Details
BUCHANAN, JAMES, President. Autograph letter signed ("James Buchanan") as President, to James William Denver, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Washington, D.C., 13 March 1859. 1 page, 4to, integral blank, slight spotting, original envelope addressed in Buchanan's hand, in very good condition.
PRESIDENT BUCHANAN ACCEPTS THE RESIGNATION OF THE CABINET MEMBER FOR WHOM DENVER, COLORADO WAS NAMED
An uncommon autograph letter signed as President: "It is, with sincere regret, that I accept your resignation as Commissioner of Indian Affairs. Your conduct in that highly explosive office had received my cordial approbation as well as that of the Secretary of the Interior [Jacob Thompson]. It will be difficult to supply your place. But I cannot consent to sever our official connection, without expressing my lasting obligation to you for the able, discreet, firm & successful, manner in which you performed your duties as Governor of Kansas under the most difficult & trying circumstances..."
James William Denver (1817-1892) was appointed secretary of Kansas Territory in 1858, an especially volatile time. Riots took place between slave owners and abolitionists who resided there, and John Brown's bloody Ossawattamie Raid took place only three months after Denver resigned. After several years of political controversy and violence, Kansas was finally admitted into the Union as a free state in January 1861. The same year, President Lincoln appointed Denver a Brigadier General; he then commanded a brigade under General Sherman until his commission expired in 1863.
PRESIDENT BUCHANAN ACCEPTS THE RESIGNATION OF THE CABINET MEMBER FOR WHOM DENVER, COLORADO WAS NAMED
An uncommon autograph letter signed as President: "It is, with sincere regret, that I accept your resignation as Commissioner of Indian Affairs. Your conduct in that highly explosive office had received my cordial approbation as well as that of the Secretary of the Interior [Jacob Thompson]. It will be difficult to supply your place. But I cannot consent to sever our official connection, without expressing my lasting obligation to you for the able, discreet, firm & successful, manner in which you performed your duties as Governor of Kansas under the most difficult & trying circumstances..."
James William Denver (1817-1892) was appointed secretary of Kansas Territory in 1858, an especially volatile time. Riots took place between slave owners and abolitionists who resided there, and John Brown's bloody Ossawattamie Raid took place only three months after Denver resigned. After several years of political controversy and violence, Kansas was finally admitted into the Union as a free state in January 1861. The same year, President Lincoln appointed Denver a Brigadier General; he then commanded a brigade under General Sherman until his commission expired in 1863.