"Salt Lake Cal. Oct. 11" (1849)--Babbitt's Special Contract Mails. Manuscript postmark with "Paid 10" on folded letter datelined "Great Salt Lake City Sept. 22, 1849", addressed to Edina, Missouri, letter is from a gold miner passing through and includes "I intend staying at this place until spring than I am going on to the gold diggins...600 miles from this place there is a range of mountains called the ser-en-a-vade, there is where fremonts men perished in snow", some minor bleaching and small edge tear

VERY FINE APPEARANCE. A RARE SALT LAKE CITY GOLD MINER'S LETTER TO MISSOURI, CARRIED IN BABBITT'S SPECIAL CONTRACT MAILS.

Babbitt's Special Contract Mails was established in 1849 by Almon Babbitt, a Mormon expressman, to carry mails between Salt Lake City and Kanesville, Iowa (which lacked a regular postal route). This letter was carried on the John Taylor trip of October 19, 1849, from Salt Lake City, arriving Kanesville December 10. While there is no express fee indicated, the sender likely paid an additional 40c for Babbitt's service.

Illustrated in Mails of the Westward Expansion on p. 87. Ex Walske

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