   
 Snippet:
“I am still staying in this God-forsaken place and it is somewhat brobable (sic) that his week will be the last…work at the shop is getting short…Mr. G.W. Kidde was at Manchest last week / he states that the Stark Mills will stop this week…what keeps of a shower of fire and brimstone from this place I am at a loss to know for if this place existed with all present inequity at the time of Sodom and Gomorrah, I think the latter place would have been spared.”

With original stamped envelope.  1¼ pp. Measures
 8" x 8"; Fold marks. Fine condition.  Scarcely found content regarding Portsmouth from the mid 19^th Century.

¹Susan TRIPP:  born on 23 Dec 1803 in Epsom, Merrimack, NH. She was christened.
! She m. George R. Carlton. Issue. (William Jones; Epsom VR; Randall, John Tripp, 31).

Price: 40.00

Belknap (1829-1890) became President Grant's Secretary of War on October 25, 1869, succeeding William Tecumseh Sherman. Belknap was charged with corruption in office, admitted receiving bribes for the appointment of Indian post-traders and resigned from the Cabinet on March 7, 1876. He was impeached by the House of Representatives and was tried by the Senate. On August 1, 1876, Belknap was acquitted on the technical ground of lack of jurisdiction because he was no longer a government official.

Letter is one page and measures 5" x 8". Slightly frayed at the very left border, a few ink remains on the page, o/w Fine. Sound and complete.

Curious content penned not long after he had been impeached, then acquitted. Scarce.

Price: 140.00

JOHN FARMER (1789-1838)  WRITES TO THE FAMOUS MAP MAKER,
PHILIP CARRIGAIN
John Farmer was an American  historian, author and genealogist. He is considered the founder of systematic genealogy in America.
Philip Carrigain was the well known NH Mapmaker  and Sec of State.  

Farmer writes to Carrigain regarding the death of “lamented friend Bartlett,” referring to
Josiah Bartlett, Jr., Son of the Signer of the Declaration of Independence.  Mentions “preparing an obituary”  to appear in “The Statesmen.”  Integral Stampless Cover, 1 1/3 pp. manuscript, 4 pp. total.  ¼ of back page absent, with clean tear to center. Dated Nov., 1837.  Measures 9.5" 7.75".
A VERY NICE ASSOCIATION PIECE SOLD

"The typhoid fever has been very prevalent in this section of country for a few years past it has taken the middle aged class mostly...
There was a protracted meeting held at Mixville the past Winter.  The meetings were quite interesting and about forty became hopefully converted, about twenty five joined the Methodist Church.  Then, there was a little flock left, who could not go with the Methodist (and as it were, having no where to go)..."

GENESEE FALLS, NY, 1859 – Six Pages. Anna Davidson to her sister.  So much strife in those days.  Typhoid Fever, deaths,  gloomy days in the small New York Town.   But the new town improves!
 Anna describes the atmosphere in great detail.
Pack with many names and local town information. Genesee Falls / Mixville, NY
Measures 6" x 7.5" Fine. SOLD

TO GENERAL ARTEMUS WARD'S GRANDSON
TRENTON, NJ  August 14, 1848. Lodowick Fosdick Billings, 1849 Harvard Graduate to his College friend, Artemas Ward Lamson. (1830-1910) 3pp.  Political content regarding the zeitgeist of the upcoming 1848 election.  A few minor fox marks, otherwise Fine condition.

"The Buffalo nomination is also unsatisfactory…Whigs do not like Van Buren.  Democrats, displeased with the regular nomination, but not actual barnburners, are disgusted with his fickle course.  The result is that many of all parties will not vote at all.  I have seen but one hot Taylor Whig.  He was noisy enough.  He would suit you.  My valuable opinion is that Taylor will be the next president, and this opinion is the more valuable because formed against my will, & in the face of testimony and observation.”
Full Letter Transcribed and provided upon purchase.

