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Lot 225
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G. W. Smith, Confederate General, Discusses Plans in New York
G. W. Smith, Confederate General, Discusses Plans in New York
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Description:

Smith Gustavus



West Point graduate G. W. Smith writes from New Orleans, where he had been supervising repairs to the U.S. branch mint building. He later served in the Confederacy as a general and briefly as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia and as interim Confederate Secretary of War.

 

GUSTAVUS WOODSON SMITH, Autograph Letter Signed, to A. S. Hewitt, July 15, 1856, New Orleans, Louisiana. 1 p., 8" x 10". Expected folds; very good.

 

Complete Transcript

                                                                        New Orleans La. July 15th 1856

Dear Sir, Yours of the 8th was received this morning. All that you say is satisfactory. I shall have one qualifying remark to make in reference to the three years obligations: but you will accede to it at once. I wrote Capt. Bowman on the 19th June, but have not heard from him in reply, telegraphed him to day, to this effect, viz. “Have you received my letter of June the nineteenth. The New York business is definitely settled, excepting time. Can I leave?”

            I shall have to remain sometime in Ky., on account of private affairs, whether Bowman consents to my leaving here now or in January. On all these points I will keep you informed. I like the title you have given me, and will remember the motto of the corps to which I belonged in the army; “essayons.” I will write again.

                                                                        Very truly Your friend

                                                                        G. W. Smith

A. S. Hewitt Esqr.

No. 17 Burling Slip, N. Y. City.                      

 

Historical Background

G. W. Smith was in New Orleans to supervise renovations to the U.S Mint building there. Originally constructed between 1835 and 1838, the three-story building had become unstable by the mid-1840s, when it was reinforced with iron rods inserted between the floors. In 1854, the federal government ordered the building to be repaired and fireproofed, and Major P. G. T. Beauregard estimated the costs for a system of repairs.

 

On March 10, 1856, Smith reported to Secretary of the Treasury James Guthrie that “a system of repairs based upon the estimates of Major Beauregard...was at once commenced and is at present in full operation. The floors are taken up in various parts of the building; the roof is being re-slated; the roof frame strengthened; new garret floor almost finished. The work of the Mint proper is temporarily suspended; in short, we are fully committed to a certain system of operations.” However, Smith had received a new letter from the Treasury Department that “directs an entirely different plan to be followed.”  Apparently, the Treasury Department persisted in its requirement that the building be made fireproof. On June 19, 1856, Smith resigned and his assistant Capt. Johnson K. Duncan continued the renovations until their completion in 1859.

 

Like Smith, Pennsylvania native Alexander H. Bowman (1803-1865) had graduated from the United States Military Academy and had become an engineer but remained in the military. In 1853, Captain Bowman was assigned to Washington, D.C. to superintend the construction of the southern wing extension of the U.S. Treasury Building. He also served as engineer in charge of the Treasury Department. During the Civil War, Bowman served as superintendent of the United States Military Academy.

 

The motto of the Army Corps of Engineers is “Essayons,” French for “Let Us Try.”

 

 

Gustavus Woodson Smith (1821-1896) was born in Kentucky and graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1842. He entered the Army Corps of Engineers and served in the Mexican War. He resigned his commission in December 1854 and became a civil engineer in New York City. He served as Streets Commissioner of New York from 1858 to 1861. When the Civil War began, he joined the Confederacy and received a commission as major general in September 1861. He commanded defenses around Richmond in late 1862 and served as interim Confederate Secretary of War for five days in November 1862. He resigned his commission in February 1863 to become a volunteer aide to General P. G. T. Beauregard for the rest of 1863. He served as superintendent of the Etowah Iron Works from 1863 to June 1864, when he received a commission as major general in the Georgia state militia. He commanded its first division until the end of the war. After the war, he was an iron manufacturer in Tennessee from 1866 to 1870 and an insurance commissioner in Kentucky from 1870 to 1876. He then moved to New York City and began writing books on insurance, the Civil War, and the Mexican War.

 

Abram S. Hewitt (1822-1903) was born in in New York and graduated from Columbia College in 1842. He taught mathematics there and became a lawyer several years later. In 1845, he and Edward Cooper began an iron mill in Trenton, New Jersey, with funding by Edward’s father, industrialist Peter Cooper. In 1855, Hewitt married Sarah Cooper, Peter Cooper’s daughter, and Hewitt supervised construction of Cooper Union, the free educational institution funded by Peter Cooper. Hewitt chaired its board of trustees until 1903. He represented New York in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1875 to 1879 and again from 1881 to 1886. He also chaired the Democratic National Committee in 1876 and 1877. In 1886, he won election as mayor of New York City and served as mayor in 1887 and 1888.

 

 


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