The “Old Sugar House Rose Street, N. Y.,” which stood on the corner of Rose and Deane Streets in New York City, was erected by Henry Cuyler, Jr., for his heir, Barnet Rynders Cuyler, probably in 1763. This date, which appears on the medal twice, is based on an authority “who had opportunity to observe.” John Austin Stevens stated from personal recollection “that he saw the date 1769 high upon the brick wall in iron figures.” The good engraving which is reproduced in James G. Wilson’s Memorial History of the City of New York and may well have been the model for the engraver of the medal, shows the year 1767 on the wall of the building. As disputed as the date of its erection is also its use as prison during the Revolution. Wilson writes: “The date and the architect’s initials are still to be seen on the side of the building, worked in wrought-iron characters, quaint and old. The Rhinelander family has owned the property since 1790, and much of the land around it has been in their possession much longer than that. When first erected the house was used as a sugar-house, but the great interest in the old building is in the memory of the use to which it was put in revolutionary times. The grated windows, the dungeon-like underground cellars, the general air of solidity and impregnability which impress the observer at first sight, bear out the assertion, which has become a creed among the neighbors, that during the Revolution the sugar-house was diverted from its legitimate use and turned into a British prison, where many an American patriot suffered not only imprisonment, but cruelties and starvation.” This was written by Wilson in 1892 in commemoration of the then recent demolition of the structure. It seems that it was the very same occasion that caused the issuance of the medal, bearing the year of the building’s demolition. Nevertheless, the use of the Rhinelander sugar-house as a prison during the Revolution was “denied by Stevens and others, who have presented testimony to disprove it,” as Stokes tells us. It seems almost impossible to decide the issue which, in turn, renders the historical justification of the issuance of the medal also doubtful.
No. 7
Libby Prison Medal
(Obverse)
No. 7 is the only medal known to the author referring to a military prison in the Civil War. No specimen of it is found in the museum of the American Numismatic Society. Nor do the catalogues, guide-books, and other pamphlets published by the Libby Prison War Museum Association in Chicago mention this medal that was probably issued by this very association. There is nothing about it in the files of the Chicago Historical Society. The Chicago newspapers of 1893 might have some article or note. But as they are not indexed it would take a great deal of time and labor to search through them.
The very heavy medal measures seventy-one millimetres in diameter. It is made of type metal, coated with a bluish-black lacquer. The obverse shows in its upper part the following legend: LIBBY PRISON; and in the lower part: WAR MUSEUM/ CHICAGO 1893. The space in the center is occupied by the picture of Libby Prison as it stood in its original place in Richmond, Virginia. Four prisoners’ tents are visible in the foreground. Of course, no barbed wire, and not even a fence are indicated. Instead sentries can be seen in front of the main building as well as of the tent-barracks, their number being six in toto. The picture is that well known from contemporary drawings or etchings.
No. 7
Libby Prison Medal
(Reverse)
The reverse of the medal bears an extensive legend in eighteen lines. These are surrounded by a circular panel, showing on top clasped hands, at the bottom crossed sabres. The panel inscription reads: NO SECTIONALISM—1861—NO NORTH—NO SOUTH—1865—NO ANIMOSITY. The eighteen-line legend gives an historical account of Libby Prison and its transformation into the Chicago War Museum:
1845
LIBBY PRISON RICHMOND, VA.