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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.

Peyster, John Watts de (1821-1907) to Edwin D. Morgan

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC03615 Author/Creator: Peyster, John Watts de (1821-1907) Place Written: New York, New York Type: Letter signed Date: 4 January 1864 Pagination: 3 p. : docket : ill. ; 20 x 13 cm. Order a Copy

Encloses an address he delivered in Vermont on secession in Switzerland (not present) and asks Morgan to read it as an example for the United States. Writes, "I sincerely hope that you will do me the honor to read it in as much as the treatment and fate of Secession in Switzerland would have served as a complete lesson to our authorities had they been willing to profit by the experience of others." Printed illustration ("Battle of Pittsburg Landing, April 6, 1862") on blank leaf of paper.

Morgan was governor of New York 1859-1862. The address De Peyster refers to is: Secession in Switzerland and in the United States Compared: Being the Annual Address Before the Vermont State Historical Society by De Peyster, J. Watts, 1863.

Peyster, John Watts de, 1821-1907
Morgan, Edwin Denison, 1811-1883

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