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349

CIVIL WAR FROCK COAT OF LT. J.M. HUBBARD, 11th KANSAS CAVALRY. Regulation 8 button frock coat of Lt.

Currency:USD Category:Everything Else / Other Start Price:NA Estimated At:5,500.00 - 6,500.00 USD
CIVIL WAR FROCK COAT OF LT. J.M. HUBBARD, 11th KANSAS CAVALRY. Regulation 8 button frock coat of Lt.
CIVIL WAR FROCK COAT OF LT. J.M. HUBBARD, 11th KANSAS CAVALRY. Regulation 8 button frock coat of Lt. Josiah Meigs Hubbard along with his sword belt and intact hangers. Scion of Middletown, Connecticut and early Kansas "Free-Soiler," Josiah Meigs Hubbard's life extolled strong New England values that traded rhetoric for rifles on the distant plains of Kansas in the tumultuous years leading up to the Civil War. This is a significant coat of an original member of the New Haven Colony and "Beecher Rifle Company." Led by Charles B. Lines, Hubbard and sixty others journeyed to Kansas Territory in 1856 to bolster the vote of the "Free-Soilers" as a consequence of the bitterly debated Kansas-Nebraska Act passed in May 1854. The New Haven contingent counted the anti-slavery cleric Henry Ward Beecher as a benefactor, his Brooklyn congregation pledging a Sharp's Rifle to each man in passionate oratory that became known as the "Rifle and Bible" speech. The group became known as the "Beecher Rifles"; their carbines, "Beecher's Bibles." Aided financially by the New Haven patriarchs, Lines, Hubbard and the New England transplants founded the town of Wabaunsee, Kansas and organized a militia company they called the "Prairie Guard." The "Prairie Guard" came to the defense of Lawrence, Kansas on May 21, 1856, and fought off a larger pro-slavery force that had burned and sacked the town. Northern editors were quick to sensationalize the escalating violence and political instability proclaiming the frontier to be "Bleeding Kansas." Swift retaliation followed as John Brown and his fanatics perpetrated the Pottawatomie Massacre where five pro-slavery men were executed. The flames of sectional tension engulfed Kansas in near anarchy as open guerilla warfare consumed the territory until Federal troops intervened to disperse the armed factions. Civil war had come to Kansas. Josiah Hubbard was serving as Judge of the Wabaunsee County Probate when he enlisted as a 1st Lieutenant in Company K, 11th Kansas Infantry in September 1862. The regiment saw its first action in Arkansas against Marmaduke's Confederates that fall and by early spring less than half of the original complement returned to Kansas City on furlough. The 11th was re-designated a cavalry regimentand brought up to strength before setting out to expel Joe Shelby's forces from central Missouri. Operating by detachment from various points in Kansas and Missouri the 11th helped repel Price's invasion of 1864 before being posted to Ft. Riley and escort duty. A portion of the regiment marched to Ft. Larned while the rest went to Ft. Kearny, then to Ft. Laramie and points farther west guarding the vast lines of communications against hostile Indians stretching nearly a thousand miles from Ft. Leavenworth. The regiment was recalled in August 1865 and Josiah Hubbard mustered out at Ft. Leavenworth in September. Back east Hubbard's older brother, Robert, had joined Company B., 14th Connecticut, but served only a month before being killed at Antietam. Their father the elder Josiah M. Hubbard died the same year. Another brother, Nathaniel N. Hubbard, joined Company I., 21st Connecticut in 1862 and was commissioned a Lieutenant in the 6th USCT in 1863, was wounded and resigned in 1865. After an absence of nine years, Josiah Hubbard returned to the family farm in Connecticut having married a local woman, Harriet E. Fairchild, who bore him a son in 1867 named for his deceased brother. She died from complications of childbirth leaving Josiah a widower. Except for the occasional reunion Hubbard never returned to'Bloody Kansas.' For the next forty-five years Josiah the gentlemen-farmer engaged in civic pursuits, was elected to county office and later to the Connecticut General Assembly serving also as Commissioner and Trustee on numerous State, institutional and academic boards. By any standard of the 19th century Josiah M. Hubbard was a "prominent and respected citizen" when he passed away in 1909. His descendants still reside near Middletown. A rare coat from the Transmississippi, with exceptional history. Provenance: Descended directly from the family. Lacking all but two of the original buttons, the coat shows considerable wear from use. Wear is especially noticeable around the collar, sleeves and button-holes. There is an old patched rip adjacent to the first waist button. Jacket lacking Hubbard's shoulder boards. The jacket exhibits one pinhole from moth damage. The belt is slightly stiff, though easily treated, and is decorated with non-regulation tooling. PLEASE NOTE: THIS LOT WILL BE SOLD ON EBAY LIVE AUCTIONS BETWEEN 4:00-5:00pm EASTERN DAYLIGHT TIME ON MAY 10, 2002. REGISTER NOW TO BID LIVE ONLINE THE DAY OF THE SALE! (EST 5500-6500)
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