Raynor HCA 2013-01
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 1/10/2013
JOHNSTON, Joseph Eggleston (1807 -1891) was a career U.S. Army officer, serving with distinction in the Mexican-American War and Seminole Wars, and was also one of the most senior general officers in the Confederate States Army during the Civil War. At the end of the war he commanded the small remaining Confederate forces in the Carolinas Campaign and surrendered his armies to GENERAL W.T. SHERMANon April 26, 1865 Autograph Letter Signed, "J. E. Johnston," one page, 8vo, Washington, D. C., April 5, 1884, to the Editor, Pittsburgh Dispatch, reading, "I am compelled to say in my own defense, that no such interview occurred as that described in the "Special telegraph from a Staff Correspondent" dated Bedford April 2d, which appeared in your issue of the 3d. I have never been in Aiken S. Car. - unless passing through the place in a railroad car can be called so. And have not been out of the city since the appearance of advanced sheets of Mr Blaine's work referred to, after which time the interview is said to have occurred. Confidently asking you to publish this note, I am Respy & Truly yours." Johnston's surrender to Sherman on April 26, 1865 was the war's largest as it included all Confederate forces in the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida. Included is an 1866 Johnson, Fry & Co., 4to engraving of Johnston in uniform. The letter is in very good condition; the portrait has moderate foxing. The letter refers to Republican nominee for President in 1884 JAMES G. BLAINE who published his memoirs "Twenty Years in Congress" in early 1884. Johnston, who served one term as a Democrat in the US House of Representatives, was a critic of Blaine and supported the Democratic nominee, Grover Cleveland.
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