RICHMOND / VA // FEB / 27 cds with matching DUE 10 and second [due] 10 on soldier’s cover endorsed mandated “Henry Higinbotham, Louisiana Guard Artillery, Richmond Defenses” on TURNED COVER to Thomas H. Higinbotham, Esqr. Care Quarter Masters Department, Mobile, Alabama. Inside use is franked with CSA 11, 10¢ blue tied MOBILE / ALA double circle postmark and addressed to Henry Higinbotham, Louisiana Guard Artillery, Richmond, Va. This correspondence is known to have passed through the LOUISIANA RELIEF COMMITTEE – a highly prized use selling for thousands of dollars (CCV $4,500) – and although this cover may have been delivered by that committee, there is no way to prove it without the requisite docketing.  Lightly water stained (possibly from smuggling across the river) and top flap reattached with hinges, completely exploded to nicely show both sides. [VA] [AL] $500.

T.H. Higinbotham is shown in military records as 1st Sgt Co. “C” 2nd Regt. Engineer Troops commanded by Capt. L. Hutchinson. His residence is listed as New Orleans. He is shown on the Roll of POWs surrendered at Citronelle, Ala by Lt. Gen. R. Taylor, CSA to Maj. Gen. E.R.S. Canby USA in May 1865 and paroled at Meridian, Miss. The 2nd Regiment Engineer Troops, Army and Department of the Gulf, was organized 7 Aug 1863 in Mobile, Alabama under Capt. Hutchinson.

Henry Higinbotham was a Private with Captain Green’s Company Louisiana Guard Artillery. Louisiana Guard Light Artillery was organized during the winter of 1861-1862 at New Orleans, Louisiana. The unit was ordered to Virginia and assigned to the Department of Norfolk and later to H.P. Jones' and A.W. Starke's Battalion of Artillery, Army of Northern Virginia. It fought from Cedar Mountain to Bristoe, then served in the Richmond area north of the James River and later the Appomattox Campaign. It lost 2 killed and 5 wounded out of the 60 at Gettysburg and surrendered with no officers and 17 men.