Page 227 - Swann Galleries - Printed & Manuscript African Americana- Sale 2308 - March 21, 2013

416
416 ● (MILITARY—CIVIL WAR.) PATRIOTIC COVERS—CONFEDERATE.
“Unite or Die. The device of our fathers in their first struggle for liberty—
1776.” Unused cover, bearing the image of a snake in 15 segments, each representing a
state in the Confederacy. A FINE EXAMPLE Charleston: C.W. Falen, circa 1863 [600/800]
ONE OF THE RAREST KNOWN CONFEDERATE COVERS bearing a boldly engraved image of
a snake broken into 15 segments, each representing a state of the Confederacy: South Carolina,
Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, North Carolina, Texas, Delaware, Maryland,
Virginia, Florida, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and Missouri. With the caption “Unite or
Die,” and a long quote from Jefferson Davis “Slave States, once more let me repeat, that the
only way of preserving our slave property, or what we prize more than life, our Liberty is by
UNION WITH EACHOTHER.” The segmented snake design was first conceived by
Benjamin Franklin and bore the caption “JOIN OR DIE,” representing the original colonies
and appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette on May 9, 1754.
417 ● (MILITARY—CIVIL WAR.) PATRIOTIC COVERS—CONFEDERATE.
The Cause of all our troubles. Two copies of a rare hand-colored Confederate cover;
both are complete; one has the flap glued down with signs of having been in an album; the
other has some staining, but the flap is free of the envelope.
(Philadephia?), circa 1861-1865 [400/600]
Two rare hand-colored covers, showing a black man within a wreath; in the background are
finely engraved scenes of a peaceful South before the war. It is interesting to note the subtle dif-
ferences in coloring between the two covers.
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