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400

400

POSTAL COVERS—UNION.

Group of 6 patriotic postal covers.

All are

complete and unused; a few show signs of removal from an album.

SHOULD BE SEEN

.

Vp, 1861-1865

[300/400]

Ha! Ha! Massa Jeff takes the Last of the Confederate Stock * The Innocent Cause of the War *

Cornerstone of Federal Union * I’se Contraband * Uncle Sam sends his Bird after Traitor Jeff *

Proclaim Liberty and The Result of Secession.

A FEW WORDS ON THE FOLLOWING LOTS

OF PATRIOTIC CIVIL WAR COVERS

From the onset of the Civil War, enterprising publishers, printers and stationers began to

design and print up patriotic postal covers on both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line. The

early covers were generally simple and “patriotic,” incorporating the flag and some words

regarding the preservation of the Union on the one side and the glory and values of the

“Old South” on the other. However, after 1861, and the prospect of a protracted war;

the covers became more and more creative. Some celebrated battles and generals, some

were humorous, while others became increasingly harsh. Instead of simple patriotic mes-

sages, biting personal attacks on Lincoln or Jefferson Davis began to emerge. Designers

were quick taking advantage of events that became the butt of satire. For example; fol-

lowing the liberation of vast numbers of slaves on the Carolina coast by General

Butler, dubbed “contrabands of war,” there emerged an entire genre of racist covers. The

election of 1864 provided ample material for the covers from both sides, not to mention

covers produced by the so-called “copperheads,” northerners that sympathized with

the South. It is estimated that by the end of the War, at least 200 different publishers

had produced close to five thousand different covers. The following lots include some of

the rarest known covers, Union and Confederate; many from the collection of Gordon Bleuler

whose collection of patriotic covers was said to be among the most complete ever

assembled.