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[48 documents from Fort St. Philip, New Orleans, including a large payroll report of payments for slave labor.]

St. Philip, New Orleans, 1847–1850. 48 returns, vouchers, receipts, etc., 8” x 10” to 31.5” x 24”. 47 printed and filled out in ink, 1 solely manuscript in ink, all docketed on versos. CONDITION: Very good, occasional 1” tears at fold intersection of larger documents.

A revealing gathering of receipts, payroll sheets, vouchers, and other documents spanning four years of operation at Fort St. Philip—a location of immense strategic importance to New Orleans—and including a large payroll sheet listing the names, terms of service, and compensation for over thirty enslaved laborers, as well as the names of their owners.

Each form offered here—vouchers, quarterly returns, accounts current, etc.—is labeled, filled out, and signed, and documents a specific category of goods necessary for the operation of the fort, from potatoes, beans, and stationary to shells, lumber, machinery, lime, and so on. Also included are several vouchers for identified steamships out of New Orleans. The vouchers read “The United States, for [in manuscript] Fort Philip,” suggesting that they document and account for monies levied by the federal government. Three large payroll sheets—all signed certifying that the “articles above enumerated have been received and services performed”—list names, occupations, pay, terms of service, and so on, and most are signed by each laborer. Overall, the lot lists hundreds of names, many with French and Spanish influences, and likely including many important families and names from the early history of New Orleans. Most significant among the payroll documents is the sheet whose printed title—“Pay Roll of Contingent Services, Mechanics, and Laborers”—is modified to read “Pay Roll of Slave Laborers at Fort St. Philip,” and which records thirty-six named enslaved laborers, all signed for by their owners, and hired out from various dates in January and February until late March 1850. The laborers’ rate of a dollar per day amounted to over a thousand dollars of profit, paid out accordingly to seven slaveowners. A second voucher, dated March 31, 1850, records labor “of Slave Sam Sampson from Jany 1 to March 31.” 

Fort St. Philip is unusual among early American forts for playing a central role in major battles across two wars; the vouchers offered here open a window into the daily operation, leadership, and personnel of Fort St. Philip in between the War of 1812 and the Civil War. All vouchers have printed on them the name of career military officer and engineer John G. Barnard (brother of Columbia College president Frederick A. P. Barnard), and five are signed by him. Barnard, a native of Sheffield, Massachusetts, specialized in the construction of coastal defenses, and after service in the Mexican–American War, served as chief engineer at the fort. In 1864 President Lincoln nominated him to succeed the late General Joseph G. Totten as brigadier general and chief of engineers, but he withdrew his nomination.

Originally constructed by the French in 1746, Fort St. Philip—then Fort San Felipe—was rebuilt by the Spanish in the early 1790s, and was acquired by the United States from France as part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1804. Its strategic location on the river proved challenging for enemy attacks, and its military significance to the future of the city of New Orleans cannot be overstated. American forces began to occupy it between 1808 and 1810, in time to successfully use it to repulse the ten-day British naval attack during the War of 1812. It was seized by the Confederate Army in 1861, and again played a key role in the defense of New Orleans and the Mississippi, standing up to heavy bombardment from Union naval forces. The fort was eventually given up, however, after Admiral David Farragut, whose forces bypassed it, successfully took New Orleans. The fort was decommissioned in 1920, though some of its ruins can still be found on the original site.

A significant group of documents reflecting the contribution of enslaved African Americans to the maintenance of a critical fort on the lower Mississippi and providing details on the operation of the fort more generally.

Item #7612

Price: $7,500.00

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