New York City Draft Riots, Civil War Broadside

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American History, Featuring the Property of N...

By Cowan's Auctions

Jun 9, 2017 - Jun 10, 2017

Set Reminder 2017-06-09 10:00:00 2017-06-10 10:00:00 America/New_York Bidsquare Bidsquare : American History, Featuring the Property of N. Flayderman & Co. https://www.bidsquare.com/auctions/cowans/american-history-featuring-the-property-of-n-flayderman-co-2392
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• Lot Description

  A rare, printed broadside urging New Yorkers to not riot, 11.5 x 18 in., stating in part: To the Laboring Men of New York...Stop and Think!...Stand by the Law!...For when the law is broken and property destroyed, and lives lost, we all suffer more or less by the injury...Stand by the Union, the Constitution and the Laws! Then peace, freedom and prosperity will be secure to you and your children after you. Anonymously signed by a Democratic Workingman, but thought to be publisher-activist Sinclair Tousey (1818-1887). Saturday, July 18, 1863. Framed, 14.25 x 20.75 in. Extremely rare for being issued so close to the riots, only a few institutional copies are known to exist. 
  
  The working classes of heavily-immigrant New York City had been lukewarm to the war from the start, owing to the fact that a majority of the South's exports passed through the ports and markets of the city and therefore provided many immigrant jobs. The Emancipation Proclamation of January 1863 strengthened immigrant opposition to the war as many foresaw free blacks migrating to the city in droves to compete for already low-paying jobs. The conscription act was the final straw, and local Democrats and Southern sympathizers seized on the opportunity to foment rebellion against blacks, Republican supporters and newspaper offices, and eventually federal troops, resulting in what was likened to a Confederate victory. Printer Samuel Tousey put his presses to work immediately, plastering his Stop and Think! and Don't Unchain the Tiger! broadsides throughout the city in an attempt to quell the hysteria. Although signed A Democratic Workingman, Tousey was in fact a committed Republican. His New York Times obituary of 1887 states that "he joined the Republican Party at its organization, and throughout the war was on terms of intimacy with many of its leaders," and says of his anti-riot appeals such as the one offered here, that "a most wholesome effect was produced."

  Condition

  Few spots on broadside, otherwise near very good to near excellent condition. Cleaned and professionally repaired by the Paper Conservation Studio, Inc. in 2008. 
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