Sep 29, 2022 - Sale 2615

Sale 2615 - Lot 77

Price Realized: $ 2,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,200 - $ 1,800
(CIVIL WAR--KENTUCKY.) Broadside proclaiming martial law in Covington in response to Morgan's Raid. Letterpress broadside, 9 1/2 x 7 inches, signed in type by Union General Jeremiah T. Boyle (military governor of Kentucky) and his provost marshal James L. Foley; minor wear at folds, minor foxing, tightly trimmed, mounted to a scrapbook leaf with 1907 newspaper clippings on verso. Covington, KY, 18 July 1862

Additional Details

The Confederate cavalry general John Hunt Morgan launched his first raid across Kentucky on 4 July 1862, raising alarm across the state. This broadside was issued by the Union military governor of Kentucky in Covington, just across the river from Cincinnati. It orders that all able-bodied citizens of the county report for militia duty by 10 p.m.: "Such as have arms and ammunition will bring them. . . . Those who are willing to fight against the traitors who are threatening your city will be organized into Companies and Battalions. . . . All refusing to bear arms in such defense will be disarmed. . . . All persons not armed are forbidden to appear in the streets of the City, until otherwise ordered, under the penalty of being shot down." On this occasion, Morgan returned south well before reaching Covington; his 1863 raid skirted north of Covington across Ohio.

The text of this proclamation was published in the New York Times of 21 July 1862, but we trace no other examples of this broadside in OCLC or at auction.

WITH--a letter from Provost Marshal James L. Foley to John W. Finnell of the Kentucky legislature, insisting that he has always refused pay for his services. Covington, 27 August 1862.