David M. Lesser, Fine Antiquarian Books LLC

Catalog 120 RARE AMERICANA

 [September, 2011]

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

 

1.   Adams, Zabdiel: THE EVIL DESIGNS OF MEN MADE SUBSERVIENT BY GOD TO THE PUBLIC GOOD; PARTICULARLY ILLUSTRATED IN THE RISE, PROGRESS AND CONCLUSION OF THE AMERICAN WAR. A SERMON PREACHED AT LEXINGTON, ON THE NINETEENTH OF APRIL, 1783; BEING THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WAR BETWEEN BRITAIN AND AMERICA, WHICH BROKE OUT IN THAT TOWN ON THE 19TH OF APRIL, 1775. Boston: Printed by Benjamin Edes & Sons, 1783. [3]-39, [1 blank] pp, lacking the half title, pinned. Lightly toned, occasional spotting, Good+.

 

     The eighth consecutive sermon on the anniversary of the Battle of Lexington, in the series of the "solemn annual commemoration of that important event; on which the militia has been under arms, military exercises performed, and a sermon preached to crouded auditories." The footnote at page 7 lists the preachers of each such oration.

     Adams's Sermon is an unusually detailed account, densely footnoted, of the sufferings inflicted by the British during the War. Despite the "barbarities committed against the Americans by the aboriginals...the affair at Lexington may be pronounced cruel beyond a parallel." The British waged war against the Americans "for no other crime than tenaciously adhering to their liberties and inheritance, which were transmitted to them from their ancestors."

FIRST EDITION. Evans 17807. Lapham 11. Not in Gephart.                     $850.00

 

2.   American Jewish Publication Society: HEBREW CHARACTERISTICS: MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS FROM THE GERMAN. New York: American Jewish Publication Society, October, 1875. 96, [3], [1 blank] pp. Original green cloth with black and gilt decoration, title in gilt on spine [lightly rubbed, light wear at corners and spine ends]. Light tanning. Ownership signature on front and rear pastedowns. Good+.

 

    The American Jewish Publication Society began publishing in 1873; it disbanded only two years later. 'Hebrew Characteristics' is apparently one of only two books published by the Society in 1875. The book is divided into three sections: Extracts From Jewish Moralists, Jewish Marriage in Post-Biblical Times, and On Interment of the Dead in Post-Biblical Judaism.

Singerman 2506.                                                                                             $150.00

 

3.   Ames, Nathaniel: AN ASTRONOMICAL DIARY, OR, AN ALMANACK FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD CHRIST, 1760. Boston: Printed and Sold by John Draper, in Cornhill, [1759]. 16mo, 12 leaves (complete), stitched. Light wear, Good+.

 

     The first page contains the "first appearance of a fine title-page woodcut showing 4 figures representing the 4 seasons surrounding the signs of the zodiac in a circle with the date 1760 in the middle. Also gives, for the first time, a description of the Ohio River and list of places and distances from the mouth of the St. Lawrence to the mouth of the Mississippi." O'Neal.

     Drake notes two issues of this printing: this one has the price line after the imprint. Also included is a three-page poem, "On the Reduction of Quebec, Sept. 18, 1759 by General Wolfe and the brave Troops under his Command, &c."

FIRST EDITION. Evans 8292. O'Neal 80. Drake 3117.                               $450.00

 

4.   Antimasonic Party in Massachusetts: VOICE OF SUFFOLK!! [Boston? 1834]. Broadside, folio, 11 1/4" x 16". Light edge wear, printed in four columns. Very Good.

 

     "Boston Daily Advocate.... Extra." A rare broadside urging election of Antimasonic candidates for Governor and other State offices. John Bailey was the Party's choice for Governor [he would lose, and die in the following year]. The broadside, signed in type by Chairman Abner Phelps and Secretary George Gibson, relies heavily on the antimasonic views of John Quincy Adams, who is quoted abundantly. "Freemasonry is in the league against the free States, and it is a very remarkable phenomenon that antimasonry has taken root only in the free States. That fact alone speaks volumes. I firmly believe that antimasonry is the only principle of political salvation to the free States." If the free States fail to halt the spread of Freemasonry, they "shall have their throats cut across from ear to ear, by the entered apprentice's oath."

OCLC 85838285 [1- MA Hist. Soc.]. Not in American Imprints or Sabin.   $600.00

 

5.   Apollo Association: APOLLO ASSOCIATION FOR THE PROMOTION OF THE FINE ARTS IN THE UNITED STATES. [New York: 1842?]. [2] pp, plus integral blank leaf. Folded to 8" x 10". Light folds for mailing, addressed on verso of the integral blank with a light Providence postal cancel. Chip at blank outer margin of integral blank, attributable to removal of a seal. Very Good.

 

     The Association was incorporated in New York in 1840, "to advance the cause of the Fine Arts in the United States, to cultivate and improve public taste, and to afford additional encouragements to our National Artists, by the purchase and distribution of their works." Subscriptions are solicited. The Committee of Management for the Year 1842-- including William Cullen Bryant-- and the list of more than forty Honorary Secretaries are printed.

Not located on OCLC, which lists several publications of the Association, all scarce.

                                                                                                            $175.00

 

6.   Associated Ministers of the County of Windham: A LETTER FROM THE ASSOCIATED MINISTERS OF THE COUNTY OF WINDHAM, TO THE PEOPLE IN THE SEVERAL SOCIETIES IN SAID COUNTY. Boston, N.E.: J. Draper, 1745. 52pp. Loosened with old stitching holes and light wear to inner margin. Attractive type ornamentation. Title page lightly soiled, else clean. Bottom margin trimmed closely, touching a few letters. Good+ to Very Good. Contemporary ink inscription, 'For the Revd. Mr. Daniel Perkin.'

 

     A window on the excitements generated by the Great Awakening. The Ministers of Windham County [in Connecticut] warn against excesses and enthusiasms in religious observances. "The Prince of Darkness" carries on his evil "Designs" "by imitating, as nearly as he could, the Work of the Holy Ghost, both by setting on imaginary Frights and Terrors, in some Instances, on Men's Minds, somewhat resembling the Conviction of the Blessed Spirit; and also filling their Minds with Flashes of Joy, and false Comforts, resembling somewhat, in a general Way, the Consolations of the Holy Ghost." The Letter discusses the characteristic expressions of and reactions to this religious revival that swept New England in the 1740's.

FIRST EDITION. Evans 5717. Brinley Sale 7751.                                       $750.00

 

7.   Atkinson, G.H.: ADDRESS DELIVERED BY REV. G.H. ATKINSON, D.D., BEFORE THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE OF THE STATE OF NEW-YORK, UPON THE POSSESSION, SETTLEMENT, CLIMATE, AND RESOURCES OF OREGON AND THE NORTHWEST COAST, INCLUDING SOME REMARKS UPON ALASKA. DECEMBER 3D, 1868. New York: John W. Amerman, Printer, 1868. Original printed wrappers [spotted, moderately worn], stitched. 17, [3 blanks] pp. Text lightly toned, occasional foxing, Good+.

 

     "An account of the Whitman settlement and the migration of 1843." Decker. "This is the book wherein for the first time appeared in print the legend-- or the claim, depending on one's point of view-- of Marcus Whitman having 'saved Oregon' for the United States. The author was a pioneer of '48, and his book the source for an historical controversy which has endured through the years, and resulted in a pro and con literature extending to several hundred titles." Eberstadt.

26 Decker 32. 107 Eberstadt 322. Smith [Edition 2] 130.                             $950.00

 

8.   Autrey, B.C.: LOOK-LISTEN. THE GREATEST BOON OF ALL TIMES. AUTREY'S MINERAL TONIC, KNOWN IN SOME PLACES AS VITONA, MINERAL TONE, TURKEY MOUNTAIN MINERAL, ETC...A MOST WONDERFUL REMEDY FOR DISEASE... Rome, GA: [@1880s?]. 4pp, folded. Caption title [as issued]. Uniformly toned, some light discoloration. Good+.

 

     Dr. Autrey's tonic gives you "the same chance as the millionaire, no matter how poor you are or where you live. This Mineral has been tested and tried by thousands and found good for the following diseases: Rheumatism, Gout, Kidney Troubles, Indigestion, Gatarrh, Piles, Exzema, Diabettes, Inflamed Sore Eyes, Blood Poison...from childhood to old age."

     A rare southern pamphlet advertising a dubious product. Testimonials from satisfied customers in Georgia, Arkansas, and Texas are included.                             $150.00

 

9.   [Baldwin, Simeon E.]: UNITED STATES LAW JOURNAL, AND CIVILIAN'S MAGAZINE. EDITED BY SEVERAL MEMBERS OF THE BAR. PUBLISHED QUARTERLY. VOL. I. New Haven: Published by Gray & Hewit, New-Haven, (Conn.), 1822-1823. [2], 616, [12- Index] pp. Numbers 1-4 of Volume I [complete]. Bound in contemporary full sheep with gilt-lettered red morocco spine label. Scattered text foxing, spine rubbed and dry, else Very Good. With contemporary learned annotations in margins and endpapers.

 

     The United States Law Journal and Civilian's Magazine was published in 1822-1823 and in 1826, in two volumes. This offering is the entire first volume, with four quarterly issues from June 1822 through April 1823. Publishing was "suspended in the summer of 1823" [Harvard Law Catalogue] and resumed in January 1826. The second volume, printed in January and April 1826, comprised Numbers 5 and 6, and was entitled, 'United States Law Journal.'

     It is "the first legal periodical ever published in New England, and the only legal periodical in the world then published in the English language." Woodard, American Association of Law Libraries, Law Library Journal, Published in Conjunction with the Index to Legal Periodicals [1919], page 89. Contents include reports on significant cases, as well as commentary about the cases and legal subjects, speeches of political figures with legal content, book reviews. The cases involve a variety of commercial controversies, including bankruptcy, patents, bills of exchange; as well as issues involving the slave trade [the Case of the Jeune Eugenie] and the scope of federal and appellate jurisdiction.

