"...Old Abe is a good man but Darling, not a great man for these times..."

Autograph letter signed by Brigadier General Thomas Howard Ruger (1833-1907), to his wife, Helen. Camp near Maryland Heights, Maryland, 3 October 1862. 11 pages, 16mo. With original cover with partial red three-cent stamp and hand stamp cancellation.

Ruger, a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, was practicing law in Janesville, Wisconsin at the outbreak of the Civil War. In June of 1861, he was assigned to the 3rd Wisconsin Regiment as a lieutenant colonel, quickly rising through the ranks to become a brigadier general, in command of a contingent in the Rappahannock maneuvers. After the Battle of Franklin, he was promoted to major general for recognition of his admirable service and served with the 33rd Infantry in the U.S. Army. After the Battle of Gettysburg, Ruger was once again commended for his courage at the Battle of Gettysburg and commissioned a brigadier general. 

In this affectionate letter to his wife, written just after the Battle of Antietam, Ruger frequently expresses his desire to be home with his "little sweetie": "I often think of the measure of being once more with you for good and all...I see no way of ending this war but to fight it out, and for me but to do my duty hoping to be brought safely through it to enjoy the society of my wifey all the more."

He expresses his frustration at the prospect of old Wisconsin regiments not being backfilled, given the death of practical experience of the new recruits: "It seems as if we will never learn wisdom. It is of much greater importance to fill up the old regiments than to raise so many new ones...the [new] officers are for the most part deficient in military knowledge."

Finally, Ruger writes of his encounter with President Lincoln, who visited the Antietam battlefield just after the conflict. Ruger's impression of the President was not exactly favorable ("Old Abe is a good man but Darling, not a great man for these times"), though he accurately predicts that history would be a better judge: "Exact justice of opinion will be more surely found among thinking, candid men after the present condition of things has passed away and the results are seen."

As for Ruger himself, after the war, Major General George Meade appointed him to serve as Governor of Georgia, following the ouster of Charles J. Jenkins. Later in 1871, Ruger was appointed superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy and was the commander of the Department the South and West, serving in this capacity until 1885.

[Civil War, Union, Confederate] [Manuscripts, Documents, Letters, Ephemera, Signatures, Autographs] [Abraham Lincoln, Politics, Mary Todd Lincoln, 1860 Election, Election of 1860, 1864 Election, Election of 1864,  Lincoln Assassination, John Wilkes Booth]