Mar 30, 2023 - Sale 2631

Sale 2631 - Lot 183

Price Realized: $ 750
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(EDUCATION.) O.O. Howard. Letter by the head of the Freedmen's Bureau and founder of Howard University. Autograph Letter Signed "O.O. Howard, Maj. Gen." to Darius H. Ingraham as fair committee chairman. One page, 9 1/2 x 7 1/2 inches, on Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands letterhead; minor wear on bottom edge. Washington, 20 March 1866
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Oliver Otis Howard (1830-1909) was a white abolitionist Union general and head of the Freedman's Bureau. In this letter, he responds to an autograph request for a charity fair in his native Maine: "I have just received your programme & feel that I must respond at once. The Widows & Orphans of Deceased Soldiers call more distinctly for sympathy and more appropriately for aid than any other objects of our affection & charity. May God bless & prosper you in your enterprise." This letter was published in the Portland Daily Press of 24 March 1866. The fair was held in Portland, ME on 23 April.

Later that year, General Howard helped launch what became Howard University, which was named in his honor.