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Exceedingly Rare Civil War Original $300 Commutation Bounty Form New York County

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles Start Price:1,100.00 USD Estimated At:1,500.00 - 2,000.00 USD
Exceedingly Rare Civil War Original $300 Commutation Bounty Form New York County
Civil War Union Documents
Exceedingly Rare Original $300 Commutation Bounty Form
February 12th, 1864-Dated Civil War Period, Partially-Printed, “New York County Substitute Committee,” Form plus attached 1864, $300 Bounty Partially-Printed Form For Volunteer as Substitute, New York, NY, Choice Extremely Fine.
New York, NY, 2 separate attached pages, being Official “Substitute” Bounty forms. The top form measures about 7” x 8.5” being printed in black upon clean white wove period paper. This is Certificate # 5046, Signed by O'Brien and notarized, reading in part:

“James O'Brien, by occupation a “Sailor,” resident at New York, having agreed to Volunteer as a Substitute Soldier, and officially mustered into the service under the ordinance adopted by the Board of Supervisors, October 26, 1863, and approved by the Mayor October 31, 1863, for and in consideration of the sum of $300 to be paid to him as Bounty by the County of New York. -- We do hereby Certify, the said James OBrian is entitled to have paid to him the sum of $300, under the provisions of the ordinance aforesaid. -- New York, Feb. 12th, 1864.”

The bottom form measures about 8.5” x 12.5” Legal Folio, being printed in black upon clean yellow wove period paper, Extremely Fine with a few light folds. The lower portion is filled out and completed as follows:

“I, James OBrian for and in consideration of the sum of $300 to me in hand paid by ORISON BLUNT, do hereby assign to said ORISON BLUNT, all claim I have against the County of New York, for and in consideration of -- having been mustered into the United States service, under the provisions of the Ordinance of the Board of Supervisors, passed October 26, 1863, and duly approved by the Mayor, October 31, 1863. -- Given this 12th day of February, 1864. -- (Signed) -- James OBrian.”

Exceeding Rare and historic $300 New York Civil War Bounty for Commutation Certificates, being the very first of this type we have encountered and offered. (2 attached forms).


Taken from 'thecivilwaromnibus.com':

When the Civil War began, there was no shortage of able bodied men who volunteered for service in both the U.S. Army and the Confederate Army.When the draft laws – known as the Enrollment Act – were first placed on the books in the United States in 1863, they allowed for two methods for avoiding the Draft – “Substitution” or “Commutation.”

A man who found his name called in the draft lotteries that chose men for mandatory service could either pay a Commutation fee of $300, which exempted him from service during this draft lottery, but not necessarily for future draft lotteries, or he could provide a substitute, which would exempt him from service throughout the duration of the war.

The $300 Commutation fee was an enormous sum of money for most city laborers or rural farmers, and the cost of hiring a Substitute was even higher, often reaching $1,000 or more. The practice of hiring substitutes for military service took hold quickly in the North, becoming much more widespread than it had ever been in the South. For one thing, there was a much larger pool of men to draw from; immigrants that flowed into the ports of the North, even in a time of war, provided a large number of the substitutes hired by those who did not wish to serve.

As the duration of the war lengthened, African-American soldiers, who’d thus far been only nominally accepted by the U.S. Army as viable soldiers, also became part of the pool of potential substitutes. Many of the recruitment posters from the time explicitly solicit African-Americans for substitution. Although the hiring of substitutes seems mercenary, and in many cases, resulted in the desertion of the substitute, many who went to war as hired men went because they were unable to enlist through the regular channels. This included the recent immigrants who were anxious to fight for their new country, and, importantly, the African-Americans who found going to war as substitutes the only way to fight for their freedom. For these men, the war was indeed a “rich man’s war and a poor man’s fight,” but from the perspective that poor men were more willing to fight for the possibilities they saw in their country.