Excerpts from Letter from Thaddeus Lowe to Joseph Henry, July 15, 1863:

To.



Professor Joseph Henry



		Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution

				 Washington, D.C.



Dear Sir.



	I beg pardon for troubling you with my affairs connected with the 

Government but in as much as the first operations of Balloons for Military

 purposes were under your immediate supervision, and you being acquainted 

with the fact that these experiments were made with my own machinery and 

subsequently used in the field by order of Captain A. W. Whipple later Gen'l

 Whipple now dead and from whom I can get no assistance, I hope that you 

will find it consistent to furnish to the Hon. Secretary of War such a 

statement as will satisfy him of the truthfulness of my claims.  In order 

that you may know what my claims are and judge of their correctness I enclose 

them with this letter....



 	The way I now stand in relation to my employment with the government

 is this... The amount I have received for service has barely supported my 

family at home and myself in the field.  For want of a proper investigation of

the advantages of my branch of science and proper organization of the 

Department its use has been suspended, which throws me out of employment too 

late in the season to resume my former enterprise, besides which my health is 

considerably impaired by hard work and constant exposure in the field - while

in the government employ I have managed my Department, with the strictest

economy and with the very best of faith and did all that I possibly could for

the cause in which we were engaged.



	My report shows this and also the great value of my services on 

several particular occasions in testimony of which I have letters from Major

Generals Heintzelman and Stoneman and shall soon have obtained a dozen others

from Generals who have used the balloons...



	As things now stand, I hope at least to be able to obtain the amount

contained in the accompanying accounts and the one already at the War 

Department for the approval of the Hon. Secretary of War the whole amounting 

to about three thousand dollars.  Should I meet with much delay in getting 

this amount it will probably defeat the object for which I have been laboring

for many years, and will consequently put me to much distress.  Again, asking 

your pardon for troubling you.  Knowing as I do, that in addition to your 

labors at the Smithsonian Institution, that much of your time is occupied in

rendering valuable scientific service in the General Government.



			I remain with great respect

			Your ever obd't servant



			T. S. C. Lowe

			      Aeronaut

			No 1617 Race St.