Raynors HCA 2016-10
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/21/2016
Cotton speculation was big business in the Southern states during the war. Government speculators worked in conjunction with the army in seizing both "abandoned" Confederate Government cotton and privately owned cotton. Col. Gilchrist of the the 12th Louisiana African Decent Regiment was tasked with collecting all the cotton he could find in the Yazoo of Mississippi. Both private cotton, which a speculator named Clemens paid for, and the above mentioned abandoned cotton was on his radar. On February 20, 1864, Robert C. Hutchinson came to Gilchrist and told him that all the cotton on Berry Plantation was legally owned by him. Gilchrist did not necessarily believe him and three days later seized all of Berry Plantation's cotton. What Gilchrist couldn't have known at the time was that Hutchinson was a secret agent working for Union General William T. Sherman who took action and directed his Chief Quartermaster Lt. Col. J. D. Bingham to return the seized cotton as compensation for his services. Here we have Sherman's directive penned by aid-de-camp Captain Lewis M. Dayton, 1p. 4to., "Hd. Qrts. Dept. of the Tenn., Vicksburg, [Miss.], March 7, 1864," in which he calls Bingham's attention to Hutchinson's plight, in part: "The Genl. Comdg. directs me to say that instructions were given to the officer commanding the Yazoo Expedition to deliver…the cotton he was ordered to collect, one hundred & fifty bales to Mr. R. C. Hutchinson. It appears his cotton amounted to to one hundred & fifty six bales which quality you will turn over to Mr. Hutchinson out of the lot now in your possession captured on that Expedition. The above mentioned cotton was the property of Mr. Hutchinson & he was allowed to bring it down in compensation for former secret service." For more on this subject and a detailed account of the raid see Col. Charles Gilchrist's report entitled: "February 15-March 6, 1864-Expedition from Vicksburg to Grand Gulf, Miss." in the War of the Rebellion Official Records of The Union and Confederate Armies." Overall Near Fine
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