Civil War-dated partly-printed vellum DS as president, one page, 15.75 x 19.5, February 5, 1862. President Lincoln appoints William S. Ketcham as a “Lieutenant Colonel in the tenth Regiment of Infantry in the service of the United States.” Signed at the conclusion by Abraham Lincoln as president and countersigned by Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton. Upper left retains the original blue War Office seal. Mounted and matted to an overall size of 24 x 28. In fine condition, with several horizontal folds and some light skipping to the signature.
William Scott Ketchum (1813-1871) was a U. S. Army officer who served in the Seminole Wars, on the Western frontier, and during the American Civil War. He was made a brigadier general of Volunteers in February 1862 and, for the rest of the war, he had staff duties in Washington D.C. that were concerned with inspection, recruitment, and auditing. Following the Civil War, General Ketchum spent four years on special service in the adjutant general’s office in Washington D.C., then retired in December 1870. The mysterious circumstances surrounding General Ketchum’s death were dramatized in the CBS radio program Crime Classics on July 27, 1953; the landlady of his boarding house, Ellen G. Wharton, was suspected of poisoning him, although she was ultimately found not guilty.
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