"THE NORTHERN GIRL TO HER LOVER" — HAND-COLORED CHARLES MAGNUS SONG SHEET, 1864, FRAMED

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$95.00 ON HOLD

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Item Code: 557-305

This is a Union patriotic song sheet, "The Northern Girl to her Lover," with words by John Ross Dix, sung to the air "After the Battle." It was published by Charles Magnus of New York and entered according to Act of Congress in 1864 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

The sheet is headed by a hand-colored vignette of Columbia. She wears a helmet and a gown in red, white and blue, and stands upon a globe lettered in part "Genius of America." One hand rests on a Union shield. The other holds a staff crowned with a gilt wreath, and a large Stars and Stripes streams behind her. An American eagle with a gilt scroll stands at her side, and a terrestrial globe sits at left. The red, blue and yellow coloring is applied by hand.

Below the Gothic-letter title are three eight-line stanzas in the voice of a young woman, who names herself Mary, sending her sweetheart off to war. The song opens "Go, darling—join the loyal strong" and urges him to fight "For Freedom—Union" and meet "the Rebel foe." It closes with her vow, should he fall, to "meekly die for you and love."

The publisher's imprint, "Published by Chas. Magnus, 12 Frankfort St., New York," runs in fine italic beneath the author credit and is partly overprinted by the air line, as issued. A papermaker's or stationer's blind-embossed stamp in a shaped cartouche appears in the lower left margin.

Charles Magnus (1826-1900), a German-born printer and publisher, worked in New York for half a century. During the Civil War he issued hundreds of illustrated song sheets and patriotic envelopes, admired for the quality of his printing and hand coloring. This piece is an appealing example of the sentimental "sweetheart" genre, uniting patriotic duty with the fear of loss.

CONDITION

The sheet is clean and bright with light, even toning, and the hand coloring remains strong. There is a short column of faint stray type marks in the left margin beside the second stanza, and a few small stray marks in the right margin. It is matted in blue and framed in a dark wood-tone molding with beaded and scalloped borders; the outer molding shows small chips to the finish. The sheet has not been examined out of the frame.

MEASUREMENTS

Frame approx. 10 x 12 1/2 in.

Mat opening approx. 4 1/4 x 6 1/2 in.    [ss[ph:L]

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