Presented here is an incredible and extensive collection of Civil War letters and documents, including numerous letters sent by Confederate prisoners of war. The album is composed of a veritable archive of letters, addressed to Virginia Miller and other members of her family. Miss Miller was the daughter of Dr. Thomas Miller, who passed away several years after the Civil War around 1872, a prominent White House physician and relative of the family of William Henry Harrison. Around 75 letters (and original envelopes) written by high ranking Confederate soldiers from Union prison camps such as Ford Delaware, Johnson's Island, Point Lookout, and Hammond General Hospital Ward are offered in this historic lot. 

Several of the letters in this collection were written by Colonel Reuben Beverly Boston, a Confederate soldier believed to be one of the final Confederate officers killed before Lee surrendered to Grant at the Appomattox Court House. Boston, the commander of the 5th Virginia Cavalry was killed on April 7th, 1865, at High Bridge two days before the surrender. Many letters in this collection were written by a second Boston, the captain Fontaine Chesterfield Boston, who in one letter dated to April of 1863 writes about defecting to the Union forces.  Many of these letters were written at Fort Delaware, a Union prisoner of war camp, and addressed to Virginia Miller, the daughter of the prominent White House physician Dr. Thomas Miller. Several of Miller’s personal affects are included in this lot, such as a letter addressed to President Andrew Johnson petitioning for the release of the Confederate doctor Cornelius Boyle signed by numerous members of the medical field. At least four of the signatories to the petition directed to President Johnson attended to the injured President Lincoln at Ford's Theatre or the Petersen House after he was shot in the head by the assassin John Wilkes Booth: Albert F. King, Charles H. L. Liebermann, Charles M. Ford, and James C. Hall. Other notable petitioners include Dr. Alexander Y. P. Garnett, physician to both Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee. 

 Boyle, as history would have it, was a Confederate spy who shuttled documents to members of the Confederate military according to the book Lee’s Bold Plan For Point Lookout. Boyle was part of numerous clandestine operations and communications during the Civil War. It has even been suggested in certain scholarly works that he may have been aware of or played a small role in both Thomas R. Harney's infamous attempt to bomb the White House and John Wilkes Booth's assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.  After the war, Boyle's vast properties were seized by the government, and he intended to immigrate to and settle in Mexico, though this never came to fruition. These letters and documents are displayed in a vintage scrapbook. This collection of letters is an exceptional and unparalleled look into the lives of Confederate prisoners and soldiers.

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