Lot
1021 
(First Day of Statehood) St. Louis. Mo. Aug 10, black cds and red manuscript "Paid 25" cent rating on folded letter datelined "Fort Armstrong, June 18, 1821" from Maj. Morrell Marston of the 5th Infantry giving a graphic description of the customs and dress of the Sac and Fox Indians who lived in the area: "…Most of them appear to be comfortably & decently clad at all times, if we except grease & dirt; soap is an entire stranger to them, & their clothes are seldom if ever washed;-they never think of even washing their face and hands, indeed so long as the practice of oiling & painting their faces continues … As the men do little or nothing but fight, hunt, dress & dance, all the labor of building huts, making mats, dressing skins, & cultivating com falls on the women…Their huts are built in the shape of a one story country house, but covered with bark; some of them are sixty or eighty feet long…On the right & left of the door of a hut are platforms elevated four or five feet from the ground & covered with mats or skins, these platforms are used for both seats & beds…In the month of October after their com is ripe & gathered they all leave their villages for their hunting grounds; the old men, women & children go by water, the young men by land with their horses-their hunting grounds are on the head waters of the des Moine & Iowa Rivers, near the Missouri…"; top edge tear, still Very Fine and rare use. Estimate $500 - 750.
On August 10th 1821, Missouri became the 24th state to be admitted to the Union. This letter was written three weeks earlier at Fort Armstrong and carried privately to St Louis, where it arrived in time to receive that town's postmark on the day of statehood.
Realized: $2,800