In 1865, Clara Barton, already well known for her services as a nurse during the Civil War, was granted authorization from President Lincoln to establish a service that would help families of missing soldiers learn what happened to their loved ones. Barton consulted prison records and talked with as many soldiers as she could in an attempt to make as extensive a list as possible of the soldiers killed and buried on battlefields and prisoner of war camps. Barton established her Missing Soldiers Office on the third floor of a building in Washington, D.C. and for 3 years, Barton and her small staff helped to identify soldiers and inform families of their whereabouts. In the end Barton's group identified the graves of 22,000 missing soldiers.
In 1996, a member of the General Services Administration was inspecting an old building at 437 7th Street in D.C. that was slated for demolition. The third floor of the building had been boarded up and left unused since 1911. While examining this part of the building, the inspectors discovered a trove of artifacts including a sign marking this as Clara Barton's Missing Soldiers Office. The GSA decided to protect the save the building from demolition. It took several years, but eventually, the building was restored and is now operated as a museum that tells the story of Clara Barton and her work for missing soldiers.
Up for auction are original pieces of wallpaper from Clara Barton's Missing Soldiers Office. These pieces were owned by Lincoln collector Dr. Blaine Houmes and were part of a lot I purchased from Heritage Auction in February of 2022. They come in a business sized envelope on which Dr. Houmes wrote "Original Wallpaper / Clara Barton Office / 2010 / Washington, DC". From photos on the Clara Barton museum's Facebook, it's clear that restoration of the interior of the third floor did not begin in earnest until 2013, meaning that Dr. Houmes acquired these wallpaper fragments before the restoration. With the restoration now complete, it is unlikely further pieces of original wallpaper will be on the market.
These pieces are fragile. The largest piece, featuring a striped design measures approximately 4.5" x 2". This piece is backed and is less delicate than the others. Please see the pictures below for more details.
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