C.H. West from E.C. Fowler, Mar. 27, 1861

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Baltimore March 27, 1861

Dear uncle,

I suppose you are anxiously waiting to hear who is to be the Collector of the Port of Baltimore.  I can say that is hard to tell.  There was a large delegation composed of men of all parties, "merchants" who went down on Monday to intercede for Mr. Corkran, Mr. Wagner and myself went down in the 4:15 A.M. train, and made all the arrangements, and met the delegation at the Depot at 10 o’ck.  We then went to Hon Montgomery Blair’s office, and had quite a satisfactory interview with him.  We then called on Mr. Chase, but did not see him.  After dinner we went to see Mr. Lincoln, and had an interivew with him.  The chairman of the delegation Mr. Geo. Rodgers, a man of great influence in the City, spoke to Mr. Lincoln and the resolutions as were adopted by the meeting were read by Mr. Redgrave, also a merchant and an influential man, the resolutions were very good, they were not very long but to the point and very pressive, I was somewhat astonished to see such an earnest desire on the part of those who differed so widely in politics, to have Mr. C. the Collector.  He is endorsed by merchants who do business, Through the Custom House to the amount of five millions of dollars a year, Mr. Lincoln said in reply to the Chairman, that he had received several communications and delegations from Balto. [Baltimore], but none such as were present.  He said it was the most formal and imposing of any he had received, they all returned home highly gratified, and from the interview he had from Mr. Blair I have not doubt that Mr. C