Letter from Alexander Hamilton returned to Massachusetts after stolen by former state employee
October 12, 2021 | In the PressFrom MassLive.com (https://www.masslive.com/news/2021/10/letter-from-alexander-hamilton-returned-to-massachusetts-after-stolen-by-former-state-employee.html)
A letter from Alexander Hamilton to Marquis de Lafayette from July 21, 1780 belongs again to Massachusetts after it was previously stolen by a former state employee.
The letter, which was written during Hamilton’s role as Aide de Camp to General George Washington, was stolen from the Massachusetts Archives between 1937 and 1945. It was then rediscovered three years ago.
The family of a man who claimed to have purchased the letter in 1945 attempted to sell it after the man’s death, a press release stated. The auction house in Virginia then contacted the FBI.
“Thanks to a tip from an auction house in Virginia and the hard work of members of the FBI’s art crime team, we were able to track down and authenticate this Alexander Hamilton letter more than seven decades after it was stolen,” said Joseph R. Bonavolonta, special agent in charge of the FBI Boston Division. “We are honored to return this extraordinary piece of history to the care of the Massachusetts State Archives so that the citizens of the Commonwealth can have the opportunity to get an up-close look at this document and learn about our country’s history.”
However, for the past three years the letter has been part of legal proceedings between Secretary of the Commonwealth William F. Galvin’s office and the estate of the man who last possessed the letter, the press release stated.
“When he wrote a letter to the Marquis de Lafayette on July 21, 1780, warning of imminent danger to French troops in Rhode Island, Hamilton scarcely could have imagined that it would someday become the focal point of a civil forfeiture action,” wrote Judge Bruce M. Selya for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit last week. “But truth often outpaces imaginings.”
The family said the letter was purchased legally and that they were the rightful owners, the release read.
A U.S. magistrate judge, however, ruled that the letter was a public record and that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts was the legal owner. Then in his Oct. 6th ruling, Selya agreed with the magistrate judge.
“This ruling is a resounding victory in our years long fight to return this historic letter back to the Commonwealth where it belongs for all to see,” said Attorney General Maura Healey. “We are grateful to our federal and state partners in this case, and to the First Circuit for affirming Massachusetts as the rightful owner of this precious artifact.”
The letter is now in the Massachusetts Archives and is expected to be on display in the Commonwealth Museum for future special events, the release stated.
One of the events will be the museum’s annual Independence Day celebration, which also features an original copy of the Declaration of Independence signed by John Hancock.
