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Jefferson Davis

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA Estimated At:4,000.00 - 5,000.00 USD
Jefferson Davis

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Auction Date:2014 Apr 16 @ 18:00 (UTC-05:00 : EST/CDT)
Location:236 Commercial St., Suite 100, Boston, Massachusetts, 02109, United States
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed
ANS - Autograph Note Signed
AQS - Autograph Quotation Signed
AMQS - Autograph Musical Quotation Signed
DS - Document Signed
FDC - First Day Cover
Inscribed - “Personalized”
ISP - Inscribed Signed Photograph
LS - Letter Signed
SP - Signed Photograph
TLS - Typed Letter Signed
ALS, one page, 5 x 7, Memphis, December 20, 1870. Letter to General Gideon Johnson Pillow. In full: “Your remarks of last evening suggested that you had accusations or disparaging reflections to make in regard to me, which were suppressed for the occasion; I therefore invite you to the full expression of whatever you have to say against me.” In very good to fine condition, with light dampstaining affecting the left side of the page, not impacting the boldness or legibility of any words. Accompanied by the original transmittal envelope, addressed in Davis’s hand.

Pillow replied the same day, declining to discuss past events and assuring Davis that he must have misunderstood—the response concluded with Pillow telling Davis, 'It seemed to me then, as it does now, that your manifestation of temper did me injustice.' After abandoning his command during the Battle of Fort Donelson, surrendering over 12,000 troops to Grant, Pillow was suspended by Davis for ‘grave errors in judgment in the military operations which resulted in the surrender of the army’—the pointed “then” that Pillow referred to in his reply.

At the time of this letter, Pillow was embroiled in a lawsuit in Memphis, having been sued for confiscating a coal mine owned by northern businessmen in 1861, even before Tennessee had seceded—the coal yard was quickly sold for $125,000 and used to arm and equip Tennessee troops. After the war, the firm brought suit against Pillow for damages, and the case was pending for five years—on December 27, 1870, a week after Davis’s letter, Pillow was ordered to compensate them in the amount of $35,000. A great piece of testy correspondence between the controversial Confederates.