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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Ransom, Thomas Edwin Greenfield, 1834-1864 to James B. McPherson

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC09269 Author/Creator: Ransom, Thomas Edwin Greenfield, 1834-1864 Place Written: s.l. Type: Letter signed Date: 28 August 1863 Pagination: 3 p. : Order a Copy

To Gen. James B. McPherson, reporting on disloyalty of W.W. Shaw, who plans to ship cotton, and attacks Col. B. G. Farrar of the 30th Missouri: "...his men and officers can not be trusted in the country alone. They pillage and plunder and destroy beyond any men I have ever commanded and will not follow or obey my orders in this respect.... the officers...seem to have a very poor appreciation of the rights of citizens- non combatants-and very little respect for private property." Ransom died in October 1864 from wounds suffered at the Battle of Sabine Station the previous April.

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