FIRST EDITION. Marvin 703. II Harv. Law Cat. 824. Lomazow 166. Not in Cohen, American Imprints, Sabin.                                                                                    $850.00

 

10.   [Banks, Nathaniel]: QUESTIONS PROPOUNDED TO THE CANDIDATES FOR SPEAKER, AND THEIR RESPONSES. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SATURDAY, JANUARY 21, 1856. [Washington, D.C.: Republican Association; Buell & Blanchard, Printers, 1856]. 8pp. Caption title [as issued], printed in double columns. Folded [split along spine fold], untrimmed [light edgewear], partly uncut. Light toning. Good+.

 

     The contest for Speaker of the House at the opening of the Thirty-Fourth Congress illustrated the deeply divisive issue of slavery in the Territories acquired from Mexico. Representatives made the issue a litmus test for the candidates. Nathaniel Banks of Massachusetts was the candidate of Republicans, anti-slavery Whigs, and Know-Nothings; he would eventually prevail after two months of bitter competition. Under close questioning from Barksdale of Mississippi and others, he asserts here that the Wilmot Proviso, which would prohibit entry into the Union of any Slave States from the Mexican Cession, was constitutional; and that "the doctrine of the Declaration of Independence, that all men are created equal," meant just what it said:  men are to be judged by their "capacity" and not their race. Banks's election was a major victory for the new Republican Party.

Sabin 3206n. OCLC notes 9 copies under 3 accession numbers. Not in LCP or Dumond.

                                                                                                            $250.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

11.   Barbe-Marbois, Francois: COMPLOT D'ARNOLD ET DE HENRY CLINTON CONTRE LES ETATS-UNIS D'AMERIQUE ET LE GENERAL WASHINGTON (SEPTEMBRE 1780). Paris: 1831. xlvii, 163pp, plus two engraved portraits and map of West Point. 3/4 morocco, gilt-decorated spine, bound by Bauzonnet. Light wear, Very Good.

 

     Second edition of the classic study of Arnold's treason. This copy is complete with the map and two portraits, which Howes says were not issued with all copies. Barbe-Marbois was an outspoken friend of the U.S., and secretary of the French Legation at Philadelphia from 1779 until the end of the War. The book was written in 1780, but was not first published until 1816.

Howes B114.                                                                                                  $275.00

 

12.   Bassett, Samuel: AN ADDRESS MADE TO THE PEOPLE, ON THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW, THE NEW SLAVE STATES, THE NEBRASKA AND KANSAS TERRITORIAL BILL, &C. BY THE WAY OF AN EXPLANATION. [np: 1854]. 4pp. Stitched in contemporary [?] plain wrappers. Untrimmed, wraps are chipped, Very Good.

 

     A rare contribution to the literature of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. Bassett denounces the Act's rejection of the right of trial by jury for alleged runaway slaves. Blissfully unaware that the Dred Scott decision would, in three eventful years, utterly shred his argument, Bassett asserts that, "There is no clause in the Constitution of the United States that says that a person born after the Constitution was made, shall not be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens, in the several States, on account of their birth." Such a person has the right to trial by jury. If the Fugitive Slave Act denies that right, then it is "unconstitutional, and is no law at all."

     Bassett also argues that, if States may permit slavery, "there is nothing said in the United States Constitution who shall be slaves. One State may make a law that all the Congregationalists in the State shall be slaves to the rest..." Finally, he claims that States have the right to nullify the Act by declaring it unconstitutional. Such Calhoun-like arguments were common in Northern States which did not wish to participate in the slave-catching activities which the Fugitive Slave Act mandated.

OCLC 30551752 [1- LCP]. Not located in LCP or LCP Supp. [but see OCLC entry], or in Cohen, Harv. Law Cat., Marke, Sabin, Dumond, Work, Blockson.      $850.00

 

13.   Beadle, Delos W.: THE AMERICAN LAWYER, AND BUSINESS-MAN'S FORM-BOOK; CONTAINING FORMS AND INSTRUCTIONS...TOGETHER WITH THE LAWS OF THE VARIOUS STATES...AND A MAP AND SEAL FOR EACH STATE IN THE UNION. New York: Phelps & Fanning, 1851. 359, [1] pp. Bound in original calf [lightly rubbed] with gilt-lettered red morocco spine title. Minor wear, Very Good.

 

     As the title promises, a map of each State is included. The publisher says that the "Maps alone are worth three times what is asked for the whole work." The book expressed the democratic view that standard legal arrangements should be available to the ordinary businessman rather than the exclusive province of alleged experts. For each State, the laws relating to rights of married women are summarized.

FIRST EDITION. Cohen 7949. Marke 545 [1854 edition].                          $650.00

 

14.   Beaumont, John W.: A FIVE BILLION GAIN FOR MISSOURI; AND A GREATER INDEPENDENCE FOR HER PEOPLE. NO HELP LIKE SELF-HELP. St. Louis: Globe-Democrat Job Printing Company, 1879. Original printed wrappers, stitched, 28pp. Wraps moderately spotted and worn, else Very Good.

 

     A rare item, perhaps unrecorded, by a Missouri booster urging his State to develop "diversified industries," without which "no people ever rose, or can rise, to a high degree of cultivation; nor without such, can any State attain enduring prosperity and greatness." Beaumont fears that the typical Missourian will be a "half-developed man," "a driveling boor," unless the State prospers with "a thousand avocations." His comparison of Missouri with Massachusetts puts his Home State to shame. Beaumont offers a cornucopia of ideas for Missouri's improvement, and prints his proposed statute "to promote manufactures in the State of Missouri."

Not located on OCLC. Not in Eberstadt, Decker.                                         $350.00

 

15.   Benjamin, J[udah] P.: KANSAS BILL. SPEECH OF HON. J.P. BENJAMIN, OF LA., DELIVERED IN SENATE OF UNITED STATES ON THURSDAY, MARCH 11, 1858. SLAVERY PROTECTED BY THE COMMON LAW OF THE NEW WORLD. GUARANTIED BY CONSTITUTION. VINDICATION OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE U.S. Washington: Gideon, 1858. 29, [1 blank] pp. Folded, untrimmed, uncut, entirely unsophisticated. Bit of chipping at blank upper edge, else Very Good.

 

     A brilliant justification of the Dred Scott decision by the Jewish Louisiana lawyer and Senator, who also rebuts Stephen Douglas's Popular Sovereignty doctrine, that inhabitants of a territory had the power to vote slavery up or down, as they saw fit. Benjamin argues, "independently of the authority of the [Dred Scott] decision," that the early colonists "brought with them the common law of England as their birthright...I shall not hazard too much in the assertion that slavery was the common law of the thirteen States of the Confederacy at the time they burst the bonds that united them to the mother country." He supports his thesis with much detail, including the early law and custom of England, aspects of the Dred Scott decision, and in colloquy with Senator Fessenden of Maine.

     Benjamin's legal theories presaged the escalation of Southern demands for Congress to pass Slave Codes which would prohibit, not merely Congress, but a territorial legislature as well, from restricting slavery in the territories; and require Congress to protect slaveholders from hostile territorial inhabitants should such a legislature breach its duty to do so. This is evidently the only edition.

FIRST EDITION. Sabin 4705. LCP 1093. Not in Work, Harv. Law Cat., Singerman, Eberstadt, Decker, Blockson, Marke, BEAL.                                                            $875.00

 

16.   Bentham, Jeremy: A DEFENCE OF USURY; SHEWING THE IMPOLICY OF THE PRESENT LEGAL RESTRAINTS ON THE TERMS OF PECUNIARY BARGAINS. TO WHICH IS ADDED, A LETTER TO ADAM SMITH, ESQ. LL.D. ON THE DISCOURAGEMENT OF INVENTIVE INDUSTRY. Philadelphia: Printed for Mathew Carey, 1796. 149, [1 blank], [2 publ. advts.]. Mild foxing to last several leaves. Bound in modern cloth with gilt-lettered spine title. Except for the Forbes Library's annoying perforation stamp on the title page, and another one at the bottom of another page, this is a Very Good copy.

 

     This is the first American edition, and the only 18th century American printing, of Bentham's classic argument that market forces should determine the cost of money. Bentham "contends that a contract for money should be left open to the good sense of those bargaining for it, like all other contracts. Mr. Bentham was one of the first to attack the policy of the Usury Laws." Marvin.

Evans 30057. Cohen 26. Kress 3088. I Harv. Law Cat. 157 and Marvin 113 cite European editions.                                                                                                         $750.00

 

17.   Beveridge, Albert J.: ABRAHAM LINCOLN  1809-1858. New York and Boston: Houghton Mifflin. The Riverside Press, 1928. Four volumes in original blue cloth [lightly flecked] with publisher's spine labels. The Standard Library Edition. Port. frontis and original tissue guard in each volume. Illustrations as issued, with original tissue guards. Margin spot to first several leaves of volume four, else a pristine and Near Fine text.

 

     Beveridge's work is the "most thorough investigation for the period covered." Howes.

Howes B408. Monaghan 2999.                                                                      $175.00

 

18.   Boston Committee of Correspondence: BOSTON, APRIL 17, 1783. GENTLEMEN, BY THE INCLOSED RESOLVE, TRANSMITTED TO YOU BY THE DIRECTIONS OF THIS TOWN AT THEIR LAST MEETING, YOU MAY FORM SOME JUDGEMENT OF THEIR SENTIMENTS RESPECTING THE ABSENTEES, AND YOUR WISDOM AND PATRIOTISM WILL DETERMINE AS TO THE PROPRIETY AND USEFULNESS OF COMING INTO THE SAME OR SIMILAR RESOLVES. 1783. Signed in ink at the end, 'Nat. Barber Chman by Order'. [Boston: 1783]. [joined with] BOSTON, APRIL 10, 1783. AT A MEETING OF THE FREEHOLDERS AND OTHER INHABITANTS OF THE TOWN OF BOSTON...RESOLVED, THAT THIS TOWN WILL AT ALL TIMES, (AS THEY HAVE DONE) TO THE UTMOST OF THEIR POWER, OPPOSE EVERY ENEMY TO THE JUST RIGHTS AND LIBERTIES OF MANKIND: AND THAT AFTER SO WICKED A CONSPIRACY AGAINST THOSE RIGHTS AND LIBERTIES, BY CERTAIN INGRATES, MOST OF THEM NATIVES OF THESE STATES, AND WHO HAVE BEEN REFUGEES AND DECLARED TRAITORS TO THEIR COUNTRY,- IT IS THE OPINION OF THIS TOWN, THAT THEY OUGHT NEVER TO BE SUFFERED TO RETURN, BUT BE EXCLUDED FROM HAVING LOT OR PORTION AMONG US... Signed in ink at the end, 'Att. William Cooper' Town-Clerk. [Boston: 1783].

