MAJOR GENERAL DANIEL E. SICKLES - AUTOGRAPHED SIGNED CHECK 04/02/1884 - HFSID 250818

MAJOR GENERAL DANIEL E. SICKLES
1884 check for payment to New York Life Insurance Co., filled out by hand and signed by the Medal of Honor recipient
Check signed: "D. E. Sickles", 8¼x2½. 1884 April 2. Check no. 14261 for $435 made out to "New York Life Insurance Co." and drawn on Sickle's account at the Bank of the Metropolis at 17 Union Square, New York, New York. Daniel E. Sickles (1825-1914), born in New York City, had gained notoriety before the Civil War when he shot Philip Barton Key, the son of Francis Scott Key, because he believed Key and his wife were lovers. (Sickles was tried for murder but acquitted, the first successful "temporary insanity" defense in U.S. history.) During the American Civil War, he rose from colonel to major general in command of a brigade at Gettysburg. Sickles, thinking that his position was vulnerable, moved his 3rd Corps from Cemetery Ridge to the battlefield's Peach Orchard without orders. His action drew criticism, but he was later credited with staving off disaster by blocking a surprise attack led by General James Longstreet against the Union Army's left flank at Little Round Top. Sickles lost a leg in the fighting, but won the respect of General Winfield Scott Hancock, in command at Little Round Top. Sickles' brigade, however, had the fifth most killed and wounded of all brigades in the war. He represented New York in the U.S. Congress (1857-1861, 1893-1895) and was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1897. Lightly toned and creased. Normal bank stamps and cancellation holes, which do not touch signature. Rounded corners. Small tears in upper left hand corner. Otherwise, fine condition.