LINCOLN, Abraham. Autograph endorsement signed ("A. Lincoln"), as President, 17 December 1862. 1 page, 4to, endorsed on verso of blank integral leaf of a draft letter to Maj. Gen. John Dix Washington, 16 December 1862 . A 15-LINE, 70 WORD ENDORSEMENT.
LINCOLN, Abraham. Autograph endorsement signed ("A. Lincoln"), as President, 17 December 1862. 1 page, 4to, endorsed on verso of blank integral leaf of a draft letter to Maj. Gen. John Dix Washington, 16 December 1862 . A 15-LINE, 70 WORD ENDORSEMENT. "THE COLORED MAN WILLIAM JOHNSON CAME WITH ME FROM ILLINOIS". A fascinating example of Lincoln declining to perform a favor for a former servant. The draft letter prepared for his signature asked General Dix to grant permission for Johnson and a Walter Sorrill to pass from Baltimore into the Confederacy at Norfolk, Virginia, to sell certain goods. "William is my body servant," the draft states, "and came with me from Illinois, and is a trusty fellow..." Lincoln didn't like it. "I decline to sign the within, because it does not state the thing quite to my liking. The colored man William Johnson came with me from Illinois, and I would be glad for him to be obliged, if he can be consistently with the public service; but I can not make an order about it, nor a request which might, in some sort, be construed as an order." Johnson was Lincoln's barber and valet for much of 1861 and Lincoln wrote two letters of recommendation for him (to Gideon Welles, 16 March 1861; and to Salmon Chase, 29 Nov. 1861), and a few Lincoln checks to him for modest amounts survive. Chase employed him as a messenger, but his work for Lincoln continued sporadically, and he accompanied the President to Gettysburg. That trip may have been the occasion for Johnson's fatal case of smallpox (see R. P. Basler, "Did President Lincoln Give the Smallpox to William H. Johnson?" Huntington Library Quarterly , 35:3, May 1972, 279-284). Johnson died in January 1864, and Lincoln paid for his funeral and tombstone. This document gives us an extremely rare glimpse of Lincoln's interaction with one of the few African Americans in his immediate circle. Published in Basler, 6:8-9.
LINCOLN, Abraham. Autograph endorsement signed ("A. Lincoln"), as President, 17 December 1862. 1 page, 4to, endorsed on verso of blank integral leaf of a draft letter to Maj. Gen. John Dix Washington, 16 December 1862 . A 15-LINE, 70 WORD ENDORSEMENT.
LINCOLN, Abraham. Autograph endorsement signed ("A. Lincoln"), as President, 17 December 1862. 1 page, 4to, endorsed on verso of blank integral leaf of a draft letter to Maj. Gen. John Dix Washington, 16 December 1862 . A 15-LINE, 70 WORD ENDORSEMENT. "THE COLORED MAN WILLIAM JOHNSON CAME WITH ME FROM ILLINOIS". A fascinating example of Lincoln declining to perform a favor for a former servant. The draft letter prepared for his signature asked General Dix to grant permission for Johnson and a Walter Sorrill to pass from Baltimore into the Confederacy at Norfolk, Virginia, to sell certain goods. "William is my body servant," the draft states, "and came with me from Illinois, and is a trusty fellow..." Lincoln didn't like it. "I decline to sign the within, because it does not state the thing quite to my liking. The colored man William Johnson came with me from Illinois, and I would be glad for him to be obliged, if he can be consistently with the public service; but I can not make an order about it, nor a request which might, in some sort, be construed as an order." Johnson was Lincoln's barber and valet for much of 1861 and Lincoln wrote two letters of recommendation for him (to Gideon Welles, 16 March 1861; and to Salmon Chase, 29 Nov. 1861), and a few Lincoln checks to him for modest amounts survive. Chase employed him as a messenger, but his work for Lincoln continued sporadically, and he accompanied the President to Gettysburg. That trip may have been the occasion for Johnson's fatal case of smallpox (see R. P. Basler, "Did President Lincoln Give the Smallpox to William H. Johnson?" Huntington Library Quarterly , 35:3, May 1972, 279-284). Johnson died in January 1864, and Lincoln paid for his funeral and tombstone. This document gives us an extremely rare glimpse of Lincoln's interaction with one of the few African Americans in his immediate circle. Published in Basler, 6:8-9.
.jpg "Quelle: Christie's")
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