 

     Two broadsides, each deemed a separate imprint, here undivided on a single folio sheet, folded to four pages for mailing. Each folded page is 8" x 13". The first page is blank except for the contemporary ink manuscript address to the Committee of Correspondence or the Selectmen of Gorham [plus unrelated scribbling]. The two interior pages are the printed broadsides of April 17 and April 10, respectively. The last page is blank, except for the contemporary notation, 'Resolve of the Town of Boston Respecting Tories, And their Committee Letter to this Town, April 10 & 17- 1783.' Untrimmed, one blank inner margin tear [from opening the sealed correspondence]. Very Good.

     These rare broadsides urge Massachusetts Towns to bar Tories, "Absentees," "Conspirators," "Ingrates," and other disloyal persons from returning "to their Estates, the Rights of Citizenship, and the Enjoyment of that Happiness they have been the main Instruments of making us thus long sorely toil and bleed for."

     The American Antiquarian Society owns only an electrostatic copy of each item. Long considered separate imprints, the two were issued here as an undivided sheet: the April 17 item's reference to "the inclosed Resolve" clearly refers to the April 10 Resolve, as no Resolve is printed in the April 17 item. This offering is an enlightening and extraordinary rarity. None of the consulted references records them joined as here.

April 17: Bristol B5687. Shipton 44348. NAIP w038713 [3- M-Ar, RPJCB, MHi]. Not in Ford or Evans. OCLC locates only microforms. April 10: Bristol B5686. Shipton 44350. NAIP w030002 [3- PPRF, RPJCB, MHi]. Not in Evans, Ford or on OCLC.

$15,000.00

 

19.   Bowker, J.A., M.D.: DROSERA, OR INDIAN SOVEREIGN REMEDY FOR PALPITATION OF THE HEART. ALSO RECOMMENDED FOR THE FOLLOWING COMPLAINTS... BOWKER & MERRILL, PROPRIETORS, WEST CHARLESTON, VT. Stanstead, C.E.: Journal Print, [1845]. Attractive broadside, 7 3/4" x 11". Light edge spotting, verso with two tape remnants for mounting. Very Good.

 

     Bowker evidently went a few miles across the border to Canada to get his broadside printed. His "discovery of the Medical properties and uses" of the plant remedy is a medical breakthrough: "it subdues undue nervous and vascular excitement, the cause of so much pain and misery. By its Tonic properties it relieves debility, giving strength to muscular energy."

     A very pleasing example of patent medicine advertising. OCLC locates copies only at the University of Rochester Medical Center and the Library Company of Philadelphia.

OCLC 504988416 [1], 78662684 [1].                                                                        $250.00

 

20.   Branch, Stephen H.: STEPHEN H. BRANCH'S DAILY HAND, WITH TRUTH AND A HEART IN IT. VOL. 1. NO. 2. New York: September 2, 1859. 4pp, folded, printed in double columns with caption title [as issued]. Light wear and dust, else Very Good.

 

     "This eccentric, if not insane author" [Sabin] issued the Daily Hand 23 times during the month of September 1859; it then disappeared. Branch's theme is the illicit connection of President James Buchanan with the Sickles family scandal, which erupted into public view when Sickles killed his wife's lover, Philip Barton Key, in 1859. Here he calls "The White House a Den of Assignation" and reports that, "God enters the Presidential Mansion, and drives out the Libertines and Concubines, and hurls Thunderbolts from Heaven that rock the Globe!"

     Branch's rare pamphlet attacks Buchanan and James Gordon Bennett, editor of the New York Herald and a regular recipient of "hush-money." In a disjointed series of essays, Branch asserts that Bennett blackmailed Buchanan in exchange for Bennett's silence about "Buchanan's most extraordinary intimacy with Mrs. Sickles," formerly Teresa Bagioli, who participates prominently in Branch's musings. Fanny White, well-known prostitute and consort of General Sickles, who was censured for escorting her into the New York State Assembly chambers, also is discussed. 

Sabin 7386n. Not in Lomazow. OCLC locates six copies under two accession numbers.

                                                                                                                        $175.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

21.   Breck, Samuel: SKETCH OF THE INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS ALREADY MADE BY PENNSYLVANIA; WITH OBSERVATIONS UPON HER PHYSICAL AND FISCAL MEANS FOR THEIR EXTENSION; PARTICULARLY AS THEY HAVE REFERENCE TO THE FUTURE GROWTH AND PROSPERITY OF PHILADELPHIA. ILLUSTRATED BY A MAP OF THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA. SECOND EDITION, REVISED AND ENLARGED. BY SAMUEL BRECK, ONE OF THE MEMBERS OF THE SENATE OF PENNSYLVANIA, FOR THE DISTRICT COMPOSED OF THE CITY AND COUNTY OF PHILADELPHIA. Philadelphia: Published by M. Thomas, 1818. Pamphlet bound in modern cloth, with title label on front cover. 81, [1- Appendix] pp, plus folding map of the State of Pennsylvania, with borders in color [several short fold splits expertly repaired]. Text untrimmed, stitched, spine of the pamphlet reinforced. Very Good.

 

     This second edition, printed in the same year as the first, "emphasizes Philadelphia's strategic position for trade with the rising West" [Howes]. Breck traverses in detail the status and statistics of turnpike roads, bridges, canals, bank financings, agriculture, schools and cultural improvements. He compares Pennsylvania's progress with similar endeavors in other States and countries. He focuses especially on the opportunities offered by the Susquehanna River, and Routes to Lake Erie and New York City.

     The Notice prefacing Breck's study explains that this second edition "has been revised and enlarged, and is in every respect, I hope, less imperfect than the first; particularly as regards the view of the head-waters of our principal rivers, which is now given in one map, instead of three. It is to the liberality, kindness and public-spirit of Mr. Mathew Carey, that I am indebted for this map."

Howes B742. Rink 4044. AI 43443 [3].                                                        $500.00

 

22.   Breckinridge, John: BRECKINRIDGE AND LANE CAMPAIGN DOCUMENTS, NO. 18. SPEECH OF HON. JOHN C. BRECKINRIDGE, VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, AT ASHLAND, KENTUCKY, SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1860, REPELLING THE CHARGE OF DISUNION AND VINDICATING THE NATIONAL DEMOCRACY. Washington City: Issued by the National Democratic Executive Committee, 1860. 16pp, printed in double columns. Disbound, light to moderate foxing, Good+.

 

     Breckinridge, Buchanan's Vice President, was the 1860 presidential standard-bearer of the anti-Stephen Douglas branch of the Democratic Party, which had split during the 1860 nominating convention. Douglas had defied President Buchanan and broken with him over the Kansas issue. Breckinridge, campaigning for the Presidency with the nomination of the Party's Southern wing, defends his devotion to the Union and the Administration's record, argues that slavery is-- like other forms of property-- entitled to exist anywhere in the Territories, and attacks Douglas, Popular Sovereignty, and Abraham Lincoln.

LCP 1496 [another printing].                                                                          $250.00

 

23.   [Brown, John]: THE LIFE, TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF CAPT. JOHN BROWN, KNOWN AS 'OLD BROWN OF OSSAWATOMIE,' WITH A FULL ACCOUNT OF THE ATTEMPTED INSURRECTION AT HARPER'S FERRY. COMPILED FROM OFFICIAL AND AUTHENTIC SOURCES. INCLUDING COOKE'S CONFESSION, AND ALL THE INCIDENTS OF THE EXECUTION. New York: Robert M. De Witt, Publisher, [1860]. 108 pp, 8 leaves of plates [as issued]. Bound in contemporary stiff plain wrappers. Good+.

 

     The last entries are dated November 30 and December 1, 1859, consisting of Brown's last letter to his family, and his Will. The book treats Brown's life, emphasizing activities in Kansas and Harper's Ferry, with statements of witnesses and participants, and a record of the trial and post-trial proceedings.

Howes B851. Blockson 9666. LCP 5925. Cohen, BEAL 14064.                 $350.00

 

24.   [Burgwyn, Henry King]: THE NORTH AND THE SOUTH. LETTERS TO THE NORTH-CAROLINA STANDARD AND THE NEW-YORK JOURNAL OF COMMERCE; WITH EXTRACTS FROM NEWSPAPERS. BY H.K.B. THORNBURY PLANTATION, NEAR HALIFAX, N.C., JAN., 1857... [Raleigh: "Standard" Print, 1857]. 15, [1 blank] pp. Stitched with caption title, as issued. Very Good, with some contemporary manuscript corrections [perhaps by the author].

 

     This rare pamphlet was written by a "quiet, unpretending planter," as Burgwyn calls himself, who has never participated "in active politics." In two Letters he expresses his alarm at the growing influence of Abolitionism, "with its more modest, but near kinsmen, 'Free Soil,'...and now 'Black Republican' parties." A mere twenty years ago, he observes, the few extremists like Arthur Tappan-- "with his then large fortune and energetic, though ill regulated mind"-- were "looked down upon and despised by men." Increasingly, however, northerners-- now in lockstep with Tappan and other abolitionists-- "trample the constitution under their feet and proclaim a 'higher law'." Only a "sickly and sentimental literature" and "a gross falsification of facts" could obscure the obvious: the Negro is "inferior to the white man." The North must come to understand "the magnitude of the interest" which it has "in preserving and even in augmenting" the South's cherished institution.

Not in Thornton, LCP, Blockson, Sabin. Not located in Work. OCLC 5998317 [6].

