American Historical Ephemera and Photography

Hand written letters in ink on paper including some with printed labels and fields to stationary (yellow toning overall with some darker toning at the edges, some torn corners, creases and folds, and some splitting at seams).

Collection of 41 pieces of correspondence and receipts once part of the Ulster Iron Works manuscript archive including documents dated from between 1795 and 1829. The archive includes ten pay stubs dated July 1820, an agreement of 3 October 1819 whereby prices and requirements were set for a glass blower's furnace on the grounds of Ulster Iron Works, assorted receipts dating from as early as 1795, an 1819 voucher signed by Oliver Vanderbilt, correspondence from Abeel & Dunscomb Rolling Mill, freight tickets for Thaddeus Phelps & Co, owner's of the steam ship Robert Fulton, and others. Also included is a January of 1809 letter from business associate J. Barney of London sent to Garrit and Abeel of New York discussing the declining relations between Britain and the United States as a result of the impressment of American sailors and the ongoing British blockade of France. That year, the Congress of the United States passed the "Non-Intercourse Act", which went into effect on March 7th, the date stamped on the back of the letter by the recipient. Ultimately, American and British relations would continue to decline into open warfare in the War of 1812.

The Ulster Iron Works was originally founded as the Quaker Iron Works in 1845, with mills operating on the site until 1950. Abeel and Dunscomb of New York, New York, operated as iron merchants from the late Eighteenth through the mid Nineteenth Century. The correspondence included in this lot provides a window into how these merchants coordinated with the Ulster Iron Works in order to survive the trying economic conditions then driving the United States into its second war with Britain.