Partly-printed DS as president, one page, 19.5 x 15, June 25, 1857. President Buchanan appoints Jacob Gideon “to be a visitor of the Government Hospital for the Insane.” Signed at the conclusion by Buchanan and countersigned by Secretary of the Interior Jacob Thompson. The hospital was founded by Congress in 1852, largely as the result of the efforts of Dorothea Dix, a pioneering advocate for people living with mental illnesses. It opened in 1855 as the Government Hospital for the Insane, and rose to prominence during the Civil War as it was converted temporarily into a hospital for wounded soldiers. In 1916, its name was officially changed to St. Elizabeth’s, the colonial-era name for the tract of land on which the hospital was built. Well-known patients of St. Elizabeth’s include would-be presidential assassins Richard Lawrence and John Hinckley, Jr., successful assassin Charles J. Guiteau (until his execution), as well as Mary Fuller, Ezra Pound, and William Chester Minor. In very good condition, with professional silking and separation repairs to folds along reverse, scattered toning and soiling, and a vertical fold through first letter of Buchanan’s signature. JSA/John Reznikoff Auction LOA and RRAuction COA.
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