                                                                                                            $750.00

 

25.   [Carroll, Anna Ella]: THE MATERIAL BEARING OF THE TENNESSEE CAMPAIGN IN 1862 UPON THE DESTINIES OF OUR CIVIL WAR. Washington: W.H. Moore, Printer, [@1871]. 19, [1 blank] pp. Original printed wrappers with wrapper title [as issued]. Disbound, two light rubberstamps and an ink accession number on blank portions of title leaf, else Very Good.

 

     The Marylander Carroll had been a Know-Nothing before the election of 1860. Despite reservations about Lincoln and the Republicans, she gave all-out support to the Union cause during the Civil War. Unusually for a 19th century woman, she had-- or, at least, claimed -- a significant influence on military strategy. This pamphlet credits her with originating the plan for "the decisive campaign of the war," i.e., "the movement which transferred the national armies from Cairo and the northern part of Kentucky to their new base in northern Mississippi and Alabama on the Memphis and Charleston railroad." 

     The pamphlet demonstrates that the best efforts of the wisest military men to defeat the Confederacy were stymied until Carroll came along. Her plan "would not have been found out in all human probability, in time to have prevented a collapse or warded off recognition and intervention, but for Miss Carroll."

FIRST EDITION. III Dornbusch 2527. Sabin 46204. Not in Nevins, Bartlett, Eberstadt.

                                                                                                            $250.00

 

26.   [Cass, Lewis]: COLOR LITHOGRAPH OF LEWIS CASS, DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR 12TH PRESIDENT. Spruce, NY: N. Currier, 1848. Broadside, 10" x 14", printed on heavy paper. Hand-colored lithograph campaign banner for 1848 Democratic presidential candidate Lewis Cass. Portrait of Cass at center with the Screaming Eagle perched upon a globe flanked by American flags directly above him. Cass and Eagle are surrounded by a border of oval portraits of the previous eleven American presidents. Four flags at the head of the design, stars are scattered throughout. At the foot of the design is a gold banner reading, "The Presidents of the United States." The copyright information is printed below the banner, with Currier listed as lithographer and the number "584." Light spotting, a few short closed margin tears [one closed tear touches upon a flag without loss] and some blank edge chipping. Good+.

 

     "Print shows a campaign banner for democratic president Lewis Cass. It is almost identical  in design to a banner Currier produced the same year for Zachary Taylor [no. 1848-5], except that here, above the portrait of the candidate, appears a bald eagle on a globe in an aureole of stars flanked by American flags... The Library's impression of this print was deposited for copyright on June 6, 1848, less than two weeks after Cass' nomination at the party's Baltimore Convention." Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Online Catalog, Number 2003656599.  

Currier & Ives : a catalogue raisonne / compiled by Gale Research. Detroit, MI : Gale Research, c1983, no. 5311; Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1848-4.                                       $400.00

 

27.   Chauncy, Charles: ALL NATIONS OF THE EARTH BLESSED IN CHRIST, THE SEED OF ABRAHAM. A SERMON PREACHED AT BOSTON, AT THE ORDINATION OF REV. MR. JOSEPH BOWMAN, TO THE WORK OF THE GOSPEL-MINISTRY, MORE ESPECIALLY AMONG THE MOHAWK-INDIANS, ON THE WESTERN BORDERS OF NEW-ENGLAND. AUGUST 31, 1762. BY...ONE OF THE PASTORS OF THE FIRST CHURCH IN BOSTON. Boston: John Draper, 1762. Disbound, with the half title. [4], viii, 50, [2 blanks] pp. Errata at base of page 50. Interesting typographic ornamentation. Scattered margin spotting, tear to blank lower corner of leaf  9-10, else Very Good.

 

     Chauncy dedicates the Sermon to William, Marquis of Lothian and President of the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge. The Society's efforts "towards the support of the missions to the western Indians" had been thwarted by Catholics, who rendered Indians "strongly prepossessed  in favor of the idolatries and superstitions of Rome." But with Chauncy and his colleagues as "your correspondent members," Christian ministers "are now gone to Indian-nations, who have not been under management by popish priests."

     From page 22 Chauncy discourses on the work of preaching to the Indians. "Both the text and the long small type foot notes contain much information regarding the Indians and the work of the Missionaries amongst them." Stevens. He insists upon the duty of American missionaries and the American churches to bring the gospel to "the barbarous nations, habiting these American lands...No places in the earth were ever more dark, and at the same time more given to cruelty, than these American regions, as possessed by the ab-originals." Chauncy acknowledges the work of "the memorable Eliot," who was responsible for translations of the scriptures "to the Indian language;" and "the renowned Mayhews," whose work  converting the heathen tribes has been spectacular. Chauncy speaks of his own experiences with "the Indians at Natick and Punkapog;" and he provides much information on the culture and religion of the Mohawks.

FIRST EDITION. Evans 9088. Stevens, Rare Americana 907. Not in Field, Siebert Sale, Eberstadt, Decker, John Carter Brown Library, Church.                                   $1,250.00

 

28.   Chauncy, Charles: THE GIFTS OF THE SPIRIT TO MINISTERS CONSIDER'D IN THEIR DIVERSITY; WITH THE WISE ENDS OF THEIR VARIOUS DISTRIBUTION, AND THE GOOD PURPOSES IT IS ADAPTED TO SERVE. A SERMON PREACH'D AT THE BOSTON THURSDAY-LECTURE, DECEMB. 17. 1741. Boston: Rogers & Fowle...Also by S. Eliot in Cornhill, 1742. [3]-40 pp, lacking the half title. Stitched, untrimmed, scattered spotting, Good+.

 

     Pastor of the First Church of Christ in Boston, Chauncy was one of the most articulate opponents of orthodox theologians who sought to establish the Church of England in America. Here he lauds the diversity of ministerial gifts: some excel in Reason, "others have the gift of moving the passions," others can "touch the consciences of sinners." Each is a desirable talent, conferred by God. Thus, ministers "should not, on this account, be out of all charity, despising and condemning one another."

     NAIP notes three states of gathering E: in this one, page 39 is paginated correctly, and the catchword on page 33 is "other."

Evans 4913. NAIP w012401.                                                                         $600.00

 

29.   Cheves, Langdon: SPEECH OF HON. LANGDON CHEVES, IN THE SOUTHERN CONVENTION, AT NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE, NOVEMBER 14, 1850. [Nashville?]: Published by the Southern Rights Association, 1850. 30, [2 blanks] pp. Stitched, untrimmed, uncut and entirely unsophisticated. Final blank leaf chipped at inner margin, light dusting, Very Good plus.

 

     Howes calls this speech "One of the earliest of radical secession utterances, practically an appeal to arms." "On June 3 [1850] delegates of nine southern states met in convention at Nashville. Here was the end product of years of effort on the part of militant southerners to secure a united South...For the first time, the southern states, by standing together, would compel a recognition of their rights within the Union or would move by concerted action to go out of it." Potter, Impending Crisis 104. There, "Langdon Cheves of South Carolina had appealed to all the slaveholding states, 'Unite, and you shall form one of the most splendid empires in which the sun ever shone...'" Id. at 461-2.

     A long-time secessionist, Cheves in 1832 had "condemned the scheme of nullification as not sufficiently thoroughgoing." Appleton. The Nashville Convention garnered support from most of the Cotton States but few other slave states. Though it failed in its secessionist goals, it forever changed the political landscape of the South by rendering secession acceptable if the South could not achieve its agenda within the Union. Cheves helped transform the South's political consciousness.

AII [TN] 436. Howes C360 [a different printing]. III Turnbull 88. Not in Allen.

$650.00

 

30.   [Civil War Union Broadside]: NEWS BY TELEGRAPH. [np: March, 1862]. Folio broadside, 9.5" x 13". Printed in three columns, previously folded. A few light fox spots and minor wear, one short closed margin tear expertly repaired on verso. Very Good.

 

     A broadside with similar title [Important News By Telegraph (From the Office of the Rockland Gazette)] and type organization was issued in May of 1861; but no information links our item to the Rockland Gazette. If our broadside's context suggests an attribution, it is to Manchester, New Hampshire: a brief article appears on the arrest of a boy for a series of post office robberies there.

     This pro-Union broadside presents details of the fighting at Winchester, Virginia, on March 23, 1862. It reports that the rebels received reinforcements under Gen. Garnell [i.e., Garnett] and shortly thereafter attacked Union forces. "The enemy were strongly protected in the woods, behind a stone wall, and their artillery was posted on an eminence on both sides of their left wing. Our whole artillery force was engaged... and after much loss the rebel infantry... attempted a charge on Dane's Battery. The first effort was nearly successful, but a heavy discharge of grape threw them into confusion. A second attempt likewise failed and the enemy fell back with heavy loss, behind the stone parapet... "

     Another article headlined "Notes on the Rebellion" discusses the Secretary of War's decision to "forgo" the arrest of the editors of "certain Boston and New York papers"; and General Simmer's order prohibiting acts of marauding in Virginia, along with a few other bits of news. Under the headline "Reported Capture of Kingston, N.C." dated March 25, details of that skirmish are given. The final news report is on the investigation into several post office robberies affecting merchants in Manchester, New Hampshire. Numerous letters containing money and drafts had been stolen, and the authorities were able to trace the crimes to a fourteen year old boy named Frank B. Knowlton.

Not located on OCLC.                                                                                   $750.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

31.   [Clark, George W.]: ON THE CONSTITUTION. [Rochester? 1860]. 4pp, folded leaf, caption title [as issued]. Near Fine.

 

     Writing from Rochester in March 1860 Clark, author of anti-slavery songsters, argues passionately that slavery "is an alien" to our fundamental law, "a loathsome gangrene eating at the very core and centre of our Religious, Literary and Political Institutions." Slavery is "in perpetual and 'irrepressible conflict' with" freedom.

FIRST EDITION. Sabin 13290. Not in Dumond, LCP, or Work.                $175.00

 

32.   Clarke, John M.: JANUARY 13, 1853, WASHINGTON CITY, D.C.| DEAR SIR: I TAKE THE LIBERTY OF ADDRESSING YOU A FEW LINES TO KNOW IF YOU CAN PURCHASE LAND WARRANTS IN YOUR COUNTRY? IF SO, I WILL TAKE ALL YOU CAN SEND ME, AND PAY THE FOLLOWING PRICES: $140 FOR 160 ACRE WARRANTS. $70 FOR 80 ACRE WARRANTS. $35 FOR 40 ACRE WARRANTS... Washington, D.C.: 1852. Broadside, 8" x 12.5". Printed with some manuscript notations and changes. Light old folds, some tanning along folds. Signed in type by John M. Clarke. Very Good.

