A Guide to the John S. Mosby Letters, 1858-1897 Mosby, John S., Letters, 1858-1897 10804

A Guide to the John S. Mosby Letters, 1858-1897

A Collection in
The Special Collections Department
Accession Number 10804

Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library

Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, Virginia 22904-4110
USA
Phone: (434) 243-1776
Fax: (434) 924-4968
Reference Request Form: https://small.lib.virginia.edu/reference-request/
URL: http://small.library.virginia.edu/

Funding: Web version of the finding aid funded in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Processed by: Special Collections Department

Repository

Special Collections, University of Virginia Library

Accession number

10804

Title

John S. Mosby Letters 1858-1897

Physical Characteristics

This collection contains two items.

Language

English

Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

There are no restrictions.

Use Restrictions

See the University of Virginia Library’s use policy.

Preferred Citation

Letters of John Singleton Mosby, 1858 and 1897, Accession # 10804, Special Collections Dept., University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.

Acquisition Information

These letters were purchased from the Book Press Ltd., Williamsburg, Virginia, on 21 November 1988.

Scope and Content Information

This collection contains two letters, 1858 and 1897, of John Singleton Mosby (1833-1916), Confederate partisan ranger. The first letter, 17 March 1858, was written during Mosby's antebellum legal career; in it he discusses the sale of five slaves with a Mr. Martin.

The second letter, 3 October 1897, was addressed to Civil War author John C[odman] Ropes (1836-1899). Mosby, writing from San Francisco, denies that he and members of his command committed atrocities during the war; rather, they "conducted honorable war." He claims that if he had served under Napoleon his tactics would have disrupted communications between [Gebhard von] Blucher (1742-1819) and the Duke of Wellington (1769-1852) [at Waterloo?] thereby thwarted their cooperation with each other. He also mentions his accident at the University of Virginia which resulted in the loss of his left eye [23 April 1897]. Additional information concerning this accident is available under accession number 7872-a, John Singleton Mosby Scrapbooks (Scrapbook II), in the Manuscripts Division of the Special Collections Department, Alderman Library.