A RUTHERFORD B. HAYES CIVIL WAR-ERA TRAVEL DESK. A metal and shell inlaid fruitwood marquetry fl...

A RUTHERFORD B. HAYES CIVIL WAR-ERA TRAVEL DESK. A metal and shell inlaid fruitwood marquetry flame mahogany traveler's writing desk, with hinged velvet inset blotter, letter compartment, and ink and pen slots, with two empty ink bottles. H: 5 5/8 in; 14/3cm; W: 14.3/4 in ;37/5 cm; D: 10 ¼ in; 26 cm. Provenance: Rutherford B. Hayes; Linea (Linnie) Watts Woodrum; by descent to Bill Runkle; sold at auction in Ohio, c.1965, to the present owner's family. At the outset of the Civil War, Rutherford B. Hayes left his successful law career and accepted a position as officer in the Ohio 23rd. His regiment was deployed to western Virginia (today's West Virginia), where Union sentiments ran high. From there the Union army devised a plan to invade southwest Virginia and destroy the Virginia & Tennessee Railroad. On May 1, 1862, Lt. Col. Hayes and 600 men of the Ohio 23rd occupied the small town of Pearisburg, VA, capturing a large store of food and supplies housed in the Presbyterian Church, taking rooms for the officers at the Woodrum Hotel, and setting up headquarters in the local doctor's office. In Hayes' correspondence from the period, he describes how delightful Pearisburg is, and how seemingly easy the occupation ran, with little more than grumbling from the locals. Soon, however, Hayes realized that Confederate forces were gathering, and that 20 miles away General Henry Heth had an army of 2,000 men and 5 artillery pieces, far outnumbering his own forces. At 4 a.m. on May 10, 1862, the Confederate forces fired on the occupiers of Pearisburg. Hayes writes, 'I got up at the first faint streak of light and walked out to see the pickets in the direction of the enemy. As I was walking alone I heard six shots. ... I hurried back, ordered up my own and the adjutant's horse, called up the men and officers, ordered the cavalry to the front...' Thus began a long day of fighting and retreating that did not end until 12 hours later over 10 miles away. While most of the Southern sympathizing citizens of Pearisburg were probably happy to see the Union Army scamper away, one townsperson was not: the landlady of the Woodrum Hotel, a woman named Linea ('Linnie') Watts Woodrum (1815-1880) who was upset that Hayes and the other officers skipped town without paying their bill. When Hayes stood as the Republican candidate for President in 1876, the old story of the unpaid bill resurfaced in the media, as such stories will do. On July 11, 1876, just weeks after Hayes secured the Republican nomination for president, the Bristol News of Bristol, TN ran the story that when Hayes and his troops were 'shelled out of Pearisburg ... he left his bill unpaid at Mrs. Woodrum's hotel.' The paper goes on to discount the excuse that Hayes fled in the wee hours and had no time to pay up. 'The excuse is good only so far. If Hayes left in his night clothes he has had twelve years in which to pay the widow Woodrum, and we presume he has hardly forgotten his shirt-tale escape from Pearisburg.' Hayes, however, never did pay his bill (which would have been the Federal Government's bill, anyway, not his), and Woodrum claimed the property he left behind, including this travel desk, which became a receptacle for Woodrum family documents which are still present. In 1931, the Woodrum story ran again in a local paper; the family clipped the story, laid it down to a sheet, and then added the family provenance for the piece to the 1960s, when it was sold at auction in Ohio to the present owner's family. For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com For further information about this lot please visit the lot listing