I shall not flatter myself that you retain any knowledge or the faintest recollection of who I am, but last evening I chanced to read an interview reported in some News-paper, which said you spent considerable time in writing to your friends, intimating that you enjoyed doing this.—While reading this paragraph, an army (and no small army) of reminiscences were called to my mind, prominent among which was the fact that YOU used to greet me so cordially when I happened to meet you which I most frequently did at the junction of Penn. Ave. & 7th. Strs., in Washington, D.C., in about 1866 and 1868.2—I was then employed in the Treasury Dept., at Washington.
After my most cordial regards allow me to say that I should feel SO proud to receive your autograph at the bottom of a few words written by your hand; coming from YOU, I am assured they can be none but bright and kind words.
Your Old Friend, and Admirer, Val. Stuart Redden.loc.03627.002_large.jpg My Sister3 attained quite a reputation about that time as a writer for News-papers under the nom-de-plume of "Howard Glyndon." She also was in and wrote from Washington at that time.
V.S. Redden loc_tb.00028.jpg loc_tb.00029.jpgCorrespondent:
Capt. Val (possibly
Valerian) Stuart Redden (1844–1917) was a veteran of the Union Army who
briefly worked as a clerk for the U.S. Treasury Department in the late 1860s. In
1869, he married Elizabeth "Bessie" Povall Reeve, and the couple moved to
Louisianna and had one son, Stuart Reeve Redden. Redden worked as a stenographer
for various companies in New Orleans and lived with his family in nearby
Covington. An 1879 article in The Marshall Messenger
reports that Redden "is the owner of an autograph album with a number of notable
autographs therein," including those of "distinguished men living and dead, who
have played conspicusous parts in American history" ("Interesting Autographs,"
[February 14 1879], 3). For more information, see Redden's obituary in the St. Tammany Farmer ("Capt. V. Stuart Redden," [June 9,
1917], 1).