Sep 28, 2023 - Sale 2646

Sale 2646 - Lot 61

Price Realized: $ 780
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(BUSINESS.) Letters to the I.M. Singer & Co. sewing machine company, many discussing the impact of the Civil War. 14 letters addressed to I.M. Singer & Company; generally moderate wear, some crude tape repairs, most with scrapbook mount remnants. Various places, 1861-1865
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The letters are from private customers, sales agents, and other employees. Mrs. Fidelia Thorndike inquired from Brimfield Portage, OH in 1863 about the expense of upgrading a standard machine to "your new improved family machines," adding that she was "an agent to sell your machines in my own town for Mr. D.M. Summerville of Ravenna." A long 23 May 1864 letter from the company's Buffalo office describes efforts to establish the company in Canada.

Many of the letters reference the Civil War. A Cincinnati agent complained on 30 September 1862: "Business is still kept back by our being under martial law. Everyone seems to be afraid to pay for anything they purchase." A potential customer found himself thwarted in the delivery of a sewing machine to contested Westminster, Maryland: "I am quite willing to take an oath of allegiance, but we have no officer in our state as a commissioner of deeds. . . . I fear I should have to abandon the purchase." The company's Brazil sales agent exulted after Gettysburg on 7 September 1863: "Did I not tell you there was a man to be found in our Army of the Potomac who could yet bring our brave boys to victory? If all others fail, hand over the command to U.S. Grant, he has never lost a battle, and if Meade cannot take Richmond, Grant can!" The head of the company's Philadelphia office asked on 16 August 1862: "If you are desirous that your agent of this city should contribute any money to the war committee in your name, please inform him." He then wrote on 3 April 1865: "Our city is wild with joy at receiving the glorious news of the capture of the city of Richmond. I humbly thank God that it is so." Just after the war, the St. Louis agent describes on 9 June 1865 how he has been "making sales along the Mississippi below Cairo. This is encouraging as it indicates a returning sense of security in sections that have been bushwhacked intolerably during the past three years." A customer in Mobile, AL requests replacement parts on 26 December 1865, adding that "this machine was broken to pieces by the U.S. troops at the time of the capture of our city." 3 of the letters are on patriotic letterhead.