Raynors HCA 2018-10
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/20/2018
CONSIGNER WANTS THIS LOT TO APPEAR AFTER HIS LOT #5 IN THE CATALOG A rare American-Indian War era letter recalling the remains of General George Armstrong Custer being removed from the Little Big Horn battlefield east, 5 1/4pp. folio, written by military laundress Bertina M. Alexander, St. Paul, Minnesota, August 1877, to the widow of Captain Louis McLane Morris (1837-1877), reading, in part: "I have just arrived from Fort Randall…you are so very kind and sweet to give me-your use to be working girl a present…oh! Mrs. Morris I love my husband more and more. He is so dreadful kind to me. They were ordered to Fort Randall and he let me come up and see him…Captain Mays wouldn't let me stay. The other laundresses of J Company was left at [Fort] Sully. My husband thought…he would get discharged…but he didn't. He doesn't look like the same man. He has got so dreadful poor and thin…I just wish I was somewhere near you…wont you please do some thing for me…write to Mrs. Fletcher beg her to help me get that widow out of J Company so I can get in…[tell her] if she is sick I will levee my work and got to nurse her. If Captain [William] Fletcher or Mrs. Fletcher get around Captain Mays I know I'll get in and I'll be awful good to all the officers. I wont be like the rest of the laundresses…I would make myself a slave to [be] nearer my husband…my husband spoke of Lou and Jennie. He said he would give one hundred dollars if he had such a good looking girl as Jennie. He thinks Jennie the prettiest girl he ever saw. He also said…lots of people got off [the boat] to visit Captain Morris' grave. He said Mr. Gats was down to Brule [Fort Hale] on a court martial…of the folks at Fort Randall they were all plain looking. Some of the young ladies tied themselves in old style…the way they used to…tight around the waist with two beans behind. Everything I saw was old style…some tell me that Mrs. [General George] Sykes is divorced. The children are off to school and he is living all alone at Fort Snelling…[George A.] Custer's remains were brought down east. One of General Carlin's little boys shot a little boy six years old while playing. This occurred at Fort Lincoln…I fell sick and worn out from traveling. I had to stage it hundred miles for the boats coming down would not stop…Mrs. Bertina M. Alexander, St. Paul, Minn." Expected wear and soiling, else VG
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