“God and Our Native Land” envelope

Contributed by Richard Sheaff

_Photo: Richard Sheaff. License: All Rights Reserved. _

During the Civil War there were many many patriotic covers (envelopes) printed, both by the North and the South. This unused one from the “Know Nothing Party” uses a patriotic flag typeface very similar to the one used in the 1870s by Robert Malcolm, as did a number of Northern envelopes. It might be a different size of Johnson’s National – or a close follower – and was printed in two runs. Note how the two colors don’t align perfectly.

National was patented in 1856, and the Know Nothing Party was dissolved in 1860. The envelope thus is probably from the second half of the 1850s.

This post was originally published at Fonts In Use