Buy this book on-line

MORVEN M. JONES : c1870s ORIGINAL, SIGNIFICANT CIVIL WAR DIARY DETAILING THE BRUTAL TREATMENT AND SCANDALOUS TRIAL OF 3 UNION OFFICERS HANDWRITTEN BY A KEY PLAYER & MUCH MALIGNED MIDDLE AGED UNION ARMY OFFICER, ATTORNEY WHO AT ONE TIME OR ANOTHER HAD THE EAR OF PRESIDENTS

4to - over 9¾" - 12" tall. On offer is a sensational, original manuscript Civil War relic of no little significant historical content. The author Morven M. Jones [1815-1886; Utica New York], was a key player in one of the Civil War's most notorious scandals: allegations of election fraud, vote tampering, conspiracy, leading to the brutal arrest and incarceration of three men; a Union Colonel, a Major and the author a middle aged Lieutenant cashiered out as an officer due to the ill effects of his time as a POW, working under the auspices of the Governor of New York whilst trying to follow unclear regulations. The case details were published in a pamphlet and researchers and historians will treasure the fact that Mr. Jones wrote his 50 page or so memoir in the broad margins of an early printed edition of this booklet about him and his co-defendants case and the trial: The United States of America vs., Samuel North, Levi Cohn and Morven M. Jones [the published work names him as Marvin which he corrected in pencil]. Writing retrospectively, we note his signature at the close of an entry near the end dated 1879, he writes a commentary following the published parts of the trial and at great length about his arrest, incarceration and his time and terrible treatment at the Old Capitol Prison especially by the warden William Wood. He also writes about his time during the war, conversations he had with President Abraham Lincoln and much, much more offering page after page of historical narrative. Here are some snippets: North, Jones, and Cohn were arrested by Military Police Oct 27, 1864 and at once placed in separate close confinement in Old Capitol Prison…The cells were close and sultry during the day but the nights were cold and chilly…One day I burned a broom handle slowly nearly from end to end for fear of entirely losing fire to kindle with…While in the cells we were not allowed to look out of the small windows not even to place our faces to the lower part of the window….Several times when I had my face close to the lower end of the window trying to inhale a little fresh air, did I see a musket pointed at my head with the order from the sentinel to get away from that wind…several of our soldiers being shot for looking out of the windows of the prison. The windows were the death line and if a prisoner could be seen looking out the order or the practice was to shoot him…My wife was one of the most fearless women I had ever known…she could assist in an amputation of a soldiers limb with as much coolness as any surgeon in the army while all the tender sympathies of the mother, wife and sister combined….soon after our imprisonment Col Foster told my wife she might as well go home, that she could do her husband no good by staying in Washington and he would be convicted and sent to state prison…whenever she went in the street was under the surveillance of male and female spies and detectives. Her private baggage and clothing was searched several times once by men with shoulder straps, she told these that her husband had been an officer…He suspected someone was preparing to attempt to escape that evening and if he saw anyone trying to get out there his orders were to shoot him. The attempt was made and the prisoner was shot dead and then Wood after telling the story would laugh at it as a good joke…Bill Wood superintendent of Old Capitol, Atheist and generally a brute as he was sometimes had good streaks in him, at one of the times when North, Jones and Cohn had been taken from their cells and put in the large favored room with some 20 to 30 other gentlemen, he said to us you damned New York ballot box stuffers have no business here…didn't do half as bad things as I did at Baltimore on Election day for I and the other fellows I took with me voted early and often…One prisoner by a bold reckless effort escaped in broad daylight although the prisoner was surrounded by 3 lines of sentinels…One day an old man and his daughter a good and respectable looking young woman were brought to the prison from West Virginia as hostages for a son and brother who was accused of a crime and with being in the rebel service. The girl was placed in one end of the block alone and there were seldom any but very few females prisoners in that part of the building. Wood used to visit her room ostensibly to obtain some state secrets but it was well known that he was a beast in his passions, soon it was known that the girls was very ill of brain fever and was a raving maniac, about a week after the body of the poor girl was carried from the prison in a rough box, the father was weeping in the prison yard he had not been allowed to visit her during her illness nor was he allowed to see her remains and all of this within almost a stones throw of the Capitol of the United States…At one time a colored soldier was brought to the prison