ALLENSWORTH, ALLEN. Two partly-printed Documents Signed by Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft. The first, a commis-sion appointing him Army Chaplain with rank of Major; the other his discharge as "Lieutenant-Colonel on the retired

ALLENSWORTH, ALLEN. Two partly-printed Documents Signed by Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft. The first, a commis-sion appointing him Army Chaplain with rank of Major; the other his discharge as "Lieutenant-Colonel on the retired list of the Army. " Each 1 page, folio; the Roosevelt handsomely framed. Washington, 1904; 1910 E3,000/4,000 Allensworth (1842-1914), born to slave parents in Kentucky, escaped in 1862 and joined the Union Army as a nurse. After the war he worked as a restaurateur to finance his education, culminating in ordination as a Baptist minister. He rose to power in the Church and in the Kentucky Republican party. In 1886 he left his parish for a commission as chaplain of the 24th Infantry, part of the Buffalo Soldiers. He saw service in the American West and the Spanish-American War. Upon retirement in 1906 he was a chief chaplain of the Army and a lieutenant-colonel, the highest rank held by any African-American officer until Charles Young's WWI appointment as colonel.