Price: 55.00

FREE FRANK – ENVELOPE TO BALTIMORE WITH RED POSTAL FREE
"WASHINGTON" 

DRED SCOT CASE LAWYER 
COUNSEL TO LINCOLN CONSPIRATOR
Reverdy Johnson (1796–1876) lawyer and statesman; Annapolis, Md.; Maryland legislature; (1821–28), United States Senate; (1845–49) Attorney General under Zachary Taylor;
As counsel for the defense in the Dred Scott Case,
he was known to have greatly influenced the Supreme Court, particularly Chief Justice Roger B. Taney.        SOLD

LOWELL FACTORY GIRLS
1853 Lowell, Mass. Historical Letter discusses the Factory Girls of the famous Lowell Mills
 (the 1853 Lowell Female Labor Reform Association movement) to reduce the hours the Factory Girls had to work to 11 hours. *
*click here for Lowell History on this

“There is a great amount of talk and excitement here about the Ten hour Rule of labor; I suppose you have heard the Factory Girls have got the eleven hour Rule. 
The Job Hands in this shop got a notice from Head Quarters requesting them not to go out to Tea until Bell-Time.  It made a great noise, among them and there are but very few now in the Shop would go for 10 hours with whole Souls & Bodies.”

Lowell, October 6, 1853 – Charles Lucious Anderson, a worker in the Lowell Machine Shop Factory to Parents. 2 full legal size pages in beautiful manuscript, plus a 4.5" page. 2.5pp in total. Fine. Letter is fully transcribed and will be provided..
Price: 85.00

LENGTHY 4 pp LETTER FROM CHARLES LUCIUS ANDERSON, WORKED IN LOWELL MILLS. W/ ORIGINAL ENVELOPE  - FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATION DESCRIPTION &  FASCINATING LOWELL CONTENT!

SLAVERY – NEBRASKA BILL, RIOT ACT, ETC…

"The fourth here in Lowell was one of the warm days I can assure you.  There was no celebration here; the principal place of attraction being the South Common where the great Broadway collection of Animals with numerous other smaller shows. Were on exhibition. 

Judging from the crowd around them I remained in the house till towards night when I went down to the P.O. and of all the sights that I ever saw on the street, I never saw anything more laughable.  Every one almost that wore thin clothing were as wet as if they had just come out of Merrimack River.

Click here for the full transcription

Price: 145.00

[SPIRITUALISTS, MEDIUMS, CLAIRVOYANTS] 1854, Three page letter HAVERHILL, MA.
Interesting missive with small illustration inside.
"B. Greenleaf, a speaking medium of this place is thinking of moving there.  There is a medium in Winchester at the junction of the Lowell and Woburn RR 2 miles below me that] will hold an empty glass bottles in her hand / they will disappear and then return filled with liquid with directions for using for medical purpose.… "
Datelined  Haverhill, Mar 16, 1854.  3 pp. Some light age wear, generally Fine condition. SOLD

“…the government seems determined to let the rebels get the start, and it is not unlikely ere this reaches you, that the rebels will have desolated the densely peopled portions of Pennsylvania, and be in undisputed possession of both the Quaker, and the Garden City…
Measures 5" x  8.5"; Last page on scan shows discoloration. This appears to more a product of the scanner, not the original. In Fine condition.   SOLD

Bishop William Woodruff Niles writes a poignant letter to his daughter

ROME, 1881; Descriptive of his travels in Rome, ruins, riding on a donkey, how he baptized a two day old child, etc…Nicely written and sweet! Signed “Papa.”

Bishop of NH – Married Bertha Olmstead Niles,  half sister to the famous architect, Frederich Law Olmsted (Founder of American Landscape Architecture [famous for designing many well-known urban parks, including Central Park and Prospect Park in New York City,  Niagara Reservation; Mount Royal Park in Montreal in Canada; the Emerald Necklace in Boston, Massachusetts; the Belle Isle Park, etc…]   SOLD