Description:

A rare document signed by James Garfield as President, only five weeks before his shooting by Charles Guiteau, ordering Secretary James G. Blaine to affix the seal to the appointment of former Union General Stephen A. Hurlbut as U.S. Minister to Peru during the Pacific War against Chile

Partly-printed Document Signed, "James A. Garfield," as President, 1 page, 8" x 9.75", Washington, May 27, 1881 authorizing the Secretary of State to affix the Seal of the United States to "the envelope of my letter accrediting Stephen A. Hurlbut as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States." Expected folds, discreet mounting remnants on verso, just a hint of toning at extreme margins, else fine condition.

Stephen A. Hurlbut (1815-1882) served in the Union Army during the Civil, commanding a division at Shiloh, and later commanding a corps during Sherman's Meridian Expedition of 1864. Following the war, Hurlbut served as Minister Resident to Columbia from 1869 to 1872. After a brief stint in Congress, Garfield appointed him Ambassador to Peru in 1881. His short tenure in Lima (he died a year later) was not uneventful as Peru and Bolivia were fighting Chile in the War of the Pacific (1879-1883). During his time in Peru, Hurlbut suffered an embarrassing altercation with Hugh Judson Kilpatrick (1836-1881), who Garfield had appointed United States Minister to Chile only two months prior. Both men (quite improperly) became partisans for the nations in which they resided and greatly complicated the peace negotiations between the two warring South American republics.

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