A Crime at the National Archives

The National Archives is one of our most beloved institutions. At the National Archives extremely rare and important documents are kept for safe keeping. While public access is allowed, there are practical policies in place to protect these documents from being altered, stolen and vandalized. Unfortunately, once in a while an important or extremely rare document is stolen and sold on the black market. This is a story about Civil War letters from the National Archives that were stolen and then sold on the black market- in this case EBay.

There are plenty of Civil War enthusiasts and many are not only passionate about its history, but also about artifacts such as letters and documents. In order to be a proficient Civil War enthusiast, you also have to be a scholar of this war and quite adept and researching artifacts. In this case, two brothers that were Civil War buffs were able to purchase letters from the war that had a high probability of being stolen from the National Archives. With the help of the FBI and EBay, this incredible crime mystery unfolded.

To learn more about this mystery and how Civil War letters were stolen from the National Archives and ultimately recovered, please visit our article at the Smithsonian Magazine’s main site at the following link: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/

National Archives, Forbidden City, Diane Arbus, Daredevil, Quincy Jones, Parthenon

The National Archives and the Theft of Civil War Memorabilia

The National Archives is one of the most prestigious institutions in America. And since our nation has a voracious appetite for knowledge, the National Archive has preserved many of our most important documents pertaining to historical events and culture. Some of the documents that are stored in the National Archives include letters from presidents, documents from the Revolutionary War and the Civil War.

While the National Archives have many security procedures in place to reduce theft, there have been instances where important, rare documents have been stolen and sold on the black market to collectors. With new technology, the black market has grown exponentially and many thieves now sell documents over the internet at sites that include Ebay.

Recently, some rare documents from the Civil War Era were stolen unknowingly from the National Archives and sold online. The Smithsonian Magazine has an interesting article on the theft and how two Civil War scholars, the FBI and Ebay all worked together to track down a thief. If you love Civil War Memorabilia and a good crime caper, you will be fascinated with this story. To read it, please visit our main website at the following link: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/

National Archives, Glacier National Park, Diane Arbus, Daredevil