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Belle Boyd Autograph Sentiment Signed ("Belle Boyd of Va, The 'Rebel Spy'"). ...
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$1,062.50
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Description
Belle Boyd Autograph Sentiment Signed ("Belle Boyd of Va, The 'Rebel Spy'"). One page, 5" x 2.5", no place; no date. The legendary Rebel spy Belle Boyd, the Siren of the Shenandoah, writes in full:"Yours Truly / Belle Boyd of Va / The 'Rebel Spy' / Ex Capt. & Aide of 'Stonewall' / C.S.A."
One of the most famous and notorious Confederate spies, Isabella Marie Boyd (1843-1900) became a spy at the age of seventeen, serving the Confederate forces in the Shenandoah Valley from her father's hotel in Front Royal, Virginia. During the spring 1862 Valley Campaign, she became a courier and provided valuable information to Generals Turner Ashby and Stonewall Jackson. A bold and daring young woman, Belle, at times, galloped headlong into the dark with cipher messages and even crept into rooms to eavesdrop on Union Army conferences. General Jackson made her a captain and honorary aide-de-camp on his staff. After being betrayed by her lover, she was arrested on July 29, 1862, and taken to Washington under orders from Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, where she spent a month in the Old Capitol Prison in Washington. Following her exchange, she lived in exile with relatives for a time but was arrested again in 1863. After spending several more months in a Washington prison, she was released after contracting typhoid fever.
Boyd then attempted to travel to England with Confederate dispatches on a blockade runner in May 1864. When Union forces stopped her ship, she was again placed in custody and transported to Canada. During this time, Boyd met and fell in love with the Union officer charged with holding her, Samuel Hardinge, and the two fled together to England, where she remained until after the war. While abroad, she attempted to capitalize on her international notoriety by publishing a memoir that mixed truth and tall tales in equal proportion. When she returned, Boyd turned the book into a traveling one-woman show, enabling her legend to spread further as she toured from coast to coast. Her mental capacity was questioned, and her veracity was often doubted, but her stories of flirtation, spycraft, and escape made her perhaps the most famous female character of the entire Civil War.
Condition: Fully mounted to a slightly larger lined notecard. Two edges rough. Light edgewear to notecard.
Auction Info
2022 November 10 Manuscripts of the American Revolutionary War and Civil War Signature® Auction #6259 (go to Auction Home page)
Auction Dates
November, 2022
10th
Thursday
Bids + Registered Phone Bidders: 3
Lot Tracking Activity: N/A
Page Views: 156
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