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Letter to Horace Hotchkiss, 25 August 1841
Source Note
Source Note
JS, Letter, , Hancock Co., IL, to , , New Haven Co., CT, 25 Aug. 1841; handwriting of ; address in handwriting of ; four pages; Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum, Springfield, IL. Includes address, postal stamp, postal notation, and docket.
Two leaves (at one time a bifolium but now separated), each measuring 9¾ × 7¾ inches (25 × 20 cm). The letter was written on all four pages. It was then addressed, trifolded twice in letter style, sealed with a red adhesive wafer, and stamped at the Nauvoo post office. The letter was later refolded for filing.
The custodial history of the letter is unknown before it came into the possession of the Abraham Lincoln Bookshop in Chicago, Illinois, which sold it in 1972 to the Illinois State Historical Library (now the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum).
Historical Introduction
Historical Introduction
On 25 August 1841, JS wrote a letter in , Illinois, to his creditor in , Connecticut, discussing JS’s debts. JS’s letter was a response to a communication a month earlier, wherein Hotchkiss expressed his confusion and dissatisfaction that JS had not paid his debts through his , as had been arranged. Although JS commissioned Galland to obtain deeds to land in the eastern and transfer them to Hotchkiss as payment for the debts, Galland never accomplished the task. By July, Galland informed Hotchkiss that he was returning to Nauvoo. Meanwhile, JS had not been informed that Galland, upon whom JS and the were relying, had apparently abandoned his assignment. JS had even begun to place increased trust in Galland—in a May 1841 letter, he asked his primary agent, , to turn his responsibilities over to Galland.
The lack of payment particularly displeased because he had deferred the first interest payment on the debt for two years. According to the bond and promissory notes from the initial purchase in 1839, JS was to pay an annual interest of $3,000 for twenty years, after which the principal would be due. However, according to the letter featured here, JS believed that Hotchkiss had agreed to defer the first five interest payments and accept lands as payment for both the principal and the interest. Hotchkiss’s September response reveals that he remembered agreeing to accept land payments for the interest only. The miscommunication was frustrating for both parties, but in the ensuing correspondence, JS and Hotchkiss renegotiated the agreement to pay the debt with the eastern lands.
made a copy of the 25 August letter before it was sent. That copy was retained in JS’s . The original was mailed on 28 August through the post office and is the version featured here. received the letter and responded three weeks later with a letter recounting his various attempts to accommodate JS’s repayment efforts—efforts that had been unsuccessful thus far. Hotchkiss presumably showed the letter featured here to his business partner, , who then also wrote a letter to JS.
Footnotes
nearly enough of real estate (in the hands of the ) to liquidate the amt. due you, my having been compelled to return, in consequence of ill heal[t]h, expecting that the would have the matter arranged long before this. Therefore so soon as we learn the particulars from we will take such measures, as will most likely meet your approval, We have learned that has been partially blind, which may be the reason why the business has not been arranged as stipulated between you and them. as, he, was to remain, with a view to accomplish that object, after my returned.— I will now give you an account of some recent deaths that have taken place here, My Brother , . and one of my s, together with many other valuable citizens— In fact we are in the midst of death— yours
JS—
<25>
< Ill AUG 28>
Esqr
Con. [p. [4]]
Source Note
Source Note
Document Transcript
Document Information
Document Information
Footnotes
Footnotes
- [12]
Almon Babbitt, acting as an agent for JS, obtained lands that he in turn transferred to Galland. At least some of these lands were apparently sold by Galland for personal gain. (Isaac Galland, Philadelphia, to Edward Hunter, [West Nantmeal Township, PA], 27 July 1841, Edward Hunter, Collection, CHL; Chester Co., PA, Deeds, 1688–1903, vol. U-4, pp. 82–83, 185–188, 271–275, microfilm 557,205, U.S. and Canada Record Collection, FHL.)
Hunter, Edward. Collection, ca. 1798–1965. Photocopy and typescript. CHL.
U.S. and Canada Record Collection. FHL.
- [13]
JS’s brother Don Carlos Smith died on 7 August 1841 at the age of twenty-five. Robert B. Thompson, JS’s scribe, died on 27 August 1841 at the age of twenty-nine. JS’s fourteen-month-old son, Don Carlos Smith, died on 15 August 1841. (“Death of General Don Carlos Smith,” Times and Seasons, 16 Aug. 1841, 2:503; “Obituary,” Millennial Star, Nov. 1841, 2:108–109; Letter to Oliver Granger, 30 Aug. 1841; Minutes, 16 Aug. 1841.)
Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.
Latter-day Saints’ Millennial Star. Manchester, England, 1840–1842; Liverpool, 1842–1932; London, 1932–1970.
- [14]
See, for example, Obituaries, Times and Seasons, 15 July 1841, 2:481; and Obituary for Alice Johnson Olney, Times and Seasons, 2 Aug. 1841, 2:501.
Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.
Postage in unidentified handwriting.
Text is part of a circular postal stamp in black ink.
George Miller handwriting ends; John S. Fullmer begins.