Visions of America: The Stephen White Collection

10 volumes expanded to 20, 8vo. EXTRA-ILLUSTRATED BY THE ADDITION OF APPROXIMATELY 44 PHOTOGRAPHS, 150 AUTOGRAPH LETTERS AND DOCUMENTS, 13 PIECES OF RELATED EPHEMERA, AND APPROXIMATELY 450 PLATES. Contemporary blue crushed levant, upper covers with central facsimile of Lincoln’s signature gilt surrounded by a double filet border with star and shield cornerpieces gilt, spines in 5 compartments with 4 raised bands, gilt-lettered in two, one with gilt eagle, one with gilt laurel wreath STAMP-SIGNED BY WHITMAN BENNETT (upper cover to vol. 1 neatly reattached with discreet spine repairs, some rubbing to spine ends.) Provenance: Mr. Kauffmann (Samuel Hay Kauffmann? Letters from Nicolay and Hay to Kauffmann describing their long-time friendship bound in to volume I).

WITH 44 PHOTOGRAPHS, CDVs, AND CABINET CARDS BOUND IN, INCLUDING A CABINET-SIZE ALBUMEN PRINT OF PRESIDENT ABRAHAM LINCOLN WITH SECRETARIES JOHN G. NICOLAY AND JOHN HAY BY ALEXANDER GARDNER. Other images bound in include a photographic portrait of Lincoln by Hesler (printed before 1900), a cabinet card photograph of Lincoln’s $5 bill portrait, a photograph of Robert Todd Lincoln, and photographs or General Grant, William Garrison, Charles Sumner, William H. Seward, John Sherman, Stonewall Jackson, Henry Ward Beecher, and Ralph Waldo Emerson.

WITH 150 AUTOGRAPH LETTERS AND DOCUMENTS NEATLY BOUND IN, FROM MEMBERS OF LINCOLN’S WAR CABINET, HIS PRINCIPAL GENERALS, AND MEMBERS OF THE UNION AND CONFEDERATE ARMIES.

INCLUDES AN AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED BY LINCOLN AS PRESIDENT TO HIS SECRETARY OF WAR Simon Cameron: “My dear Sir Let Charles S. Hamilton, of Wisconsin, be a Brigadier General of volunteers.” Written 2 August 1861 from the Executive Mansion (not in Basler). Charles Smith Hamilton (1822-1891) attended the United States Military Academy where he was a classmate of Ulysses S. Grant. He served in the Mexican-American War before the outset of the Civil War. He returned to active service accepting the commission of colonel just one month after the attack on Fort Sumter. He drilled and equipped his regiment and reported to Nathaniel P. Banks in Harpers Ferry. On his arrival, he was promoted to brigadier general and placed in command of a brigade in the Army of the Potomac. He was transferred to the Western Theater in 1862, and during his service, commanded divisions and corps of the Army of the Potomac, the Army of the Mississippi, and the Army of the Tennessee. After the war, he was appointed U. S. marshal for the Eastern District of Wisconsin.

ALSO INCLUDED ARE 4 AUTOGRAPH LETTERS SIGNED WRITTEN TO LINCOLN AS PRESIDENT. The letters comprise: REED, Amos, as Acting Governor of Utah Territory, to President Lincoln. Salt Lake City, 18 February 1864. Recommending Charles W. Wandell as Justice of the Supreme Court of the territory. –GILMORE, Joseph, and the Executive Council of New Hampshire, to President Lincoln. Concord, NH, 22 March 1865. Requesting the reinstatement of George P. Folsom, who had been court-martialed for reported embezzling the public’s money entrusted to his care as Paymaster in the Army -- Members of Congress from Pennsylvania, to Lincoln as President. Washington, D. C., 2 March 1863. Signed by 18 members, recommending Hon. John T. Nixon to the position of Judge of the Court of Claims. – Citizens of Pottsville, Pennsylvania, to Lincoln as President. Pottsville, n.d. Signed by 24 residents, recommending Nicholas Jones for the office of Marchall of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

WITH ADDITIONAL AUTOGRAPH LETTERS SIGNED BY MARY TODD LINCOLN, ROBERT TODD LINCOLN, HANNIBAL HAMLIN, WILLIAM H. SEWARD, ULYSSES S. GRANT, ROBERT E. LEE, Millard Fillmore, William Cullen Bryant, Jefferson Davis, Stephen Douglas, Sam Houston, General George McClellan, General George Meade, Edwin Stanton, Edward Everett, Horace Greely, Charles Dana, Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, Winfield Scott, John Tyler, Schuyler Colfax, Alexander Stephens, John A. Dix, Salmon P. Chase, Simon Cameron, Gideon Welles, J. C. Fremont, D. C. Buell, John Sherman, Horatio Seymour, Carl Schurz, John A. Logan, James Longstreet, Alexander Webb, Philip Sheridan, George Bancroft, Josiah Scott, William French, Robert Schenk, Fighting Joe Wheeler, and Geritt Smith.

With a calligraphic notarized affidavit SIGNED BY THOMAS F. MADIGAN dated 3 February 1925 bound into volume I: “To Whom It May Concern: The Autograph Letters and Documents in this copy of Nicolay and Hay’s ‘Abraham Lincoln’ have been carefully scrutinized by me and found to be authentic originals.” Complete list available on request.

WITH 13 PIECES OF EPHEMERA BOUND IN, including ribbons, songsheets, currency, and a reproduction handbill of Our American Cousin (printed after the Civil War). 

A SUPERB EXTRA-ILLUSTRATED COPY OF NICOLAY AND HAY’S WORK ABOUT LINCOLN, presumably from the collection of Samuel Hay Kauffmann, publisher of the Washington Star newspaper, Treasury Department clerk, and patron of the Corcoran and Smithsonian.