You may reach me at Mapmaker3@aol.com, but I already have the text as your wrote it in reply to John Kay in this forum on December 6. I merely wish to cite you as a source in my writing about this. If you wish to protect your privacy I could cite you as "private collector who holds the original letter" or some such, or whatever reasonable citation you prefer. I intend to cite the specifics of your reply in this forum, but I wanted to see if you want something more personal, to give you credit for giving us the text. This is for endnote 18 of Chapter 30 (as it looks now) to "Guerrilla Warfare in Civil War Missouri, vol. III, 1864-1865," currently in manuscript. Apparently, this letter exists in no other place other than your generous text of it on December 6. You see, I attempt to cite source for anything I use in my writings, which my publisher strongly endorses. My policy is if I cannot cite a source, I cannot use the information. If you examine my first two volumes in this series, especially the endnotes, you will see what I mean.

You may answer privately at my email address or in the forum, whichever you prefer.

Interestingly, the telegram exchange between Brigadier General John B. Sanborn and his department chief, Major General Grenville M. Dodge, is not reflected in "Official Records" in either series 1 or series 2, but only recorded in detail in the 1883 Greene County history where Brownlee was executed and buried. As mentioned before, Brownlee's eloquent 9 May 1865 plea letter to BG Sanborn is recorded in the Missouri Division, United Daughters of the Confederacy 1913 "Reminiscences of the Women of the Sixties" book (very rare, but thankfully reprinted 1988 by the former Morningside House, Inc. of Dayton, Ohio, now called Gatehouse Books, if I got that name correct).

What do you say?

Bruce Nichols