James Douthat, the retiring president of Lycoming College, was cleaning out his closet when he stumbled on an amazing find, an historical document that had been missing for years, signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863, naming the college's founder a Civil War chaplain, according to ABC News.
The certificate appears to be in good condition. It had been displayed in a worn black frame, and Lincoln's signature is visible above an ornate, patriotic-themed imprint at the bottom of the commission certificate for Methodist clergyman Benjamin Crever.
"In the back of my mind, I remember hearing about it," Douthat told ABC. However, he didn't know what it looked like, and never went out of his way to look for it.
Douthat will be retiring at the end of June after 24 years at the college, and he was in the process of clearing out the boxes from the top shelf in his office when he noticed what he at first thought was a black-framed panel like the type used to access interior plumbing.
"When I took it down, of course I recognized Lincoln's signature immediately," he said. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton has also signed the document.
"I assume it was in the top of the closet 24 years ago," Douthat said. "I had never seen it."
College officials had been aware that the college had it in their possession, but that was as far as they knew. It was located somewhere on campus, but somewhere just out of sight.
"It was initially discovered a while ago," Janet McNeil Hurlbert, the associate dean and library director, said. "And then it got...put someplace else for a while."
A preliminary appraisal values the certificate at over $6,000. For the college, the document adds value to its connection to Crever, its founder.
"It was a pleasant surprise just to see it," Douthat said.
John Brinsfield, a U.S. Army Chaplain Corps historian emeritus, said that Crever was one of 500 Union hospital chaplains. Crever served between July 1862 and August 1865.
"Civil War commissions of any type are rare because they were sent to the individual chaplains," Brinsfield wrote to ABC in an email. "If any exist, it is only because the families saved them."
The certificates are so valuable because Lincoln approved the chaplains.
The school will keep the document in the college archives in the library basement until they determine a permanent place for it.
"We will know exactly where it will be from now on," McNeil Hurlbert said.
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