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THB[CIVIL WAR] Confederate Raider Hanged as a Spy: Signed Book
![[CIVIL WAR] Confederate Raider Hanged as a Spy: Signed Book](https://s1.img.bidsquare.com/item/xl/3597/35973160.jpeg?t=1W3CFO)
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About Auction
LiveApr 25, 2026
Featuring rare artifacts, documents, ephemera, photography, and weaponry relating to the American Civil War. Fleischer's Auctions info@fleischersauctions.com
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- Lot Description
BOOK SIGNED BY A CONFEDERATE RAIDER HANGED AS A SPY
James P. Holcombe. An Introduction to Equity Jurisprudence, on the Basis of Story’s Commentaries. New York & Cincinnati: D. Appleton & Co. and Derby, Bradley & Co., 1846. 8vo. Contemporary calf.
Boldly signed by Confederate privateer John Yates Beall (“John Y. Beall”) on the front free endpaper.
An extremely rare signature of John Yates Beall (1835–1865), the Confederate privateer who was arrested as a spy and executed during the Civil War.
Born in Virginia, Beall studied law at the University of Virginia, but abandoned his studies to take over the family farm after his father’s death. This volume almost certainly dates from the period of his education.
From 1855, he operated the family plantation in Jefferson County, where more than 100 individuals were enslaved (New York Times, 15 February 1865), until the outbreak of war, when he enlisted in Company G, “Botts’ Grays,” 2nd Virginia Infantry. Shortly thereafter, however, he was wounded in the chest at Bolivar Heights on 16 October 1861.
Unable to return to the field as an infantryman, he conceived a plan to launch privateers on the Great Lakes. Fearing damage to relations with Great Britain, however, Confederate authorities declined to implement it. He was commissioned an acting master in the Confederate States Navy, though he was not given a command. Undeterred, he assembled a crew and proceeded as a privateer, commanding the Raven and the Swan.
He was captured in November 1863 and confined at Fort McHenry as a prisoner of war, but was exchanged on 5 May 1864. He immediately resumed various schemes aimed at freeing Confederate prisoners, including a plan to attack Johnson’s Island via Lake Erie. His next plot involved derailing a passenger train, but he was arrested on 16 December 1864. Tried and found guilty on all charges, he was sentenced to death. Despite appeals for Lincoln to intervene, he was executed on 24 February 1865.
[Civil War, Union, Confederate] [Books, Bibles, Soldiers' Bibles, Prayer Books, Ephemera, Pamphlets, Publications, Booklets, Memoirs] [Manuscripts, Documents, Letters, Ephemera, Signatures, Autographs]
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