PHILADELPHIA — A financially strapped book dealer who stole scores of Civil War documents from U.S. archives and sold them on eBay was sentenced Thursday to 15 months in prison.

Denning McTague, 40, worked as an unpaid intern last summer at the National Archives and Records Administration branch in Philadelphia to complete a master's degree program.

Assigned to organize Civil War papers, he took to stuffing them into his yellow legal pads and walking out with them.

"I'm so deeply sorry," a tearful McTague told U.S. District Judge Stewart Dalzell. "I feel like I've inflicted a lot of pain on the people at the archives."

The 146 stolen documents include the War Department's announcement to the troops of President Lincoln's death, an 1860 letter from famed cavalryman J.E.B. Stuart and an 1864 appeal for better pay from a group of Philadelphia women pressed into wartime jobs.

"History cannot be replaced. Historical documents tell a story to generations who come long after the events occur," Assistant U.S. Attorney Susan L. Fields wrote in her sentencing memo.

McTague's lawyer described him as a quiet, decent man who became mired in debt as he earned two graduate degrees and tried to keep afloat the rare book business he had inherited.