68
●
(CIVIL WAR.) Wilder, Wilber F.
Triumphal March of Sherman’s Army into
Atlanta.
Illustrated broadside, 14
1
/
2
x 9
1
/
4
inches to sight, with related manuscript letter on
verso; separations at folds, minor dampstaining, mounted in a double-sided frame. Not
examined outside of frame.
[Savannah, GA?, circa early January 1865]
[600/900]
This heroic 25-verse ballad recounts Sherman’s Atlanta campaign and subsequent march to the
sea from May to December 1864. It is illustrated with an American flag. The author was a
private in the 18th Wisconsin, which participated in the campaign. Only one copy in OCLC.
On verso is a letter from another campaign participant, Sergeant John Foster of the 111th
Illinois Infantry, Company I. His regiment was the first to enter the fort. He writes from
Savannah to his wife Sarah in Carlyle, IL, 10 January 1865: “You will see on the other side
something about our charge on Fort McAlister. I have marked with my pencil where it commences.
I think it is vary nice. It looks nicer to me now than it did a few minutes before we started on
the charge. . . . When we got orders to start we gave the yell and it was not long untill we was
into the fort. They killed several of our men after we got into the fort.” True to his word, Foster
had marked the 17th verse with a small pencil “x”: “Our fleet was waiting in the stream with
full and fresh supplies / But Fort McAllister’s score of guns like breakers met their eyes.”
WITH
—a cased ambrotype portrait of a Civil War sergeant found with the broadside, presumed
to be Sergeant Foster.
69
●
(CIVIL WAR.)
Group of 8 political speeches leading up to the war.
8vo,
unbound; foxing, folds, uncut.
Vp, 1859-61
[200/300]
Grow. Free Homes for Free Men. 29 February 1860 * Lands for the Landless. Np:
Republican Association of Washington, [1859?] * Perry. Posting the Books between the
North and South. 7 March 1860 * Seward. The State of the Country. 29 February 1860 *
Trumbull. Remarks . . . on Seizure of Arsenals at Harper’s Ferry. 6 December 1859 * Wade.
Property in the Territories. 7 March 1860 * Wilson. Territorial Slave Code. 25 January
1860 * [Yates.] Governor’s Message. Springfield, IL, 23 April 1861.
68
