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Lot 335
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"By Command of Maj. Gen JEB Stuart" Signed Endorsement By Order of Robert E. Lee Re: Stolen Horse
"By Command of Maj. Gen JEB Stuart" Signed Endorsement By Order of Robert E. Lee Re: Stolen Horse
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Description:

Robert E. Lee
Virginia, August 13-22, 1863
"By Command of Maj. Gen JEB Stuart" Signed Endorsement By Order of Robert E. Lee Re: Stolen Horse
ALS

[ROBERT E. LEE.] Williams C. Wickham, Autograph Letter Signed, to James D. Ferguson, August 13, 1863, Virginia; with a series of six endorsements, including one by W. H. Taylor conveying General Robert E. Lee's final decision. Brigadier General Fitzhugh Lee signed two of the endorsements, but adjutants and Wickham wrote and signed the others. 4 pp., 7.75" x 9.75"; 3.375" x 4.75". Light toning; very good.

Colonel William C. Wickham sent this letter to Captain J. D. Ferguson of Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry brigade to get a ruling on a situation caused by William R. Winn, the colonel of a local militia. When Winn was conscripted, he provided a substitute named Burke and gave Burke a horse as required. It turned out that the horse had been stolen, and when it was returned to its owner, Winn refused to replace the horse for Burke. Wickham wanted to know if Winn should be reported to the enrolling officer in his county.

Brigadier General Fitzhugh Lee forwarded the question up to division commander, General J.E.B. Stuart, who asked when the substitution occurred, suggesting that some general orders might cover the situation. Wickham replied that it occurred before July 20, so those orders did not apply to the case. Wickham again forwarded it to Fitzhugh Lee, who again forwarded it to Stuart, whose adjutant forwarded it to General Robert E. Lee. In the last endorsement, on a separate sheet, Lee's adjutant directed "By order of Genl Lee" that either Winn had to supply another horse or the substitution would be canceled, and Winn drafted.

Complete Transcript
Head Qrs. 4th Va Cav.
Aug: 13th 1863
Captain J. D. Ferguson / A.A.G.
Lee's Brigade
Captain
Wm R. Winn Col. of the Hanover militia was conscripted and elected to put a substitute in Co F. of Regt. an essential to this substitution is that a good cavalry horse should be furnished the substitute at the time of substitution. He furnished him such a horse but soon after the horse is recognized as one stolen from a soldier and is turned over to its owner. Winn declines to replace the horse. Does it not void the substitution? Should not Winns name be sent to the enroling officer as one to be conscripted?
Oblige me by forwarding this for a decision in the proper quarter.
Your obt. Svt.
W. C. Wickham
Col. 4th Va Cav

[Docketing:]
Wm C. Wickham / Col. 4th Va Cav
Aug 13th 1863
States that one Winn liable to conscription elected to put a substitute in Co. F of this Regt. That an essential to this substitution was the furnishing a good horse. That the horse furnished was proved to have been stolen from a soldier some time before and was returned to him. Winn declining to furnish another horse does it not void the substitution and should not Winn's name be sent to the enrolling officer of his county conscription[?]

HdQrs Lees Cav Brig / Aug 14 1863
Respectfully forwarded
Fitz Lee / Brig Gen Comdg

HdQrs. Cav Div. A.N.V. / Aug. 18th 1863.
Respectfully returned. When was this substitution made? Does this case come under General Orders No 98 III A&I GO, current series
By Command of Maj. Gen JEB Stuart
H. B. McClellan / Maj. & AAG.

HeadQr 4th Va Cav / Aug 19th 1863
Respectfully forwarded
This enlistment was made before the 20th of July, had it been made since I would have sent Winns name at once to enrolling officer. My point made is that Winn having furnished Burke with a horse to which he had not a good title has failed in an essential to the substitution and the proceeding ought therefore to be declared void
W. C. Wickham
Col. 4th Va Cav

HdQrs Aug 19, 63
Respec: re-forwarded attention called to Col W's remarks
Fitz Lee / Brig Gen Comdg

Hd. Qrs. Cav. Div. ANV / Aug. 20th
Resp: forwd: for decision / For / Maj. Genl. J.E.B. Stuart
H. B. McClellan / Major & A.A.G.

