WALLACE LEW: (1827-1905) American lawyer, Union General in the American Civil War, politician, diplomat, and author of the historical adventure story Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1880). A.L.S., Lew Wallace, four pages, 8vo, Rome, 11th June 1885, to Mrs. Berdan. Wallace states that he had left Constantinople with ´the most confident expectation´ of meeting his correspondent in Paris ´where according to General B[erdan] you were about arriving from Stockholm´, continuing to express his surprise and regret to learn that she was en route to Sorrento, and explaining ´I had intended in Paris answering in person your interesting letters, and you will never be able to say that would not have been more agreeable than the receipt of half dozen proxy replies by post. My purpose was to tall you in full what I had done for your husband, and how in my last interview with the Sultan he ordered conditions to be drawn for presentation to the General; if they proved acceptable, he was to be taken into the imperial service forthwith. He was then to have trials of the torpedo´. Wallace further informs Berdan that he is leaving for Florence tonight, and then two days later will leave for Paris ´which will not be half so charming now that you have taken the Italian flight´, and also remarking ´I know less about that city than any other of the European capitals, and it would have been so pleasant to have put myself under your able and all sufficient chaperoneship, and seen it. Alas, it was one of the lost opportunities of my life!´. Some light foxing, creasing, and minor age wear, G

Hiram Berdan (1824-1893) American Colonel, the guiding force and commander of the United States Volunteer Sharpshooter Regiments during the American Civil War. Berdan was also an engineer and inventor of the Berdan rifle.

Wallace served as United States Minister to the Ottoman Empire from September 1881 to May 1885.