Apr 07, 2022 - Sale 2600

Sale 2600 - Lot 176

Price Realized: $ 1,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(NEW YORK.) Noyes family papers from western New York, including the loss of family members in the steamboat Lexington tragedy. Approximately 170 manuscript letters and documents (0.2 linear feet) in one box; condition varies but generally strong. Various places, 1791-1936, bulk 1834-1866
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Additional Details

The central figure in this archive is Thomas Noyes (1786-1860) of Painted Post, Chemung County, NY. His family suffered a terrible tragedy on 13 January 1840 with the sinking of the passenger steam Lexington on Long Island Sound. His son Charles Phelps Noyes (1818-1840) and brother-in-law Charles H. Phelps were aboard, on their way to visit family members in Stonington, CT. 7 letters in this lot dated January and February 1840 discuss the disaster. A New York cousin recalls: "I never saw dear Charles so reluctant to go to Stonington, yet his uncle thought it such a good excuse for him to make a visit." A black-bordered letter from friend Paul Babcock in New York City recalls: "Yr brother came here in the early part of last week & designed returning the latter part, but having slipped down on Thursday or Friday & sprained his ancle . . . stayed over till Monday the 13th." He then asked his nephew Charles Noyes to accompany him on the trip "as he was so much crippled." Babcock offers a long summary of the ship's loss: a fire, "confusion & the swamping of 3 boats," the difficulty of a rescue with all nearby small vessels "being ice bound on the shores," and the rescue of a mere two crew members who clung to cotton bales in the icy waters overnight.

52 other letters are mostly dated 1834-1869. Son Henry B. Noyes wrote to his doomed brother Charles in 1836, asking "Let me know how they get along with the Stonington & Providence RR, when it will be completed." Charles responded with an 11 May 1838 letter discussing the safety of packet ships and English steamers, less than two year before his tragic death. A handful of 20th-century letters are addressed to Cornell University student Neil Morton and others (relation unknown).

Rounding out the collection are 37 documents (deeds, leases, etc.), 1801-1855; and 52 receipts dated 1784-1862, many of them relating to the family of Pardon and Achsah Redfield of Bainbridge, Chenango County, NY (relation to the Noyes family undetermined). Bainbridge was originally named Jericho, in Tioga County.

Among the more interesting odds and ends: a 16-page manuscript notebook of dessert recipes kept by the Noyes family; a worn fragmentary manuscript copy of the original division of the land in Jericho (Bainbridge), listing dozens of original settlers circa 1791; and a quite defective 1796 lease of Jericho land with a clear signature as witness by the town's best-known founder, Jedediah Smith Sr. (father of the famous mountain man of the same name).