Sale 2471 - Printed & Manuscript African Americana, March 29, 2018

62 62    (SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.)Watts, JamesW., engraver; after Herrick. Reading the Emancipation Proclamation. Engraving, 19 x 23 inches; moderate foxing, dampstaining in lower right corner. [Hartford, CT]: Lucius Stebbins, 1864 [400/600] By torchlight, a Union soldier reads a newspaper printing of the proclamation to a group of anxious freedmen in a cabin.With an inset portrait of Lincoln in the lower margin. Neely & Holzer, Union Image, page 232. RUMORSTHATTHEYANKEESWOULD “KILL & EATTHEM” 63 c   (SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.) Scott, GeorgeW. Pair of letters describing escaped slaves in North Carolina. Autograph Letters Signed, each 4 pages 7 3 / 4 x 4 3 / 4 inches on one folding sheet; minor wear. With complete transcripts. Plymouth, NC, 15 and 16 April 1863 [300/400] George W. Scott was a musician in the nine-month 46th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, stationed in Plymouth, NC. There he had the opportunity to meet numerous escaped slaves. His 16 April letter notes that “the slaves are told by their masters before they skedaddle that the Yankees will take & sell them to Cuba to pay for the expenses of the war. Others have told them that we should kill & eat them, but in spite of their stories they come into our lines thick as toads. Aunt Rose told me that there was not a nigger who left Plymouth when the Rebs did unless he was tied or compelled to go under the lash.”