Res: repd That a horse should be furnished was a part of the contract for the substitution. If the principal was aware of the invalidity of his title to the horse when he effected the substitution, fraud was perpetrated and the transaction is rendered void. If this was not the case, and he now becomes aware of the fact for the first time, he should rectify the error, for if he persists in clinging to it, it is almost equivalent to the perpetration of a willful fraud. Either another horse must be furnished the substitute (as required by the terms of the contract) or the substitution be cancelled and the principal again called into service.
By order of Genl Lee
W H Taylor / A A Genl
22 Aug '63

Williams C. Wickham (1820-1888) was born in Virginia and graduated from the University of Virginia. Wickham became a planter and lawyer and served in the Virginia General Assembly (1849-1850, 1859-1861), as colonel of the 4th Virginia Cavalry (1862-1863), as brigadier general of a brigade in Fitzhugh Lee's division (1863-1864), and as a member of the Confederate Congress (1864-1865). After the war, he became president of the Virginia Central Railroad.

James DuGue Ferguson (1838-1917) was born in Charleston, South Carolina, and attended South Carolina College and the University of Virginia. He became an attorney in Charleston. During the Civil War, he served as an assistant adjutant general to General Fitzhugh Lee, with the ranks of captain (1862-1863) and major (1863-1865). After the war, he was an attorney in Charleston and Baltimore, Maryland.

Fitzhugh Lee (1835-1905) was born in Virginia, the grandson of "Light Horse Harry" Lee and the nephew of Robert E. Lee. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1856 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 2nd Cavalry, with service in Texas. In May 1860, he was appointed instructor of cavalry tactics at the U.S. Military Academy but resigned when Virginia seceded in 1861. He joined the Confederate Army as a lieutenant of cavalry and gained promotion to brigadier general by July 1862. After the Battle of Chancellorsville, rheumatism incapacitated Lee for a month. During the Overland Campaign in the spring of 1864, Lee was a divisional commander of a cavalry commission under J.E.B. Stuart. He commanded the entire cavalry of Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia and surrendered at Appomattox Court House. After the war, he received a pardon in 1869 and farmed in Virginia. He served as Governor of Virginia (1886-1890), consul-general at Havana, Cuba (1896-1898), and a major general of volunteers in the U.S. Army during the Spanish-American War and beyond (1898-1901).

James Ewell Brown (JEB) Stuart (1833-1864) was born in southern Virginia and graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1854. He served in the frontier army and participated in the capture of John Brown at Harpers Ferry. When Virginia seceded, he resigned to serve in the Confederate Army, first under Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson and then under Robert E. Lee. As commander of cavalry for the Army of Northern Virginia, he became Lee's "eyes and ears." He twice audaciously circumnavigated the Union Army of the Potomac, and he cultivated a cavalier image with cape and hat with ostrich plume. His separation from the main army during the Gettysburg campaign left Lee blind to Union troop movements, and during the next year's Overland Campaign, Union cavalry under Philip Sheridan attacked Stuart's cavalry and left him mortally wounded at the Battle of Yellow Tavern in mid-May 1864.

Henry Brainerd McClellan (1840-1904) was born in Philadelphia into a family from Connecticut. He graduated from Williams College in 1858 and moved to Virginia, where he became a schoolteacher. Although four of his brothers fought for the Union during the Civil War, he enlisted in the 3rd Virginia Cavalry in June 1861. He became a lieutenant and adjutant general for the regiment in May 1862. In April 1863, he was promoted to major and became adjutant-general to Major General J. E. B. Stuart in early May, after Stuart's adjutant general was killed at the Battle of Chancellorsville. After Stuart's death in May 1864, McClellan served for three months on the staff of General Robert E. Lee. In August 1864, he was appointed as assistant adjutant general to General Wade Hampton III. After the war, he lived in Virginia for a few years before accepting a position as professor at Sayre Female Institute in Lexington, Kentucky. He remained in that position until his death more than three decades later.

