[C.1809–1813 Autograph Letter Signed by Nathaniel Irish to General Andrew Porter, both former Revolutionary War Officers and Founding Members of the Society of the Cincinnati].

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Autograph Letter Signed by Nathaniel Irish (1737–1816) writing to former Revolutionary War General Andrew Porter (1743–1813), then Surveyor General of Pennsylvania, seeking an appointment for John Morrison as Surveyor of Huntington County. At the beginning of the American Revolution, Irish was a cannon founder; he later raised an artillery company before receiving a captain’s commission. After the war, he became a founding member of the Society of the Cincinnati.

Alexander Porter served in the American Revolution; appointed in 1776 Captain of Marines by Congress and later as an artillery officer under General Henry Knox. In Porter’s role in the artillery he may have come to know Nathaniel Irish. In 1781, Porter was assigned to manufacture gunpowder for the Yorktown campaign, Washington proclaiming “[T]here is no officer in the army better qualified than yourself for the station I have assigned you.” He was also a founding member of the Society of the Cincinnati. A student of mathematician David Rittenhouse (1732–1796), Porter served from 1809 until his death as Surveyor General of Pennsylvania. (DAB)

Contemporary docketing on the letter notes that John Morrison was “Appointed.”

A fine association between two founding members of the Society of the Cincinnati, both involved in artillery.

Price: $350.00