 

     Clarke twice made manuscript changes to the date on this solicitation, originally printed as September 1st, 1852-- to Dec. 29 and then January 13, 1853. He also changed by hand the printed prices. Clarke lists twenty references, including Judges, Senators, Congressmen, Governors. Congress awarded Bounty Land Warrants in return for veterans' military service, beginning with the Revolutionary War and continuing through the late 1850s. The land warrants, which could be exchanged for land titles, were freely transferable and from time to time were objects of avid speculation.

Not located on OCLC, but several examples were located on line.               $175.00

 

33.   Clay, Henry: AN ADDRESS OF HENRY CLAY, TO THE PUBLIC; CONTAINING CERTAIN TESTIMONY IN REFUTATION OF THE CHARGES AGAINST HIM, MADE BY GEN. ANDREW JACKSON, TOUCHING THE LAST PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION. New-Brunswick: Published by Order of the Administration Corresponding Committee. D.F. Randolph, Printer, 1828. 56 pp. Stitched, untrimmed, and uncut as issued. Generously margined. Lightly foxed, else Very Good.

 

     The tumultuous 1824 presidential election damaged Clay's reputation and mortified him. It was a four-way free-for-all; no candidate won an electoral majority (although Andrew Jackson had the plurality of votes). Thus the election was thrown into the House of Representatives, where Clay was pivotal in electing John Quincy Adams. Soon thereafter, Adams appointed Clay his Secretary of State, traditionally a stepping-stone to the presidency. Jackson and others angrily declared that Clay and Adams had entered into a "corrupt bargain," in which Clay had traded votes in exchange for elevation to the Secretaryship. Jackson called him "the Judas of the West." Peterson, The Great Triumvirate 130.

     Clay passionately defended his honor and integrity: the result was this pamphlet, issued before the 1828 election, which promised to be an ugly rematch between Jackson and Adams. With numerous depositions and narratives from witnesses, Clay demonstrates that his opposition to Jackson was well-known, on principled grounds of statecraft, long before personal advancement could conceivably have motivated his support of Adams. There was one printing which appeared in 1827; there were at least six 1828 editions.

Wise & Cronin 199. AI 32732 [5]. Coleman 2707 note. Not in Felcone.      $500.00

 

34.   Clay, Henry: A SUPPLEMENT TO THE ADDRESS OF HENRY CLAY TO THE PUBLIC, WHICH WAS PUBLISHED IN DECEMBER, 1827. EXHIBITING FURTHER EVIDENCE IN REFUTATION OF THE CHARGES AGAINST HIM, TOUCHING THE LAST PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, MADE BY GEN. ANDREW JACKSON. Washington: Printed by Peter Force, 1828. 22 pp. Stitched, untrimmed, generously margined. Lightly spotted, Good+.

 

     Clay issued this Supplement to his Address to the Public. Like the Address, this Supplement was issued before the 1828 election. Dated June 10, 1828, and signed in type by him, it provides further depositions, including one from Thomas Hart Benton, attesting that his opposition to Jackson was well-known, on principled grounds of statecraft, long before personal advancement could conceivably have motivated his support of Adams.

FIRST EDITION. Wise & Cronin 201. AI 32734 [11].                                $500.00

 

35.   [Clay, Henry]: TO THE PEOPLE OF THE CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT COMPOSED OF THE COUNTIES OF FAYETTE, WOODFORD, AND CLARKE, IN KENTUCKY. [Washington? 1825]. 33, [1 blank] pp. Disbound. Light wear, Very Good, contemporary notation on title page.

 

     Clay's Letter is dated at the end March 26, 1825, from Washington. It is his first detailed justification of his conduct in the hotly contested 1824 election, which John Quincy Adams won when Clay threw his support to Adams in the House of Representatives. Clay was charged with engineering a "corrupt bargain" when Adams appointed him Secretary of State, a stepping-stone to the presidency. Adams's Inauguration had occurred only three weeks earlier.

     Clay's long rebuttal of the "unmerited animadversions," when he was merely acting in the "honest and faithful discharge of my public duty," focuses first on his candidacy for the presidency and the events which would throw the four-way election into the House. It is a detailed discussion of the most complicated presidential election in our history. Clay notes with irony that, before he made his choice, "I seemed to be the favourite of every body...I knew that the sunbeams would quickly disappear, after my opinion should be ascertained, and that they would be succeeded by a storm; although I did not foresee exactly how it would burst upon my poor head." He explains his refusal to be bound by the Kentucky Legislature, which had instructed him to vote for Jackson; and evaluates the relative merits of Adams and Jackson, who had won the popular plurality.

FIRST EDITION. Coleman 2708. 168 Eberstadt 277.                                  $650.00

 

36.   [Cleveland, Grover; and Adlai Stevenson]: GRAND JOLLIFICATION  THE DEMOCRACY OF ORRVILLE AND VICINITY WILL HOLD A GRAND JOLLIFICATION OVER THE RESULT OF THE ELECTION OF CLEVELAND AND STEVENSON ON TUESDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING, NOV. 15... A GRAND PARADE AND TORCHLIGHT PROCESSION WILL BE ONE OF THE FEATURES. MUSIC BY GLEE CLUB AND SEVERAL BANDS. LET JOY BE UNCONFINED; BLOW YOUR FISH HORNS, RING YOUR BELLS AND MAKE THE DEMONSTRATION A MEMORABLE ONE. ALL LADIES, DEMOCRATS OF ADJOINING TOWNS, REPUBLICANS, PEOPLE'S PARTY AND PROHIBITIONISTS ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO JOIN WITH US IN CELEBRATING OUR GREAT VICTORY. BY ORDER OF THE COMMITTEE. [Orrville, Ohio? 1892]. Broadside, brown color with a large illustration of a crowing rooster, 31" x 24", with ornamental border. Some edge chipping, occasionally into the border but not affecting any text. Matted, which obscures the edge chipping. Else Very Good.

 

     A rare, strikingly attractive broadside celebrating the Democratic victory in the 1892 presidential race.

Not located on OCLC.                                                                                   $250.00

 

37.   Clinton, De Witt: A MEMOIR ON THE ANTIQUITIES OF THE WESTERN PARTS OF THE STATE OF NEW-YORK. READ BEFORE THE LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY OF NEW-YORK. Albany: I.W. Clark, 1818. 16pp. Disbound and lightly toned, else Very Good.

 

     Clinton was a man of incredibly broad-ranging interests and talents: in addition to his political career-- as Governor of New York and presidential candidate-- he was an inquisitive naturalist, President of the Literary and Philosophical Society of New York, and a founder of the New York Historical Society. Here he explains that western New York was, "prior to [its] discovery and occupation by Europeans, inhabited by numerous nations in a settled state and much further advanced in civilization than the present tribes of Indians." He describes in detail various archeological sites which he visited, and from which he draws his conclusion; and discusses contributions of the French, the Iroquois, and other tribes. An earlier issue of this pamphlet opines that the Spaniards had a colony in the Onondaga territory; but Clinton omitted that reference in this printing.

Field 330. Sabin 13718. AI 43645 [6].                                                           $250.00

 

38.   [Coleman, William]: A COLLECTION OF THE FACTS AND DOCUMENTS, RELATIVE TO THE DEATH OF MAJOR-GENERAL ALEXANDER HAMILTON; WITH COMMENTS: TOGETHER WITH THE VARIOUS ORATIONS, SERMONS, AND EULOGIES, THAT HAVE BEEN PUBLISHED OR WRITTEN ON HIS LIFE AND CHARACTER. New York: Hopkins and Seymour, 1804. [4], 238pp. Scattered light foxing. Bound in attractive 19th century half morocco [lightly rubbed], gilt rules, raised spine bands, and marbled boards, with gilt spine labeling. Very Good. Also bound in are two separate imprints: Mason, J.M.: An Oration, Commemorative of the Late Major-General Alexander Hamilton... New York: 1804; and Otis, Harrison G.: Eulogy on General Alexander Hamilton... New York: 1804. Each of these well-known funeral orations is in Very Good condition, except for light toning and foxing, and the Appendix [pp 33-40] to the Mason sermon is bound upside down.

 

     This is a riveting publication of the exchanges of letters between Burr, Hamilton, and other interested parties who were unable or unwilling to head off the duel initiated by Burr, but perhaps invited by Hamilton. Precisely what Hamilton said about Burr that was so "despicable," in the words of the news report that triggered the dispute, is unclear. Coleman, editor of the New York Evening Post and Hamilton's close ally, wrote this at the Widow's request. It includes "nearly every thing related to his death...and much else that could otherwise be found only by a reference to the papers of the day." Ford.

FIRST EDITION. Howes C572. Gaines 04-15. Ford 94. Tompkins 32.       $650.00

 

39.   Colored People's Educational Monument Association: CELEBRATION BY THE COLORED PEOPLE'S EDUCATIONAL MONUMENT ASSOCIATION IN MEMORY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, ON THE FOURTH OF JULY, 1865, IN THE PRESIDENTIAL GROUNDS, WASHINGTON, D.C. Washington: McGill & Witherow, Printers and Stereotypers, 1865. 33, [1] pp. Stitched in original printed yellow wrappers. Text lightly toned, wrappers lightly worn and dusted, Very Good.

 

     The pamphlet records "the first time that the colored people have attempted any celebration of a national character" [page 3. Similarly, see Library of Congress's American Memory]. The Colored People's Educational Monument Association, which organized the occasion, was headed by the African-American abolitionist Henry Highland Garnet. It was among the earliest groups which sought to create a memorial to Abraham Lincoln. The result was a sculpture, erected in 1876 in Lincoln Park near Capitol Hill, depicting a supplicant slave and a towering Lincoln. Known as the Emancipation Memorial, or the Freedmen's Memorial, it generated some contemporary criticism for its depiction of the inferior position of the black man.

