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Abraham Lincoln

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:0.00 USD Estimated At:8,000.00 - 10,000.00 USD
Abraham Lincoln

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Auction Date:2010 Jan 13 @ 10:00 (UTC-05:00 : EST/CDT)
Location:5 Rt 101A Suite 5, Amherst, New Hampshire, 03031, United States
War-dated LS as president signed “A. Lincoln,” one page, 5 x 8, Executive Mansion letterhead, August 8, 1862. Lincoln sends thanks to supporter W. W. Carter for a gift. In full: “Allow me to thank you very cordially for the elegant and ingenious flag which you have had the kindness to send me, and for the earnest and patriotic letter by which is was accompanied.” In very good condition, with light to moderate overall foxing, a mild block of toning from previous display, and a professionally repaired hole to upper right blank corner.

Carter was an ardent Lincoln supporter who, in March 1862, created what he hoped would be a new motto for America during wartime: “The heel of the old flag-staff shall bruise the rattlesnake’s head”—with the flag representing the federal government and the rattlesnake representing the Southern rebellion. Carter was so taken by his wording that he had it applied to a flag and then sent to Lincoln in a show of patriotism. Accompanying the gift was a letter—the letter to which Lincoln here replies—in which Carter asked that “the flag...be desposited in the War Department, order order that the motto might be incorporated into the national faith during the president struggle for the supremacy of the Constitution and the lawns, and the prosperity of our nationality.” Describing his motto as “symbolic and prophetic,” Carter had also maintained that it could rally the nation behind the “absolute power and invaluable determination of the federal government to crush our the Rebellion at any and every cost.” It was upon reading such battle-ready fervor that Lincoln, in return, replied via the letter offered here. Although the motto may not have had staying power, it was later used during the National Union Ratification Meeting in Baltimore in June 1864, during which Lincoln’s nomination for a second term in the White House was ratified.
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