Patriotic covers were a popular form of visual propaganda and became a collector’s item during the Civil War. Produced both in the North and South, these envelopes featured patriotic imagery and slogans, although some—primarily printed in the North—employed stereotypical and exaggerated images of the speech, dress, and physical characteristics of African Americans.

The bare feet depicted here represent enslaved people fleeing to “freedom” at Fortress Monroe, outside Washington, D.C. after Union General Benjamin Butler’s declaration that enslaved people escaping from secessionist masters were contraband of war and should not be returned to their enslavers.