     The pamphlet begins with letters from luminaries Frederick Douglass, who writes that "the prophecy of 1776 will not be fulfilled till all men in America shall stand equal before the laws"; Charles Sumner, Salmon P. Chase, Gerrit Smith, and other stalwarts of the anti-slavery movement. The centerpiece is a long oration by William Howard Day, "a young colored man of New York." Actually, Day was forty years old, editor of the Cleveland True Democrat, and the 1858 President of the National Board of Commissioners of the Colored People, whose formation signaled the beginnings of an autonomous black civil rights movement. His oration, like Douglass's letter and Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, places the promise of the Declaration of Independence at the heart of the American political experiment.

Sabin 41178. Not in Blockson, Work, LCP, Weinstein, Monaghan.             $3,000.00

 

40.   Cook, G. & D.: G. & D. COOK & CO.'S ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF CARRIAGES AND SPECIAL BUSINESS ADVERTISER. NEW HAVEN, CONN. 1860. New York: Baker & Godwin, 1860. Oblong 8vo, 7" x 9 3/4" in original publisher's cloth. Front cover gilt-decorated and stamped in blind, with presentation stamp of Thomson & Co., New Haven Grocers [whose advertisement appears at pages 112-113]. Two frontis engravings [the Company's building in New Haven, and portraits of the Cooks and General Manager Kimball], with tissue guard. [4], 226pp. With full-page woodcuts of carriages numbered in accordance with the Descriptive Price List. The facing page of nearly every woodcut is an attractive, detailed, full-page engraved and usually illustrated advertisement for New Haven, Hartford, or New York merchants engaged as suppliers to the carriage trade, or other business concerns. Inner hinges expertly strengthened, a couple of light spine repairs, Near Fine.

 

     An Index to advertisements is included. The advertisement for Henry Austin, Architect, is a tinted plate which includes a hand-colored woodcut of his office on Chapel Street, New Haven. A six-page article on New Haven in 1860, with a railroad map of the shoreline from New York to Boston, is also included. "With excellent tinted litho. pls. of every American carriage of the day." Romaine. "Includes advertisements from other firms, most of which were located in New Haven." Winterthur.

Romaine 80. Winterthur 1801.                                                                       $2,000.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

41.   Davis, Jefferson: MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES. [Richmond: 1863]. 16pp, caption title [as issued]. Disbound, else Very Good.

 

     Davis delivered this Message in January 1863, a relatively happy occasion permitting him to look back with "the most fervent expression of thankfulness" on "our history during the two years of our national existence;" without yet experiencing the new year's unpleasantness.

     "At Vicksburg another formidable expedition has been repulsed with inconsiderable loss on our side and severe damage to the assailing forces." But, deploring European responses to the Union's naval blockade of the Confederacy, he informs that "less than justice has been rendered to this people by neutral Europe, and undue advantage conferred on the aggressors in a wicked war." Davis denounces the Emancipation Proclamation as "an authentic statement by the government of the United States of its inability to subjugate the South by force of arms."

FIRST EDITION. P&W 917. Crandall 622.                                                  $250.00

 

42.   De Vinne, Daniel: THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH AND SLAVERY. A HISTORICAL SURVEY OF THE RELATION OF THE EARLY METHODISTS TO SLAVERY. BY...OF THE NEW-YORK EAST CONFERENCE. New York: Francis Hart, 1857. Original printed wrappers [light chipping and spotting], stitched. 95, [1] pp. Very Good.

 

     A scarce, detailed history of the introduction of slavery into the Methodist Episcopal Church, and efforts to combat its cancerous spread. The author argues "that the Methodist Episcopal Church was founded on a non slaveholding basis...and that all the slaveholding which has ever been in our Church, has been in contravention to the spirit and design of her organic law." He writes on the evolution of Church doctrine and practices, early efforts to extirpate slavery, the growing fellowship with slaveholders.

FIRST EDITION. Dumond 47. Sabin 19821. LCP 3090. Not in Work, Blockson, Weinstein, Eberstadt, Decker.                                                                                    $350.00

 

43.   Dean, James: AN ALPHABETICAL ATLAS, OR GAZETTEER OF VERMONT; AFFORDING A SUMMARY DESCRIPTION OF THE STATE, ITS SEVERAL COUNTIES, TOWNS, AND RIVERS. CALCULATED TO SUPPLY, IN SOME MEASURE, THE PLACE OF A MAP: AND DESIGNED FOR THE USE OF OFFICES, TRAVELLERS, MEN OF BUSINESS, &C. BY...TUTOR IN THE UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT. Montpelier: Printed by Samuel Goss-- for the Author, January, 1808. Contemporary quarter morocco [moderately worn]. 43, [1 errata] pp. Very Good. Occasional margin trimming close to the text, but no text affected. Lightly toned. A clipped presentation inscription from the author. Very Good.

 

     The book treats all subjects, described in the title, on the counties and towns of Vermont, with detailed Tables. Manufacturing, agricultural, and topographical data are included in this early Vermont gazetteer.

FIRST EDITION. Howes D167. McCorison 984. Rink 229.                                    $450.00

 

44.   [Decker, William R.]: OUR GREAT INDIAN WAR. THE MIRACULOUS LIVES OF MUSTANG BILL (MR. WM. RHODES DECKER) AND MISS MARION FANNIN. THE BRAVE INDIAN FIGHTER AMONG THE HOSTILE SIOUX. THE CUSTER EXPEDITION AND MASSACRE. THE BATTLES, STIRRING SCENES, ETC. A TRUE RECORD OF THRILLING ADVENTURES. Philadelphia: Barclay & Co., [1880?]. Original printed pictorial wrappers [spine wrappers worn, blank wrapper edges chipped]; portrait of Custer on front wrap, illustrated rear wrap. Pages [2], [19]-78, [1 blank], [1 Custer port.] [as issued]. Full page illustrations [captions in English and German]. Stitched. Good+.

 

     The story of the Custer massacre. Howes records 1876, 1881, and 1885 printings, all rated 'aa' for scarcity. OCLC does not record this printing, with copyright date of 1880. The first part of the book recounts the bravery and gallantry of Mustang Bill, the Alacran Scout, and his 'Record of Thrilling Adventure in Texas and the Great Southwest.'  "Mustang Bill was captured by the Comanches between the headwaters of the Washita and Red Rivers, and made his escape..." Eberstadt. The second part is the Custer Massacre, with biographies and names of officers, a list of the killed and wounded, the comments of army officers, and the "blood-thirsty crimes" of "Rain-in-the-Face, the Indian Devil."

Howes D194aa. Graff 3138 [1876]. 109 Eberstadt 40 [1885 printing].        $750.00

 

45.   DeGroot, Henry: RECOLLECTIONS OF CALIFORNIA MINING LIFE. PRIMITIVE PLACERS AND THE FIRST IMPORTANT DISCOVERY OF GOLD. THE PIONEERS OF THE PIONEERS- THEIR FORTUNE AND THEIR FATE. WRITTEN FOR THE MINING AND SCIENTIFIC PRESS. San Francisco, Cal.: Dewey & Co., 1884. Original printed wrappers [some foxing] with vignette of miner engaged in his trade on the front wrapper, and illustration of 'Early California Quartz Mill' on rear wrapper. Private bookplate on blank verso of front of wrapper. Stitched, 16pp, with five full-page engravings. Text printed in double columns, lightly worn, Very Good. Presentation inscription at head of title page in pencil, "Fred K M. Stocking/ Compliments of the Author." Fred Stocking, according to the online site of the Oakland Museum of California, was a gold miner who came to California in 1853. 

 

     "Crammed with gold discovery data." Wheat. DeGroot provides an eye-witness account of the early California Gold Rush. DeGroot was a journalist with the New York Tribune who went to California in 1849. He took up gold mining rather quickly and continued to write about it as a newspaperman. His pamphlet explains Fremont's failure to discover gold, discusses General Sutter's discovery and the principal actors in that drama, the spreading of the news, General Sutter's account of the gold find, and much else. The illustrations are of Sutter's Mill, "where gold was first discovered"; several scenes of gold mining; "street in a mining town"; and a mining camp in the mountains.

FIRST EDITION. Streeter Sale 2985. Wheat Gold Rush 56. Cowan 162. 133 Eberstadt 182. Howes D220 note.                                                                                    $2,500.00

 

46.   Drake, Charles: SLAVERY'S DESTRUCTION, THE UNION'S SAFETY. SPEECH ...BEFORE THE FREEDOM CONVENTION, IN LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY, FEBRUARY 22ND, 1864. [Louisville? 1864]. 9pp, stitched, printed in double columns, caption title [as issued]. Very Good.

 

     Drake was "the most active and conspicuous member" of Missouri's Civil War radical faction, which was "well organized under Drake and with a definite program, including immediate emancipation, a new constitution, and a system of drastic disfranchisement." DAB. Drake here lauds Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation while regretting that it did not go far enough: "I only regret that he should not have seen his way clear to pronounce the doom of Slavery in the whole land." Thus he rejects Lincoln's plan of compensated emancipation to slaveowners in loyal States; and wishes Lincoln had not revoked Fremont's 1861 General Order freeing Missouri's slaves. But now a great change in favor of freedom is sweeping the land. The nation is breaking the "fetters, with which the South had most adroitly bound it to the cause of Slavery."

FIRST EDITION. Bartlett 1383. Sabin 20817n. Not in Coleman, LCP, Dumond, Work. OCLC 4821731 [9].                                                                                         $275.00

 

47.   Election of 1864: THE PLATFORMS. np: [1864]. Broadside, 9" x 11 1/2". Mildly dusted at outer margin, Near Fine.

 

     A Republican recitation of the Democrats' Platform and the Republicans' Platform in 1864, and an analysis of their 'Points of Difference.' "The Union platform looks to the ending of the war through the defeat and overthrow of the Rebellion, while the Democratic contemplates peace through the virtual triumph of the traitors." The broadside exhorts, "Freemen of the United States! read, mark, weigh, resolve, and VOTE! This is preeminently a contest regarding important principles and measures, compared with which, personal considerations are of small account."

