(CIVIL WAR) Amelia Russell Whitman Fish Courtship letters to

Sale 2600 - Lot 61

Price Realized: $ 812

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 400 - $ 600

(CIVIL WAR.) Amelia Russell Whitman Fish. Courtship letters to a veteran on the hunt for unmarked Union graves. 71 Autograph Letters Signed to her sweetheart / husband, Army captain Lawrence B. Fish, in one small box; condition generally strong. Almost all remain folded in original stamped and postmarked envelopes. Various places, 1868-70

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Additional Details

Amelia Russell Whitman Fish (1840-1905) was raised in Massachusetts and was living in Louisville, KY when she met Civil War veteran Lawrence Brainard Fish (1841-1898). They were married in September 1869. Fish was assigned to a massive project to document Union gravesites throughout the South, so they could eventually be disinterred and consolidated into national cemeteries (see Swann's 17 September 2015 auction, lot 87, for a related notebook kept by Fish). Amelia resided in Louisville, KY and in Stone Mountain, GA while Fish traveled widely; her letters are addressed to him in Corinth, MS (where he was stationed for a longer period), various locations in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Georgia, and occasionally further afield. The letters cover the period of their courtship and first year of their marriage.

This collection is also of potential philatelic interest. Most of the letters are in their original envelopes with 3-cent Washington stamps, some grilled.