Our Collection

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.

Pickens, Francis Wilkinson (1805-1869) to John Cunningham

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC05816 Author/Creator: Pickens, Francis Wilkinson (1805-1869) Place Written: Charleston, South Carolina Type: Letter signed Date: 2 January 1861 Pagination: 1 p. ; 24.8 x 19.6 cm. Order a Copy

Orders Cunningham "to assume the command" of operations in Charleston Harbor, since Brigadier General Simons has resigned. Orders him "to take such measure as to prevent any intercourse with Fort Sumter from obtaining supplies of any kind from this city." Postscript states that the orders come directly from Pickens because Major General Schnierle is sick. Postscript signed by J. Jonathan Lucas as aide-de-camp.

Francis Pickens was the governor of South Carolina.
John Cunningham was colonel of the Seventeenth South Carolina Militia Infantry Regiment, and was in commanding this regiment in Charleston when this letter was written.
J. Jonathan Lucas became a Major commanding the fifteenth South Carolina Heavy Artillery Battalion.
John Schnierle was the Mayor of Charleston in the 1840s and 50s and Major General of the Sixteenth Regiment of South Carolina Militia.

Pickens, Francis Wilkinson, 1805-1869
Lucas, J. Jonathan, fl. 1861
Cunningham, John, fl. 1861
Schnierle, John, ?-1869

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