2022-01 Raynors HCA Auction
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 1/28/2022
ETHAN ALLEN HITCHCOCK (1798-1870) Major General in the Civil War. Grandson of American Revolutionary War hero General Ethan Allen. Hitchcock became special adviser to the Secretary of War from February 17, 1862. From March 17 to July 23, 1862, he served as the chairman of the War Board, the organization that assisted President Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of War Stanton in the management of the War Department and the command of the Union armies during the period in which there was no general-in-chief. (Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan had been relieved of his responsibilities as general-in-chief and Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck had not yet replaced him.) From November 1862 e served as Commissioner for Prisoner of War Exchange. Autograph Letter Signed. Washington City, April 20, 1862. 4 pp. 5" x 8". The celebrated General in a most significant period writes to his niece Mary with rich detail and content and includes a drawing which he warns Mary: "Don't you laugh at my topographical accomplishments:" "...I believe I wrote to you a week since on the point of departure for the camp of McClellan where I passed part of the 16th and 17th. I returned yesterday morning; and … This (Sunday) regret to find the weather bad, it makes the troops near Yorktown so uncomfortable. On the principle, first come first served, the enemy near Yorktown has taken the best positions and left the swamps to our troops. In the rainy season, only just now drawing to a close, the entire peninsula (almost) where the operations are going on is one vast quagmire. Our troops entered the peninsula in the midst of one of the severest rain and sleet storms known the past season, And colonel Gault assured me that the roads were so bad that supplies could not follow the troops, and that he himself had to go 29 hours without breaking his fast. I found things much improved in this respect, and daily improving. The fight (skirmish) which was reported a day or since (the Vermont troops losing 32 or 35) men took place this day I reached the camp. Gen. McClellan, in the evening told me that the move....was made in disobedience (so I understood him) of his orders. The enemy is pushed behind a...branch of the Warwick river in which they control the depths of water by dams. McClellan did not intend to pass that stream at that time, or at that point where the skirmish took place. But the troops, finding the stream fordable went over (under whose immediate orders does not appear) and the water was then deepened so that they were measurably cut off." The commander then draws a half-page picture of the peninsula, camps, and the enemy's batteries. He continues: "It is against my rule to predict events in war. I give no opinion of matters before Yorktown further than to say that McClellan apparently has the power to take the place…" With original stamped envelope to St. Louis Missouri. In fine condition.
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