Civil War Mail Contractor 2 Letters Re: Pay and Contracts

A pair of letters relating to Post Office contractors during the Civil War. Both relate to Mr. R. W. Elsom, who was seeking help from the government to pay mail contracts with money that was owed to him during the war. Accompanying the two letters is a newspaper clipping of an article entitled "Ante-Bellum Mail-Contractors", dated March 14, n.y. Both letters have mail folds and light uneven toning. With a few spots of soiling. Both boldly signed.

Includes the following, with transcriptions:
1. ALS "R. W. Elsom", Howardsville, Virginia, dated November 20, 1865. Notarized on verso by W. R. Bowie, a Notary Public, on January 10, 1883. With a blind embossed Notary Public seal. Reading:
"Whereas D. J. Hartsook advanced me money to carry on mail contracts before the war which I have not been able to repay - and whereas service was rendered the United States on said contracts during the year 1861 for which no payment has been made me, I hereby assign and transfer to said Hartsook all right to claim, and any balance due me on said contracts held by me at the beginning of the war."

2. ALS "Madison Davis" as Acting 3rd Assistant Postmaster General, Washington, D.C., dated March 25, 1884. Addressed to W. R. Bowie on Post Office Department letterhead. Reading:
"Your letter of the 21st inst., in relation to the account of R. W. Elsom with this Department for carrying the mails in 1860 and 1861, was duly received, and will be referred to the Auditor of the Treasury for the P.O.D., who will no doubt give you the information you desire."

In 1857, Congress passed an Act which offered mail contracts to private companies in the hopes of improving mail service in the country. The first contract went to Butterfield’s Southern Overland Mail, which traveled from St. Louis to San Francisco via stagecoach and took nearly a month for delivery. The famous Pony Express offered an expensive, yet high-speed alternative, with mail arriving in less than a week. However, with the start of the Civil War and the invention of the transcontinental telegraph in 1861, these private mail contractors became more and more obsolete.

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