Important archive of baseball letters flashes back and forth between two purely American subjects: The Civil War and Baseball. Fresh to the hobby find of ten letters written by William Richmond to his friend Harry Syle. Ultimately, the blood and guts of brother on brother bloodshed comes to affect the escapist baseball paradise. A three-year journey in which William Richmond starts as a 14-year-old to the age of 17. It all starts out as fun and baseball games with an actual diagram of his 1860 baseball uniform, and moves on to the Lincoln Inauguration, the voice of war, baseball team disbands by the “Sucesh” and the sound of silence.
1) LIBERTY BASE BALL CHALLENGE – MARCH 5, 1860: William Richmond (WR) writes to Harry Syles (HS) challenging him to join his Liberty B.B.C. at the “Liberty Base Ball Club Grounds”. Advises him not to bother to bring his “cricket bat”. Although this was a baseball game they were still transitioning from cricket. A testament to how early in the formation of the game this was.
2) LIBERTY BASE BALL “UNCHALLENGE” LETTER – March 9, 1860: Dissatisfied WR obviously unhappy that club president Ethan Allen has cancelled the game and is staging a mini revolt. HS should come anyway and now he SHOULD bring his cricket bat as ”we will straightaway seize and compel them to play with us”.
3) BASE BALL & TOM BROWN’S SCHOOL DAYS – July 14, 1860: Baseball detail is tremendous: Ethan Allen elected club president “for the third time”, invitation fee for games has been “raised to 25 cents”, they have “twenty members”, with “two splendid players”. The Poughkeepsie club’s “First Nine is going to play a match with Unions (Newburgh) First Nine and Poughkeepsie Second Nine with Olympics First Nine …” He starts and ends with his enthusiasm over the most popular boys book series of the day
“Tom Browns’ School Days”.
4) EARLIEST UNFORM DESCRIPTION & SKETCH – August 28, 1860: Best of all he describes their new uniforms: “White duck caps with a dark flannel band at the bottom and red cord over the top…” Then he actually inserts a small drawing to demonstrate. Incredible! “Oh!!! And black straps in front with the initials ‘PJBBC (Poughkeepsie Junior Baseball Ball Club) in addition to our shirts. And some have dark blue flannel trousers” and “a shield on our shirts”. This is the earliest written description and drawing of a baseball uniform we know of.
5) BASE BALL & LINCOLN INAUGURATION – February 24, 1861: Dated the day after President Lincoln first arrived in Washington from Springfield, IL: “When Mr. Lincoln passed down the river, I of course went to see the ‘Big Thing’. I was so lucky as to be near enough to get a very good view of him. I think him a very fine-looking man. Of course, my opinion is ALL important (sarcasm!). President Lincoln was sworn in March 4th and gave the famous first inauguration speech. WR goes on to baseball and NS having been “(ridden) out on a rail” by his club. PJBBC has the “best catcher in Poughkeepsie and the best pitcher” and talks of selling their “old balls”.
6) HECKLER PARADE – March 30, 1861: Wants to change the name from the juvenile sounding “Poughkeepsie Juniors” after being heckled as “Poughkeepsie Baby Base Ball Club“ in pre-game parade. Musses, what happens when they are “30 years old”? Interestingly he hyphenates “Base-Ball” which is rarely seen. So early they were still working on the spelling.
7) BASE BALL & CONFEDERACY – September 9, 1861: Teammates desert the club for the War: “Our Base-Ball club disbanded with spring because a great number of the members had left (for the War). O! I forgot our new club would not have broken up if the boys had been Unionists, but the SUCESH principle existed in the majority.” Obviously, his teammates were Confederates or had the ideals of them. Talks about his father returning home from battle on furlough as he would have been either “killed or wounded or taken prisoner or else he would have run”. Wow.
8) DEATH & BASE BALL – January 8, 1862: Cantankerous WR again got mad, this time of the member of the cricket club. So, he switched back to baseball and scored a run in the game versus “Eastman’s Commercial College club” beating them 63-22. “You can find the score in the New York Clipper”. The brother of HS was killed, we presume it was in the war. WR is working on the well known “Gaudet’s Guide” for the deaf.
9) GOD & GENERALS – August 21, 1862: The war is in full swing and we are far more serious. He is critical of General McClellan but “shouldn’t think the government would allow an incompetent officer” to lead the Union. He prefers General Burnside. He looks to the church as a “Holy Comforter”. No room for games.
10) HARVARD & BLINDNESS – July 11, 1863: His sight is failing and he is unable to attend Harvard. A sad ending to a sad period. This is the final letter and we do not know the end.
The combination of baseball and the Civil War is one of the rarest and most desired combinations in collecting. Few pieces ever come to market such as the “Union Prisoners at Salsbury North Carolina” print. They go into collections and it seems they never come out.
There is a second set of letters of baseball & the Civil War in this same auction. From the same source but two completely different circumstances.