Lot 73 email save

STANDING UNION SOLDIER, IDENTIFIED, WITH LETTER

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1/4 plate tintype in a leather case with its original spine. Accompanied by a small envelope with a scrawled note, in rich dark ink, headed "Taltsville" [?] Nov. 2_, 1864. "My Dear Father. I received your letter and the dime/ that flax you sowed [sic] grandpa is fixing to have thrashed." It is signed "John H. Orcutt." A 19 year-old Orcutt enlisted in the Minnesota 1st Heavy Artillery on 9/22/64. It was in charge of the heavy guns at Chattanooga until 6/17/65. I took the sentence about the threshing to be allegorical and biblical, but the consignor [who deciphered "flax"] feels it is agricultural news from home. Another slip enclosed in the envelope is a long transcription of biblical generations. The envelope (stamp bleached white or possibly a blank to be signed upon receipt) is addressed to the father, Co. C, 6th Reg. [M] [Minnesota?] Vols/ Washington, D.C." . There was a Henry M. Orcutt, a couple of years older than John, probably his brother, who served in the same unit. It occurs to me that this could be a portrait of the father, who received the letter, and not the son. Orcutt has a sad face, stands before the vertical division between the studio curtain and the white backdrop. [3+]

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