21 May 1874 • Elmira, N.Y (MS: DLC, UCCL 01092)
I lately copyrighted, as proprietor, an Engraved Design for Cover of “Mark Twain’s Sketches,”1explanatory note & am informed from your office, that I can have evidence of said copyright Ⓐemendation in the form of a certificate by paying 50 cents more. I would like to have the certificate, & so enclose the 50 cents in this letter.
A. R. Spofford, Esq.
See 7 May 74 to Spoffordclick to open link, librarian of Congress.
Fractional currency was first issued during the Civil War, when
the total disappearance of specie caused trouble in providing small change. The people had resorted to a variety of substitutes, including postage stamps, which suggested the authorization by the act of July 17, 1862, of an issue of stamps, and later of currency, for fractional parts of a dollar, at first in the from of postal stamps engraved on the notes, subsequently in other forms. (Hepburn, 191–92)
Before its use ceased in 1876, fractional currency was issued in denominations of three, five, ten, fifteen, twenty-five, and fifty cents. The note that Clemens enclosed was from the first series of the fifth general issue (February 1874 to February 1876), bearing a likeness of Samuel Dexter (1761–1816), Massachusetts congressman and senator and secretary of war and the treasury in the cabinet of John Adams (Hepburn, 222–23; Raymond et al., 173–76).
MS, Miscellaneous Manuscripts Collection, Library of Congress (DLC). A fifty-cent fractional currency note survives with the letter and is photographically reproduced.
L6 , 150–151.
acquired by DLC in 1960.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.