[Three Letters Written Home to Waco by Ensign John Francis Marshall While Aboard the U.S.S. Montgomery]

[Argentina & Brazil, 1900. About very good.. Three letters, totaling [12]pp., with original mailing envelopes, plus one later photograph. Previously folded, with scattered minor loss at fold points, slightly affecting text. One letter with two-inch closed tear at top edge; another letter with a chip, still present but costing a few words of the first line of text. Otherwise, minor wear and tanning. Three letters from a United States Navy Ensign, John Francis Marshall, Jr. (1874-1948), written while aboard the USS Montgomery, and sent to his mother, a widow in Waco TX. The ship was part of the South Atlantic Squadron, which operated along the Atlantic coast of South America and was formed specifically to support good relations with the countries there and to forward United States interests in the region. Marshall describes in great detail the social events to further these aims, writing at first from La Plata, Argentina, where the squadron hosted the Argentine President, and where the Americans in Buenos Aires hosted the whole crew. Then, writing from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Ensign Marshall describes a huge event at Petropolis, overseen by Admiral Admiral Winfield S. Schley. After a stop in Bahia, Marshall writes from Pernambuco, describing his having to accompany the Negro Consul ("However I took it philosophically and didn't mind it in the least. Thought I would stand him if the government could"). He writes that they will stop at Barbados, then St. Lucia, then home to New York. Marshall had graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1895; served as an ensign on Admiral Dewey's flagship, the Olympia, and had taken part in the Battle of Manila Bay, before his tour of duty on the Montgomery. With a group photograph of John Francis Marshall and the officers of the South Atlantic Squadron taken in May 1900 at Petropolis, including the Envoy Extraordinary Col. Charles Page Bryan (1975 copy from the US Naval Historical Center - handstamped released). Interesting detail about the social and political missions of the U.S. Navy at the turn of the 20th century.