October 1861 full ALS in pencil by General Amiel Whipple about maps of Washington being forwarded to different personel when the City was preparing its defences.    Amiel Weeks Whipple (October 21, 1817 – May 7, 1863)[1] was an American military officer and topographical engineer. He served as a brigadier general in the American Civil War, where he was mortally wounded at the Battle of Chancellorsville. Among his many survey assignments for the US War Department, he participated in the difficult survey of the new United States and Mexico boundary and led the survey of a possible transcontinental railroad route along the thirty-fifth parallel from Arkansas to Los Angeles.