St Louis Sanitary Fair quilt in Nebraska

Silk hexagon quilt in the collection of the Nebraska State Historical Society

Signatures in the white hexagons in the center are now mostly unreadable but one is U.S. Grant.

The ink chemistry has shattered the silk.

The catalog copy:

Mosaic quilt consisting of pieced silk hexagons...There is a central hexagon, all in white silk, that has signatures in ink, including that of U.S. Grant....[Others] one appears to be "Wm (?) Smith, Major General" ne begins "U. S..." and has a"'64"at end. One has "Clint(?) B(..)sk, One has "Geo. (T or J) Nea(?)....This quilt was purchased at a Union sanitary fair in St. Louis during the Civil War. Nellie Grant, daughter of General Ulysses S. Grant, presided over the booth from which it was purchased. General Grant and eighteen others signed the quilt in ink. Credit line Henry Blum, Lincoln, Nebraska and Joseph A. Blum, Des Moines, IA.

Women and quilts

at the Mississippi Valley Fair

About a year ago I wrote a post on photos of that 1864 St. Louis Sanitary Fair, called The Mississippi Valley Fair. The Missouri Historical Museum has a set of stereocards photographed by J.A. Scholten

http://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2015/04/quilts-at-mississippi-valley-sanitary.html

In the corner of one of the photographs is a hexagon quilt,

very much like this one.

The family story even mentioned Nelly Grant who attended the fair and sold copies of the photo above.

See more about this remarkable quilt at the Nebraska State Historical Society.
http://nebraskahistory.pastperfectonline.com/webobject/E93A9A45-DE03-4978-B881-436028479847