American Historical Ephemera & Photography

Autograph letter to Lieutenant Colonel David Berkley McCreary. Erie, PA, 25 November 1863. 18 pages, 8vo, 5 x 8 1/8 in., with stamped and postmarked envelope addressed to McCreary, old creases.

An extensive letter consisting of 18 pages, with 2 pages devoted to an attack by the Rebels by way of Canada and Lake Erie: "You have doubtless been told...of our great military preparations against a rebel attack by way of Canada and te Lake [Erie]." He continues: "There was no doubt a plot concocted in Canada, originating in Richmond to seize vessels on Lake Erie and make a descent on Johnson's Island and release the Rebels there confined." There is more content regarding the pending attack on the US from Canada. 

The recipient, Lt. Col. David Berkley McCreary (1826-1906) was from Erie, PA, and lived there after the war. At the start of the war, he was 35 and working as a lawyer in Erie. He enlisted on 21 April 1861 as a first lieutenant, commissioned the same day into Co. B of the Erie Pennsylvania Infantry, a 3-month unit. Mustered out in July, he was commissioned as a captain into Co. D of the 145th Pennsylvania Infantry on 27 August 1862. He was promoted extensively thereafter: lieutenant colonel (5 September 1862); colonel (17 January 1865, not mustered; 13 March 1865 by brevet); and brigadier-general (13 March 1865 by brevet). He was also listed as a prisoner of war (POW) at Chancellorsville, VA on 3 May 1863, confined at Richmond on 7 May 1863, and again at Petersburg, VA on 16 June 1864, confined at Macon, GA and Columbia, SC.