(CIVIL WAR WEST VIRGINIA) Hess John H Letters of a sergeant

Sale 2505 - Lot 70

Price Realized: $ 562

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

Estimate: $ 400 - $ 600

(CIVIL WAR--WEST VIRGINIA.) Hess, John H. Letters of a sergeant in the 13th West Virginia Infantry. 8 Autograph Letters Signed to wife Samantha Hess of Syracuse, Meigs County, OH, one of them on patriotic letterhead; minor wear and foxing. Vp, 1862-64

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The letters of John H. Hess (1836-1892) present a healthy challenge in terms of handwriting and spelling. His 18 February 1863 letter, the first of 3 from camp at Hurricane Bridge ("herican bridg"), WV, notes that "we are bilden brest work as fast as we can. Tha say thare is eight hunderd rebls in 16 miles of us." Two letters are written from Fort Defiance in Kanawha County, WV, and the final two from Barboursville, WV, where Hess boasted on 11 March 1864 that "the Rebs is comen in, about 17 hundard, but we can whip them so bad that tha can't stand it. . . . One of the boys shot too shots at a sitsen [citizen] yestarday and run him out of town. He wold a cild [killed] him if the cornell hadent a come out." After the war, Sergeant Hess was a barber in rural Graham County, WV on the Ohio line.