(CIVIL WAR NEW YORK) 4 letters from the front to discharged

Sale 2287 - Lot 187

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Estimate: $ 600 - $ 900

"IF THE REBS DON'T SHOOT ME, MY TIME WILL BE OUT IN OCTOBER " (CIVIL WAR--NEW YORK.) 4 letters from the front to discharged comrade Lyman J. Plummer of the 94th New York. Various sizes and conditions; 3 are accompanied by the original stamped envelopes. Vp, 1864-65

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Lyman James "Jim" Plummer (1843-1923) of Ellisburgh, Jefferson County served two years in the 94th New York. These letters from the front were received after his November 1863 discharge, with two of them coming from his comrades in his Company C.
William Webb of the 94th wrote on 11 August 1864 from on picket near Petersburg, boasting that he was "tuff as a bare and as black as a niger." He looked forward to his imminent discharge: "If the Rebs don't shoot me, my time will be out in October and then they won't get me agane for all the money that thay have got in the United States." Eight days later, he was captured at Weldon Railroad, and died in a Confederate prison.
Lemuel Taber of the 94th wrote on 2 May 1864. He had been wounded at Fredericksburg and was just returning to duty after more than a year of recuperation: "I can't do any duty. I was on guard one night and have been under the doctor's care ever since. I am well in health but my right leg is no good to me much. I can walk around some but am verry lame."
Cyril Lum of the 185th New York wrote twice. His 15 May 1865 letter describes his company's only battlefield fatality, at the Battle of Gravelly Run: "Peter Parker was killed while they were carrying him to the rear. He got wounded in the leg and the boys were carrying him off, he got hit in the head and hip." with--8 letters from New York friends and family, 1864-65; and other family papers, 1828-1917. See also lots 182 and 252 for letters from Plummer's brothers. Provenance: Descended in the family to Plummer's great-great-granddaughter, 2007 (note in collection).