Original Photograph, Mortgage Deed, and Last Will and Testament of Joel Valentine (1791-1866), Bennington, Vermont

, 1860; Circa 1860 silver gelatin photograph of Joel Valentine of Bennington, Vermont, together with 1856 mortgage deed and 1866 certified probate court copy of Valentine’s last will and testament. Photograph measures 6 1/2" x 8" and is accompanied by a 7" x 10" steel engraving on heavy paper, modeled after the photo original. Both photograph and engraving are in excellent condition. The mortgage deed is handwritten by town clerk D.F. Squire, bears the signatures of two witnesses, and is signed, sealed, and dated by Elisha B. Day on March 6, 1856. There is some paper damage at the fold ends, with minor text loss. The will, dated August 14, 1866, is the town clerk’s copy ( D.F. Squire), is likewise handwritten, executed in the court of Judge Thomas White, and bears the probate court’s official seal and five-cent U.S. Internal Revenue certificate stamp. There is some paper damage in the blank margins with, as above, minor text loss. Joel Valentine, whose father served in the Revolutionary War, was born 1791 in Jackson, Washington County, New York. He began life as a farmer and later fought in the Wars of 1812 and 1814, after which he became a clothier. In 1821 he married Miss Judith Wells, and the next year moved with his wife to Bennington, Vermont, leasing the Waibridge Fulling Mill at Bennington Falls, where they engaged in the manufacture of wool cloth. Lewis Cass Aldrich in his book "History of Bennington County, VT" writes that "few, if any, did more to shape the course of Bennington village in its early history than did Joel Valentine." A son, Alonzo B. Valentine of the Tenth Vermont volunteers, eventually took up his father’s business, the Valentine Knitting Company, and served Vermont as state senator, state agricultural commissioner, and delegate to the Republican national convention in 1884. A unique grouping of historic Vermont ephemera.