- Signed -


MAJOR GENERAL WILLIAM S ROSECRANS

Civil War Content Telegraph  
 
 
Dated January  28, 1862 
 

An American Telegraph Company telegraph sent by  W.S. Rosecrans, Brigadier General, United States Army, to  Colonel J. N. Rathbons.

Received at Parkersburg, (then Virginia), January 28, 1862, from Headquarters at Wheeling, (then Virginia).

Concerning a transfer of prisoners. Rosecrans reminds Rathbons that a writ of Habeas Corpus had been served on him requiring him to give up captured prisoners he was holding. Rosecrans also threatens to proclaim martial law should citizens attempt to collect fees "for liberating enemies of the country by civil process..."

Includes 12 lines of hand-written text spanning both sides of the telegraph, signed W. S. Rosecrans / Brig General / USA. 



Measures approx. 5-1/4 x 8-1/4 inches; folded twice for delivery (once vertical, once horizontal); age toning with a few interior loses and some apparent fading to ink.

Includes old dealer typed transcription of text.

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Biography:


William Starke Rosecrans (September 6, 1819 – March 11, 1898) was an American inventor, coal-oil company executive, diplomat, politician, and U.S. Army officer. He gained fame for his role as a Union general during the American Civil War. He was the victor at prominent Western Theater battles, but his military career was effectively ended following his disastrous defeat at the Battle of Chickamauga in 1863.

Rosecrans graduated in 1842 from the United States Military Academy where he served in engineering assignments as well as a professor before leaving the Army to pursue a career in civil engineering. At the start of the Civil War, leading troops from Ohio, he achieved early combat success in western Virginia. In 1862 in the Western Theater, he won the battles of Iuka and Corinth while under the command of Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. His brusque, outspoken manner and willingness to quarrel openly with superiors caused a professional rivalry with Grant (as well as with Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton) that would adversely affect Rosecrans' career.

Given command of the Army of the Cumberland, he fought against Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg at Stones River, and later outmaneuvered him in the brilliant Tullahoma Campaign, driving the Confederates from Middle Tennessee. His strategic movements then caused Bragg to abandon the critical city of Chattanooga, but Rosecrans' pursuit of Bragg ended during the bloody Battle of Chickamauga, where his unfortunately worded order mistakenly opened a gap in the Union line and Rosecrans and a third of his army were swept from the field. Besieged in Chattanooga, Rosecrans was relieved of command by Grant.

Following his humiliating defeat, Rosecrans was reassigned to command the Department of Missouri, where he opposed Price's Raid. He was briefly considered as a vice presidential running mate for Abraham Lincoln in 1864 but the telegram correspondence Rosecrans sent back to Washington that stated his interest, was intercepted by Stanton, who buried the message. As a result, Lincoln never received his response and began looking for other candidates. After the war, he served in diplomatic and appointed political positions and in 1880 was elected to Congress, representing California.

During the 1864 Republican National Convention, his former chief of staff, James Garfield, head of the Ohio delegation, telegraphed Rosecrans to ask if he would consider running to be Abraham Lincoln's vice president. The Republicans that year were seeking a War Democrat to run with Lincoln under the temporary name of "National Union Party." Rosecrans replied in a cryptically positive manner, but Garfield never received the return telegram. Friends of Rosecrans speculated that Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War, intercepted and suppressed it.




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