Original 1861 Abraham Lincoln Pardon of Louis Neals

Item Details

An original 1861 pardon of Louis Neals issued and signed by President Abraham Lincoln. The pardon was issued on June 18, 1861, three months into Lincoln’s first year of presidency. The pardon is on off-white unlined paper, in brown ink and reads ‘I hereby authorize and direct the Secretary of State to affix the Seal of the United States to a Warrant for Warrant for the pardon of Louis Neals___dated this day and signed by me and for so doing this shall be his warrant. Abraham Lincoln. Washington, June 18th, 1861’. The document is folded, with ‘Abraham Lincoln’ in blue ink to the front, along with ‘18 June 1861 Pardon’ in pencil to the top. A Letter of Authenticity from James Spence Authentication is included. Certification Number: Z39223.

Accounts of the crime committed by Louis Neals note that in 1858 Neals and his brother-in-law Tecumseh Fontenelle were involved in an argument about past dealings near the Half-Breed Tract (Nemaha and Richardson Counties, Nebraska.) A later encounter is said to have occurred outside of the Omaha Reservation (en route from Decatur, Nebraska) between Fontenelle, Neals and Neals’ wife Susan. Fontenelle is noted to have attacked Neals with a knife. Neals, drawing his own knife, stabbed and mortally wounded Fontenelle.

Illustrated History of Nebraska, Volume 1 (1911) by Julius Sterling Morton cites the incident and subsequent trial, ‘An important question as to the jurisdiction of the United States courts over crimes committed on the Omaha Indian Reserve arose in the trial of Louis Neal [sic] for the killing of Tecumseh Fontenelle, a brother of the noted Chief Logan Fontenelle, in a quarrel at the Indian village. The jurisdiction was sustained and the prisoner convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to imprisonment for three years.’

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Condition

-good to fair, antique, crease marks, slight soiling to paper, edge wear, several small tears, brown ink smudges to outside

Dimensions

Item #

17CIN311-054