Belair [Md.]  Aug 25^th 1864

Mr president    It is my Desire to be free. to go to see my people on the eastern shore.  my mistress wont let me    you will please let me know if we are free. and what i can do.  I write to you for advice.  please send me word this week. or as soon as possible and oblidge.

Annie Davis

Annie Davis to Mr. president, 25 Aug. 1864, D-304 1864, Letters Received, ser. 360, Colored Troops Division, Adjutant General's Office, Record Group 94, National Archives. A Bureau of Colored Troops notation on the outside of the letter reads merely "file," and no response to Annie Davis appears among the copies of letters sent by the bureau or by other offices in the War Department.

Published in The Destruction of Slavery, p. 384, in Free at Last, p. 349, and in Families and Freedom, p. 227.