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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Shaw, Samuel (1754-1794) to the Commissary

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC02437.01790 Author/Creator: Shaw, Samuel (1754-1794) Place Written: West Point, New York Type: Autograph document signed Date: 3 January 1783 Pagination: 2 p. : docket ; 7.7 x 19.9 cm. Order a Copy

Writes, "Please to issue to Prince Darby of the Massa. Artillery, fifteen days provision from the 4th instant - he being ordered on command with officers horses. By order of the Comdt." Note on verso signed illegibly.

Prince Darby, a former slave from Dorchester, Massachusetts, had earned his freedom by enlisting in the army. (Ebenezer Clapp, Jr. in "The History of the Town of Dorchester..." 1859, p. 343)

Knox, Henry, 1750-1806
Darby, Prince, fl. 1783

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