Oroville Cal. July 12, 1855. Manuscript postmark with "15c Paid" on "Miner's Coat of Arms" illustrated cover depicting mining equipment arranged on a pole as a coat of arms with a miner and a bear holding the pole, Barber & Baker of Sacramento imprint at left, to Crowland P.O., Niagara District, Canada West, red "U. States Paid" handstamp with "9" rating, with illustrated engraved lettersheet of "The Miner's Ten Commandments" depicting eleven vignettes including elephant and miner reading a broadside, Hutchings imprint at bottom, several of the designs with imprints including Anthony & Baker, contents datelined "Ophir Sunday July 8th 1855" interesting contents including "I am at work putting a wheel in the River to throw water on the bank 29 feet high to run a sluice-the wheel will be 32 feet in diameter and propelled by the force of the current...I send you on this sheet the miners 10 com. which is very well got up", lettersheet with minor edgewear, cover with some edgewear and soiling

VERY FINE. A REMARKABLE ILLUSTRATED COVER DEPICTING THE MINER'S COAT OF ARMS, WITH AN ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATED ENCLOSURE DEPICTING ELEVEN DESIGNS AND THE MINER'S TEN COMMANDMENTS AND WITH MINING-RELATED CONTENTS. A REMARKABLE ARTIFACT OF THE GOLD RUSH ERA.

Ken Kutz recorded only a dozen examples of the "Miner's Coat of Arms" illustrated cover, and this is the only one we are aware of to a destination outside of the United States. George Holbrook Baker, of Barber & Baker, was an art student in New York when the gold rush broke out. He "dropped his brushes" and went west, trying his hand as a miner before settling on trading and drawing. He was the owner of the short-lived Baker's Express in 1850. He partnered with Edmond Barber from 1854-56, where they had a wood engraving studio in the Union building in Sacramento.

The lettersheet of the Miner's Ten Commandments was the first design produced by James Mason Hutchings. According to an informative article in April 1956 Western Expresses, "Hutchings came to the United States from England in 1848, after viewing sometime in 1844 George Catlin's American Indian exhibition then on tour in the Midlands in England. Hutchings, being deeply religious, deplored the desecration of the Christian Sabbath Day by the miners. He joined the campaign then under way to return Sunday to the day of rest and devotion it enjoyed in the long established communities of the various homelands of the miners. As it would not help to moralize with the miners, he wrote a parodied Fourth Commandment as follows: 'Thou shalt not remember what thy friends do at home on this Sabbath Day lest the remembrance should not compare favorably with what thou doest." He was not pleased with this 'half-told tale' and continued on to compose The Miner's Ten Commandments. This he signed with 'Forty-Nine'." The design proved immensely popular, with Hutchings claiming to have sold more than 90,000 copies in one year (source: Letters of Gold, p. 267).

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