JOHNSON’S ISLAND, SANDUSKY, OHIO: North to South inner envelope posted with RICHMOND VA JAN 19 DUE 10 when it crossed the lines and the outer cover was discarded per regulations; manuscript directive at upper left “For Flag of Truce Via City Point” and mandated “Virgil S. Lusk, Capt. Co  (A) 5th N.C. Bat.” to his wife “Mrs. Mollie J. Lusk, Asheville (Western) N.C. Care Capt. C. Moore Homing Creek, N.C.” Sealed tears at top and bottom. $250.

Virgil Stuart “Tollie” Lusk (1836-1929) was a Confederate Cavalry officer and a prisoner of war for two years. Col. Lusk was a district attorney and political leader in North Carolina who twice served as mayor of Asheville and twice in the NC legislature. During his terms as mayor of Asheville, he sponsored the first lighting of the streets, the first paving, the first water department, and the first fire department, according to his obituary in The Asheville Citizen, September 6, 1929. The paper stated, “No man in the mountain country was more widely known.” Lusk spent his postwar years battling the Ku Klux Klan in the courtroom, in Congress, and even in a shootout with local Klan members. He was also an ardent prohibitionist. Lusk clearly left an indelible mark on North Carolina history.