Civil War Gen.-Sen. Edward Baker Killed At Battle Of Ball's Bluff For Sale

4 pp, 5 x 8, USS Steamer Lancaster, Panama Bay, Nov. 14, 1861, DAVID SMITH, ALS, to his brother John L. Smith of S. Dedham, MA, on patriotic stationary. Smith engages in a brief narrative about Gen. Edward Baker, a sitting senator, who was killed in the Battle of Ball’s Bluff. Smith questions the soundness of the Union’s army and navy strategy in the Civil War.

“...I expect to be in California in a month. We will sail in three or four days. We will be detained there about three months. We are to put in a new section of shaft – our old one having cracked. It will be quite an undertaking, but we can do it...I know great many people at San Francisco. It will be pleasant to meet them. I made quite a number of new acquaintances coming from N. York on the boat. Many of them were very anxious to have me call on them...

“How unfortunate that affair at Edwards Ferry. Gen. Baker that was killed there. I met [him] before leaving here. His wife was a passenger with us. His body came here by the same steamer [USS Pawnee] that your letter came. It is now on its way to San Francisco.

“I wonder if our army is every going to do anything...I almost despair of our cause. We blunder so – though possessing greater resources and a greater number of men. We allow the enemy to meet us with superior numbers and either rout us or compel us to fall back. I am living in hopes that the Naval Expedition will be successful. It will distract the enemy. I must confess the Navy as well as the army are not up to the times. What is the state of feeling at home? Are the people becoming at all discouraged? I sometimes fear it.

“...There is a circus here at present. It [is] a Godsend in this benighted place. We have an invitation to go whenever we please. I have been twice. The tickets are a dollar so much saved by belonging to the Nacy. We have a free ticket over the Aspenwall & Panama R.R. The regular ticket is twenty five dollars for forty miles. Quite reasonable.

“Everything is very dear except imported manufactured goods as there is no duty on them, but all eatables are very high as things will not keep in this climate...It costs us about one dollar per day to live...

“Your Brother

“David

“John L. Smith

“S. Dedham

“Mass”

U.S. Senator-Brigade Gen. Edward Dickinson Baker was killed near Edwards Ferry (Battle of Ball’s Bluff) Virginia on October 21, 1861. Baker was the only sitting U.S. Senator ever killed in combat. He was a close friend of Abraham Lincoln, a prominent lawyer and orator. Baker was killed during a poorly coordinated crossing of the Potomac from Maryland into Virginia to reconnoiter and probe Confederate positions. Baker was killed by multiple gunshot wounds while trying to rally his men along the bluffs above the river. Baker’s death shocked the North and directly led to the creation of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War in Congress, which aggressively oversaw Union military operations.

Baker’s body lay in state in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, the first time a sitting U.S. Senator received that honor. He was later buried at Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis, Missouri.

The Lancaster was a steam-powered sloop of war commissioned in 1859. In July 1859, she sailed from the East Coast around Cape Horn to the Pacific. She served as flagship of the U.S. Pacific squadron through the early years of the Civil War, safeguarding U.S. interests.

The letter is in excellent condition. Normal mailing folds.

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