Sabin 63348. Not in Bartlett.                                                                          $450.00

 

48.   Farmers' Convention: THE TRANSPORTATION QUESTION. FARMERS' CONVENTIONS, OPINIONS OF THE PEOPLE, RESOLUTIONS, PETITIONS, ETC., HIGHWAY FROM THE MISSISSIPPI TO THE HUDSON, IMPROVEMENT OF WESTERN RIVERS, ETC., PACIFIC RAILROAD, IMPORTANCE OF CHEAP FREIGHT, ETC. Chicago: Tribune Company's Book and Job Printing House, 1866. 24pp, bound in new marbled paper wrappers. Old rubberstamp. Very Good.

 

     A rare and significant Chicago imprint emphasizing farmers' urgent demands for cheap rail and water transportation. "Chicago, as the head of the system of Lake navigation, needs only to be connected with the waters of the Upper Mississippi to increase her supremacy in the trade and markets of the West. Let our Farmers' Conventions everywhere take this view of the subject into consideration." Proceedings of the Bloomington and Geneseo farmers' conventions are summarized, and other documentation provided.

FIRST EDITION. Not in Ante-Fire Imprints, Sabin, Eberstadt, Decker, Soliday, Graff. 599 NUC 0309922 [1]. OCLC 15046007 [1- Lincoln Presidential Library].   $600.00

 

49.   Foot, Samuel A.: AN EXAMINATION OF THE CASE OF DRED SCOTT AGAINST SANDFORD, IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES, AND A FULL AND FAIR EXPOSITION OF THE DECISION OF THE COURT, AND OF THE OPINIONS OF THE MAJORITY OF THE JUDGES. PREPARED AT THE REQUEST OF, AND READ BEFORE "THE GENEVA LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC ASSOCIATION," ON TUESDAY EVENING, 28TH DECEMBER, 1858. BY...LATE JUDGE OF THE COURT OF APPEALS. PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE ASSOCIATION. GENEVA, N.Y., JANUARY, 1859. New York: Wm. C. Bryant & Co., Printers, 1859. Original printed wrappers with wrapper title [as issued]. Stitched. 19, [1 blank] pp. Light wear, Very Good. Ownership signature at head of title, 'John R. Edie,' probably the Pennsylvania Republican Congressman, born in Gettysburg and brevetted colonel during the Civil War.

 

     Foot "was a distinguished attorney and former judge of the New York Court of Appeals, the State's highest court. Foot offers a critique of Taney's opinion that was prepared for informed laymen rather than attorneys. He argues that Taney's opinions on the territories and the rights of blacks were obiter dicta and ‘have no judicial authority.' This pamphlet is a useful example of how Northerners viewed the decision, and how they feared that the Supreme Court would 'give us a new constitutional and legal system on the subject of slavery and our territories.' The publisher of this pamphlet, William Cullen Bryant, was one of the leading literary figures of the mid-nineteenth century and an active abolitionist." Finkelman.

FIRST EDITION. Work 345. Finkelman 53-54. LCP Supp. 822. I Harv. Law Cat. 708. Dumond 52. Cohen, BEAL 11881. Not in LCP, Blockson, Weinstein.     $650.00

 

50.   Gardiner, Asa Bird: THE BATTLES OF "GRAVELLY RUN," "DINWIDDIE COURT-HOUSE," AND "FIVE FORKS," VA., 1865. ARGUMENT ON BEHALF OF LIEUT. GEN. PHILIP H. SHERIDAN, U.S.A., RESPONDENT, BY ASA BIRD GARDINER, LL.D., JUDGE-ADVOCATE, U.S.A., OF COUNSEL, BEFORE THE COURT OF INQUIRY, CONVENED BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES...IN THE CASE OF LIEUT. COL. AND BVT. MAJOR-GENERAL GOUVERNEUR K. WARREN, CORPS OF ENGINEERS, FORMERLY MAJOR-GENERAL COMMANDING THE 5TH ARMY CORPS, APPLICANT. DELIVERED JULY 27TH, 28TH AND 30TH, 1881. Chicago, Illinois: 1881. Original printed blue wrappers, stitched. 126pp plus two large folding maps. Wraps with some extremity spotting, one map with a short closed tear from careless opening. Else Near Fine, with clean and bright text.

 

     Warren objects to Sheridan's relieving him from command during the Battle of Five Forks in 1865. Warren thus fell, from his enviable position as 'The Hero of Little Round Top,' into disgrace. He spent the rest of his life trying to salvage his reputation. General Grant had given Sheridan permission to relieve Warren if, in Sheridan's opinion, Warren failed to perform his duties with dispatch. Enraged that Warren had failed to attack with sufficient speed at Five Forks, Sheridan did so.

     President Rutherford Hayes convened a Court of Inquiry, of which this pamphlet was a part. The Court exonerated Warren from wrongdoing, but only after Warren's death.  

114 Eberstadt 115. III Dornbusch 1871. Nicholson 307.                              $375.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

51.   [Genet, Edmond C.E.]: COMMUNICATIONS ON THE NEXT ELECTION FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, AND ON THE LATE MEASURES OF THE FEDERAL ADMINISTRATION, WITH NOTES, ILLUSTRATIONS AND DOCUMENTS. BY A CITIZEN OF NEW-YORK. PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR. [Albany?] : 1808. 40pp, disbound, scattered foxing and tanning. Good+.

 

     The French Republic's first Minister to the United States had, after the dust cleared from his meddling in American foreign policy, settled in New York and become an American citizen. Here Genet warns against the elevation of James Madison to the presidency; he supports New York's Governor George Clinton, who happened to be his father-in-law. Opposing this latest attempt "to perpetuate the Presidency in the hands of Virginia," Genet attacks the Embargo, keystone of the Madison-Jefferson foreign policy.

FIRST EDITION. Gaines 08-13. AI 15093 [7].                                            $600.00

 

52.   [George, Daniel]: WEATHERWISE'S TOWN AND COUNTRY ALMANACK, FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD, 1784...EMBELLISHED WITH A PLATE, REPRESENTING THE VICTORIOUS GENERAL WASHINGTON, SURVEY'D IN PLEASING ATTITUDES, BY WISDOM AND VALOUR, WHILE BRITANNIA DEPLORES HER LOSS OF AMERICA. Boston: Printed for, and Sold by Nathaniel Coverly, opposite the sign of the White Horse, in Newbury Street, [1783]. 12 leaves, as issued. With the full-page woodcut of Washington, as described in the title, preceding the title page. Stitched and untrimmed, toned with light foxing; a short, expertly repaired, closed corner tear [no loss]. Good+.

 

     Evans attributed authorship to Rittenhouse; but NAIP says, "The actual author was Daniel George." This is one of  the three Weatherwise almanacs printed in Boston for the year 1784. The woodcut illustration is captioned, 'Washington- Victory doth thy Trumpets sound, Who are with Laurals cover'd round!' 

Evans 18163. Drake 3335. NAIP w036458.                                                  $950.00

 

53.   Georgia Mississippi Company: STATE OF FACTS SHEWING THE RIGHT OF CERTAIN COMPANIES TO THE LANDS LATELY PURCHASED BY THEM FROM THE STATE OF GEORGIA. United States [Philadelphia?]: 1795. 64pp, contemporary plain wrappers. Scattered foxing, contemporary ink doodling on title page. Blank top title page margin clipped. Good+.

 

     "The land companies' attempt to uphold the sale of Georgia's western lands to them, in face of charges of bribery and fraud in the passing of the bill. The next year the legislature nullified the sale." Streeter. Indeed, virtually the entire Georgia legislature had been bribed. After repeal of the law, claimants who had purchased land from the companies tied up the courts for years in their efforts to defend their land titles.

FIRST EDITION. Howes G126aa. II Streeter Sale 1158. Evans 28745. I De Renne 270.

                                                                                                            $1,000.00

 

54.   Gillett & Henry: AN ENTIRE NEW STOCK OF GOODS NOW OFFERED BY GILLETT & HENRY, AT HAYNEVILLE, GEORGIA. Hayneville, GA: May 1, 1847. Folio Broadside, 12 1/4" x 15". Large and bold type fonts. Worn, with some small holes, some spotting, text is clear. Good.

 

     A rare announcement to "friends and customers, in Houston county," that the proprietors "have recently returned from New-York and Boston, with an entire new stock, consisting of every variety of Staple and Fancy Dry Goods." Signed in type by Alfred S. Gillett and John Henry. A Connecticut native, Gillett moved to Georgia as a young man and was postmaster in Hayneville as well as a successful merchant; but growing southern sectional animosity caused him to move to Philadelphia, where he married Ella Gratz, daughter of the merchant Edward Gratz.

See online: http://www.intowner.com/fr/scenes/scenes051107.htm.              $125.00

 

55.   [Gleason, Ezra?]: THOMAS'S MASSACHUSETTS, CONNECTICUT, RHODE- ISLAND, NEWHAMPSHIRE & VERMONT ALMANACK, WITH AN EPHEMERIS, FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1795. Worcester, Massachusetts: Isaiah Thomas, Sold by him in Worcester...and at the Boston Bookstore; and by other Booksellers in Boston, [1794]. [48] pp. Stitched and untrimmed, as issued, with some loosening. Generously margined, with some chipping at blank extremities. Woodcuts. Very Good.

 

     This is the first of two editions printed in 1794. It is an attractive and interesting almanac covering many subjects, including a warning that the use of cradles is "pernicious to children."

Evans 27052. Drake 3538.                                                                              $250.00

 

56.   [Gordon, John and William]: A FULL REPORT OF THE ARGUMENTS OF THOMAS F. CARPENTER, SAMUEL Y. ATWELL, AND JOSEPH M. BLAKE, ATTORNEY GENERAL, IN THE CASE OF THE STATE VS. JOHN AND WILLIAM GORDON. FOR THE MURDER OF AMASA SPRAGUE. SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT, MARCH, 1844. REPORTED BY EDWIN C. LARNED. Providence: Printed at the Office of the Daily Transcript, 1844. 38pp. Bound in contemporary quarter morocco and green boards [hinges separating]. Dusted and moderately foxed and spotted, Good+.

