2101

John Dillinger Autograph Letter Signed

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA Estimated At:25,000.00 - 30,000.00 USD
John Dillinger Autograph Letter Signed

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Auction Date:2017 Jun 24 @ 01:00 (UTC-5 : 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 in pencil, signed “John Dillinger #14395,” one page, 7.75 x 3.75, no date [but circa 1929–1933]. Letter written while in the Indiana State Prison at Michigan City, to prison assistant superintendent. H. W. Waymire, in full: “I am working in the shirt shop and the work is hard on my eyes and I would like to get transferred to the foundry #4 or Machine shop if possible. I will certainly appreciate it very much if you will do what you can for me.” Double-matted and framed with a typed note stating Dillinger, “wants a transfer to the foundry from the shirt shop says the shirt shop is hard on his eyes,” an original 1934 US Justice Department wanted poster, and a portrait of Dillinger holding a pistol and a Tommy gun, to an overall size of 28.75 x 14.5. Several vertical folds, one through a single letter of signature, two punch holes and a staple hole to top edge, and some scattered light soiling, otherwise fine condition.

In 1924, Dillinger was sentenced to 10-20 years for his part in the assault and attempted robbery of a grocery store owner in Mooresville, Indiana. While working in the shirt shop at Indiana State Prison, he befriended the men who would later become his notorious ‘Shirt Shop Boys,’ a group that included Handsome Harry Pierpont, Charles Makley, and John Hamilton. The men spent hours devising elaborate escape plans and foolproof crimes, and upon his parole in 1933, Dillinger put their various schemes to action, robbing his first bank on June 21st. Dillinger was arrested for another robbery two months later, but before his capture he had successfully smuggled guns into the cells of his former ‘Shirt Shop Boys,’ which they promptly used to escape. On October 12, those same men, disguised as Indiana State Police officers, freed Dillinger from his own cell, killing a sheriff in the process. Dillinger remains exceedingly rare across all formats, with this example representing the only letter we have ever offered.