Robert E. Lee (1807-1870) was born in Virginia and graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1829. He was commissioned a brevet second lieutenant in the Corps of Engineers. After working on the construction of fortifications on the coast of Georgia, Lee returned to Virginia in 1831 and married Mary Custis, with whom he had seven children. He served as an officer and engineer in the U.S. Army for 32 years. He served as one of General Winfield Scott's chief aides in the Mexican War and was instrumental in several American victories through his personal reconnaissance. He fought in several major battles; received promotions to brevet major, lieutenant colonel, and colonel; and was wounded in battle. After the Mexican War, he returned to engineering work for the army and served as the superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy (1852-1855). When his father-in-law died in 1857, he had to take a two-year leave of absence to execute the will, which included a proviso to free his nearly 200 slaves within five years of his death. He finally filed the deed of manumission in December 1862. In 1859, Lee commanded a detachment of militia to arrest John Brown and his followers at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Lee was in Texas when that state seceded, and his commanding officer surrendered Lee and the other American forces to the Texans. Lee returned to Washington and was appointed colonel of the First Regiment of Cavalry. Three weeks later, he was offered overall command and the rank of major general of the expanding U.S. Army. Although Lee opposed secession, he would not fight against Virginia, and after that state voted to secede, Lee resigned his commission. He immediately received an appointment to command the Provisional Army of Virginia and the Virginia State Navy. With the formation of the Confederate States Army, Lee was one of its first five full generals. After commanding in western Virginia, he was sent to the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas to organize coastal defenses. On November 5, 1861, he was appointed as commander of the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. In the spring of 1862, he became a military adviser to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, who in June appointed him as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, after Joseph E. Johnston was wounded. Lee successfully thwarted Union General George B. McClellan's Peninsula Campaign. He also defeated General John Pope at the Second Battle of Bull Run. His narrow defeat at Antietam gave President Abraham Lincoln the victory he sought for issuing the Emancipation Proclamation. Lee went on to additional victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville before his invasion of Pennsylvania was turned back at the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863. He battled effectively against new Union general-in-chief Ulysses S. Grant throughout 1864 but was forced to withdraw into the defenses of Richmond and Petersburg after devastating losses on both sides during the Overland Campaign. In February 1865, Lee became General in Chief of the Armies of the Confederate States, but losses of manpower and supplies forced Lee's abandonment of Richmond on April 2 and surrender to Grant a week later at Appomattox Court House. After the war, Lee was neither arrested nor punished, though he lost both the right to vote and the Custis-Lee Mansion across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., which became Arlington National Cemetery. He applied for a pardon but did not receive one. He joined the Democrats in opposing the Radical Republicans but accepted an invitation from President Grant to visit the White House in 1869. He served as the president of Washington College (now Washington and Lee University) in Lexington, Virginia, from October 1865 until his death.

Walter Herron Taylor (1838-1916) was born in Norfolk, Virginia, and graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1857. He became a railroad clerk and banker in Norfolk. When Virginia seceded from the Union, Taylor joined the Confederate Army. He was assigned to the staff of General Robert E. Lee soon after Lee was given command of Confederate forces. He was Lee's primary assistant adjutant general and chief aide-de-camp from when Lee took command of the Army of Northern Virginia in June 1862 through the end of the war. Taylor was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel in December 1863 and accompanied Lee to the surrender at Appomattox Court House. After the war, he resumed his banking career and worked as an attorney for several railroads. He was a Virginia state senator from 1869 to 1873. He also served as president of the Marine Bank in Norfolk (1877-1916).

William Robert Winn (ca. 1826-1876) was born in Hanover County, Virginia, and graduated from the Lexington Law School in 1854. In 1850, he was a farmer who owned 10 slaves, and by 1860, he owned 11 slaves. During the war, he served as a major and then colonel of the 74th Virginia Militia. He also served as a commercial agent and commissioner for Hanover County. After the war, he represented Hanover County for several terms in the Virginia House of Delegates (1869-1871, 1873-1875). One of his slaves, William Tinsley (1852-1945), was one of the last surviving former slaves in the nation when he died in Peekskill, New York.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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  • Dimensions: 7.75" x 9.75"; 3.375" x 4.75"
  • Medium: ALS

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