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HENRY CLAY (April 12, 1777 – June 29, 1852) represented Kentucky in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. He was the seventh speaker of the House and the ninth Secretary of State, appointed by President John Quincy Adams. He resigned from the Senate in 1842 and won the Whig presidential nomination but was narrowly defeated in the general election by Democrat James K. Polk, who made the annexation of the Republic of Texas his top issue.
2 pp, 8 x 12 ¼, ALS July 26, 1844, from WILLIAM LINN (1787-1873) to his friend JAMES EWING of Burgettstown, Washington County, PA, remarking on the Whig meeting and expressing concern that anyone could vote for Clay. Linn also provides an interesting description of his trip aboard a crowded boat with strange passengers boarding at every stop.
He writes, in part, “We have had a dry season since I returned home. The corn crop is failing very fast but this day it rains constant which I think will make a great many thousand bushels of corn. I think a much greater blessing than the great Clay Whig meeting that is to take place in Chambersburg today. For my part, I cannot see why any moral, good man could wish to place Henry Clay at the head of the nation and look for a blessing of prosperity on that nation.”
He also writes, “...Anderson was at sometimes very noisy and at other times troublesome. We have to confine him at different times. Although for the most part he was at liberty and a good deal on deck when the weather was pleasant. When we came in sight of Johnstown, he was on deck and seen the stage passing and ran and picked up his trunk and then threw it off the moment the rain was lacking...The day turning out wet made it very unpleasant. Our boat being crowded from the start still became more so. We now changed boats and strange passengers getting on almost at every stopping place. The captain who was not a very accommodating man began to mention putting us off at Huntington. I at first told him he would bare on that night...Mr. Kelso & Gracey thought it best for them to get off with Anderson...and rest that afternoon and got a carriage and crossed the mountains on Saturday and arrived home that evening. I continued in the boat to Harrisburg and arrived safe home on Saturday...”
Linn was possibly a prominent attorney of Franklin County and served as one of the directors of the Franklin County Poor House from 1837-39.
In blue ink and quite readable. Integral address leaf is nicely done with a black Shippensburgh, PA, postmark.
Folds and expected toning. Very nice Pennsylvania Americana.
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