Civil War cigar relic, 1862

Civil War cigar relic, 1862
  • MMN Item 84253
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Description

Major Thomas W. Hyde of the 7th Maine sent this cigar to John Marshall Brown of Portland with a letter explaining that a soldier, while on picket duty, took tobacco from an estate on the Chickahominy River. Hyde wrote, "The men make large numbers of them and we call them the Chickahominy Brand. The tobacco is the best raised in Virginia."

Hyde, an 1861 graduate of Bowdoin College, won the Medal of Honor in the war. Brown, an 1860 graduate of Bowdoin, enlisted in the 20th Maine in 1862, rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel, and was brevetted a colonel and a brigadier general.

After the war, Hyde returned to Bath and founded Bath Iron Works. Brown returned from the war to run his family's sugar factory and other businesses.

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