Scott, Winfield:

$3,250 · Offered by William Reese Company · No longer available

[AUTOGRAPH LETTER, SIGNED, FROM GENERAL WINFIELD SCOTT TO ADJUTANT GENERAL JAMES GADSDEN, REPORTING ON DIFFICULTIES WITH ORDERS RELATING TO THE CUTTING OF PUBLIC TIMBER IN THE FLORIDAS, SUGGESTING ... An unusually lengthy and interesting autograph letter, signed, from General Winfield Scott to Adjutant General James Gadsden (of the eponymous purchase) during Scott's command in Florida in the early 1820s. Scott had already become a brigadier general during the War of 1812, and remained one of the army's leading commanders in the brief time of peace which followed. In 1820, Scott was sent to Florida with a military detachment to oversee and facilitate the cutting down of public timber. Here at the beginning of his second year in the southernmost territory of the United States, he has much insight to offer on his orders and on the military development of Florida.At the time, a garrison was stationed on the hotly contested Amelia Island for the purpose of protecting trade on the St. John's and St. Mary's rivers. Scott disapproves of the encampment, which he believes can "afford no direct protection" and describes it as "wholly worthless." He suggests instead that, "if it be thought necessary to keep a company in the vicinity of Saint Mary's," they move it to Point Petre. Point Petre, he argues, is a more defensible location and "in point of unhealthiness it is something less bad than Fernandina." Apparently, the troops stationed on Amelia Island suffered through a "decisive exper

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