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.

This cover, published in New York, depicts an elderly Black man entreating his enslaver to not disrespect the flag or his dead father’s memory by leaving the Union.