Sep 29, 2022 - Sale 2615

Sale 2615 - Lot 91

Price Realized: $ 750
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 600 - $ 900
(CIVIL WAR--MARYLAND.) C.E. Goldsborough. The unpublished reminiscences of a Civil War surgeon. 102 pages, most about 12 1/2 x 8 inches: 25 pages of typescript, 49 pages of manuscript, and 28 pages of annotated newspaper clippings, irregularly paginated and apparently incomplete; generally minor wear. No place, circa 1900-1913
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As a young physician, Charles Edward Goldsborough (1834-1913) settled near Gettysburg, PA. During the Civil War he served as a surgeon in the 5th Maryland Infantry. He worked out of a hospital in Frederick, MD, and the September 1862 capture of the city by the Confederates is told with high drama. Goldsborough spent a stint confined at Libby Prison (not well described here), and was exchanged in time to attend the consecration of Gettysburg in November 1863, which is discussed for three pages in his memoir: "This seems strange and almost remarkable, but the great throng was there more to see Mr. Lincoln than to hear what he had to say." He recalls that "the day was an ideal Indian Summer day, with just enough crisp in the air to make fall clothing comfortable."

The reminiscences begin with 23 complete pages of typescript covering the period 1856 to September 1862, followed by 23 pages of quite irregularly paginated manuscript which appear to be incomplete, and concluding with 26 pages of somewhat continuously numbered manuscript pages starting in November 1863 and concluding in 1865 with "The End." Also included is a typescript transcript of a program for the "Libby Prison Minstrels" from 24 December 1863.

Also included in the lot are Goldsborough's pre-war reminiscences, as published in an unidentified newspaper circa the 1890s under the running title "Adventures of a Runaway Boy." This covers his travel adventures from 1851 to 1854, including the Lopez expedition to liberate Cuba, a trip down the Mississippi, a trip across the Great Plains by wagon, a meeting with Kit Carson, encounters with the Mormons in Salt Lake City, mining in California, a clipper ship to Peru, and other interludes. These clippings are mounted on 26 long sheets of paper (about 25 x 8 inches, folded over), and lightly edited with an eye toward republication in book form.