under sentence of death by court martial for shooting his wife. He was to be hanged in two days this was the first he had heard of his sentence. He was placed in a cell close by where I was and a colored preacher was sent to prepare him for his doom. Bill Wood said it looked too damned bad that if his death could be put off for a week he would find whiskey and beef steak and the nigger preacher could pray the poor devil right straight into Father Abraham's bosom. Early next morning the day of execution Wood sent the colored preacher in his carriage to ask President Lincoln to defer the execution for a week but the preacher returned saying he could not see the President. wood said no one could keep him out of the White House and he and the preacher started putting the horse to his speed…saying the President would very likely interfere and compel them to come again that it would be just as well to hang the man that morning. Wood came back jubilant over his success in seeing the President Lincoln and told the preacher to do his best and pray the nigger in Abraham's bosom…When arrested October 27 I was put in a cell with a man charged with passing Confederate money, here I was buried out of sight…Nov 1 a prison official opened my cell door and ordered to proceed to the prison office as I did with a guard of a soldier with a fixed bayonet…On our trial we called for the order for our arrest and it was then By Order of Abraham Lincoln President by HA Stanton Secretary of War a forged or substituted order died the next day after we were in prison…May 17 my wife and self with Dr Coventry and Merit Peckham started for Washington on a telegram from JF Seymour this was soon after the slaughter of the Wilderness…My wife and myself devoted our time and strength to the 50,000 wounded and sick soldiers in the hospitals at Washington. They died there by thousands many recovered or were removed to distant hospitals or were sent home discharged but the places were filled from the battlefield the 50000 cots were full. This was true while Republican soldiers in the hospitals in Washington had no difficulty in having their voting papers certified by officers detailed of the purpose every obstacle was thrown in the way of Democratic soldiers…An Oswego Captain whose arm was shattered so that he could but barely write his name and that with much pain and difficulty being a Democrat came from his hospital to the NY agency and for a day or two and took a few votes. For this he was at once dismissed from the service without any ceremony only for helping some wounded democratic soldiers to send home their votes for the old Gen Little Mac and Gov Seymour…The next Monday Jones and his traps were taken to cell No 8 where he was put in with a Cincinnati engraver arrested on a charge of counterfeiting…in a few days Jones was taken from No 8 and put in cell No 6 where he found Col North alone and Sick…The next day Wood called for Cohn and invited him to take a ride took him to the Treasury where they stopped fora few minutes and then drove on to the White House, with as much freedom as tho he had owned the White House, Bill Wood invited Cohn upstairs to see Old Abe, they were shown into a small room and there Cohn found the President, Col Foster the Judge Advocate and Clephane the recorder of the military court, the two men who had imposed themselves upon Jones in the Prison Office 25 days before. The whole trick and conspiracy were apparent at a glance…After an Introduction President Lincoln with Foster, Clephane and Wood present, says President Lincoln, you Mr Cohn are one of these New York prisoners arrested for fraud as to soldiers votes, now if you will make a full statement of all you know about those matters you need not go back to prison but shall be discharged from this moment. Cohn replied that he knew nothing in regard to those matters but what he was willing to tell there or anywhere. Pres Lincoln then repeated what he had said that if Mr Cohn would then state what he knew he should then and there be discharged…Mr Cohn then gave a history of all he had known or see with regard to voting at the NY Agency and elsewhere…When Mr Cohn had completed his statement, President Lincoln said, Mr Cohn I don't see as you have hurt anybody, nor could I if I told the truth, was Mr Cohn's reply. The President then dismissed Cohn and Wood and Cohn started downstairs supposing that he was free according to Pres Lincoln's promise, Oh No, says Wood you will have to go back to prison until your statement is written out for you to sign and then you will be discharged…The McClellan meetings seemed to be the largest and most enthusiastic, a large portion of the soldiers were for little Mac…on one evening the Republicans had a very large torch procession helped greatly by niggers and as it passed up Pennsylvania Avenue one of the helpers at Old Capitol Prison set fire to and burned the large National Flag hanging across the avenue in front of the Democratic Headquarters…Toward the latter part of Oct President Lincoln became quite confident of carrying New York. in

Bibliophile Bookbase for antiquarian books, maps and prints.