 

     "Sprague was a very wealthy businessman, a brother of the United States senator from Rhode Island, and a local tycoon who dominated the area around Providence. He prevented a brother of the Gordons', newly arrived Irishmen, from getting a liquor license, and as a consequence was waylaid and beaten to death. The Irish raised a fund to defend the Gordons, but John was hanged for the crime." McDade. John was the only Gordon convicted.

     The fact that defendants were Irish immigrants may have affected jury deliberations; certainly Rhode Island's Irish community believed thus. The prosecutor's closing argument claims that "the Irish have strong propensities, strong attachments and resentments," and "the tie of kindred is to an Irishman an almost indissoluble bond."

McDade 364. Cohen, BEAL 12633.                                                              $350.00

 

57.   Great Western Railroad Company: REPORT OF THE GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY, CANADA WEST, TO THE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTORS. BY CHARLES B. STUART, CHIEF ENGINEER. [Ontario?]: September 1, 1847. 47, [1 blank] pp, plus two folding maps [as issued]: 'Map and Profile of the Great Western Railway Canada West,' 48 1/2 cm x 32 cm; 'Map of the Route of the Great Western Railway Shewing its Connection with other Public Works,’ 35 1/2 cm x 29 cm. Versos with expertly repaired closed tears, short margin tear, else Very Good.

 

     The railroad is "on the precise ground that will enable it to control the trade and travel of such a vast portion of the Canadas and the prosperous American States."

TPL 2850. Sabin 28478n.                                                                               $350.00

 

58.   Grimes, James W[ilson]: AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED, BY FUTURE IOWA GOVERNOR GRIMES, TO CHARLES MASON, COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS, WASHINGTON, D.C. SENT FROM BURLINGTON, IOWA, MAY 15, 1854. 7 3/4" x 9 3/4", folded. 1 1/3 pages plus integral address leaf stamped 'FREE' and postmarked from Burlington, May 15. On light blue paper; small blank margin tear on last leaf from opening the Letter. Docketed as having been "Answered May 22/54." Very Good plus.

 

     Free Soil men of all political stripes-- Whigs, Republicans, Anti-Nebraska Democrats-- united to elect Grimes, an anti-slavery man, Iowa's Governor in 1854. DAB credits him as the man who "made Iowa Republican, and allied it with the loyal states," believing that "the great issue was the extension or non-extension of slavery into the territories."

     Grimes wrote this Letter during his campaign for Governor, as the anti-slavery forces were losing the struggle to bar slavery from the Kansas-Nebraska Territories. About two weeks after Grimes sent this letter, President Franklin Pierce would sign the Kansas- Nebraska Act, which inaugurated a bitter sectional struggle culminating in War. The Letter promises to respond to the Washington Union's recent "three column editorial attack upon me." He seeks confirmation that "the Hon. Alex. H. Stephens...stated in your presence, or, predicted before you, that in fifteen years Iowa would be a slave state. Is it so? I have it from two gentlemen who I understand heard you say that you heard the declaration made." Grimes requests Mason to "telegraph me immediately."

     Later, as Senator from Iowa, an ailing Grimes cast the decisive vote which saved President Andrew Johnson from conviction after his impeachment by the House of Representatives.                                                                                        $850.00

 

59.   Halsted, William: OPINION. THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS HAVE BEEN SUBMITTED TO ME IN BEHALF OF THE MECHANICS AND MANUFACTURERS BANK AT TRENTON, FOR MY OPINION... [Trenton, N.J.: June 8, 1837]. Eight-page autograph manuscript, signed and dated by the author. 10" x 8". Five sheets, glued together along the top margin. Minor blank edge wear, Very Good plus.

 

     Halsted "was born at Elizabethtown, graduated from the College of New Jersey in 1812, read law, and was admitted to the bar in 1816. He was supreme court reporter from 1821 to 1832...served as a member of Congress from 1837 to 1839 and from 1841 to 1843,” and then became US Attorney for New Jersey until 1853. Felcone 750.

     During the great Panic of 1837, many banks had insufficient specie to redeem the paper notes which they had issued as currency. Halsted's Opinion addresses the question whether the Bank has "forfeited its charter by refusing to redeem in specie or other lawful money its bills or notes during the regular hours of doing business." He also answers several subsidiary questions, the most important of which is whether the Bank's failure to redeem its notes in specie disqualifies it from lawfully discounting paper or otherwise "transacting its ordinary business as a banking institution."

     Halsted opines, doubtless to the Bank's distress, that its failure so to redeem its notes is indeed a "lawful cause of forfeiture." That is, the failure exposes the Bank to proceedings which may result in "a judgment of forfeiture against it." But, in a weak effort to assure his client, he explains that "the actual forfeiture does not take place until the judgment of forfeiture is regularly pronounced in such proceedings." The Bank's corporate powers, including its transaction of ordinary banking business, may be dissolved only in the regular course of judicial proceedings. Halsted quotes abundantly from relevant pronouncements of Chancellor Williamson of New Jersey, Chancellor Kent of New York, and Chief Justice Parsons of Massachusetts.                          $950.00

 

60.   Hamilton, Alexander: THE FEDERALIST, ON THE NEW CONSTITUTION, WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1788, BY MR. HAMILTON, MR. MADISON, AND MR. JAY: WITH AN APPENDIX, CONTAINING THE LETTERS OF PACIFICUS AND HELVIDIUS ON THE PROCLAMATION OF NEUTRALITY OF 1793; ALSO, THE ORIGINAL ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION, AND THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, WITH THE AMENDMENTS MADE THERETO. A NEW EDITION. THE NUMBERS WRITTEN BY MR. MADISON CORRECTED BY HIMSELF. Hallowell: Glazier, Masters & Smith, 1837. 500pp, bound in contemporary full sheep, with gilt-lettered spine title on red morocco. Binding rubbed, text with scattered foxing, rear blank free endpaper torn. Tear to outer margin of leaf 21-22 costs a couple of letters on page 22. Good+.

 

     "Most famous and influential American political work." Howes. The third of six Hallowell editions.

Ford 30. Howes H114. Sabin 23987.                                                             $450.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

61.   Hamilton, Alexander: REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY OF THE UNITED STATES, ON THE SUBJECT OF MANUFACTURES. In: THE UNIVERSAL ASYLUM, AND COLUMBIAN MAGAZINE, FOR JANUARY, 1792. BY A SOCIETY OF GENTLEMEN. Philadelphia: Printed for the Proprietors, by William Young, 1792. 79, [1], [10 (of 12?) printer’s advts] pp. Stitched, corners turned, scattered foxing, a margin tear affects a couple of letters. Good+.

 

     One of the very earliest printings of Hamilton's foundation report on manufactures. It occupies pages 33-75. The Report was issued on December 5, 1791.

     "One of the great American state papers, the Magna Carta of industrial America." Howes. The Philadelphia edition, issued in folio by Childs & Swaine in 1791, was its first printing. Hamilton presciently envisioned the path by which the Nation, following the principles that he so persuasively advocates, would expand its manufactures and become a great power. "As the successive reports of the Secretary were studied, the scale of his ideas gradually became evident. He was not merely planning a fiscal system, but doing it in such a way as to strengthen the central government and develop the resources of the country, to stimulate trade and capitalistic enterprises, and to bring about a more symmetrical balance between agriculture and industry." DAB.

Howes H123. Ford [Hamilton] 202. Neither source mentions this printing.  $500.00

 

62.   [Hammond, James Hamilton? Hayne, Isaac William?]: TO THE PEOPLE OF THE SOUTH. SENATOR HAMMOND AND THE TRIBUNE. BY TROUP. TRACT NO. 3. Charleston: Evans & Cogswell, 1860. 24pp, stitched into modern wrappers. Blank margin of title leaf has a chip. Light spotting. Good+.

 

     Sabin records, in addition to this copy, another issue with 23, [1] pages. This 1860 Association tract contrasts, through articles "served up" in that Black Republican rag, the New York Tribune, the distorted, hateful view of the South shared by northerners; with the "cool-headed, sensible, unimpassioned" picture of the South offered by South Carolina's Senator Hammond. Tracing the intractable conflict between North and South to the country's birth, the author asserts that, "It is a great mistake to assign the election of Lincoln as the CAUSE for a disruption of the Federal Government. It is but the occasion." Secession and a separate Southern, slave-holding Confederacy are passionately urged.

     Page 24 of this issue prints an extract from the New York Herald, which tallies the growing Free State majority in the Union, and warns that Lincoln's election will destroy slavery unless the South secedes.

602 NUC 0351630 [5]. LCP 10436. III Turnbull 306.                                  $500.00

 

63.   [Hammond, James? Hayne, Isaac William?]: TO THE PEOPLE OF THE SOUTH. SENATOR HAMMOND AND THE TRIBUNE. BY TROUP. TRACT NO. 3. Charleston: Evans & Cogswell, 1860. 23, [1] pp. Disbound, light spotting and some pages tanned. Good+.

 

     The other issue of this 1860 Association tract. See the previous catalog entry for description. The last page, unnumbered, prints the 'Constitution of 1860 Association,' whose purpose is "promoting resistance, by the slaveholding States, to the aggressions of the non-slaveholding States."

602 NUC 0351631 [4]. Sabin 30101. Not in LCP or Turnbull.                     $500.00

 

64.   Hawaii: TOURISTS' GUIDE FOR THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. PUBLISHED BY J. WILLIAMS & CO. Honolulu, H.I.: Printed by Thos. G. Thrum, 1882. 2 3/4" x 4 1/2". 15pp, in original printed wrappers with wrapper title [as issued]. Photograph of 'Hawaiian Hotel' mounted on verso of title page; illustration on rear wrapper of "Diamond Head, Near Honolulu." One persistent chip to upper blank forecorner, not affecting any text but occasionally taking portions of a page number. Else Very Good.

 

     A rare booster for travel to Hawaii, rendered much more convenient by the replacement of "sailing packets" with steamers, which can make the trip "comfortably in a week's time from San Francisco" via the Oceanic Steamship Company. The pamphlet extols the luxuries of travel by steamer, and the "tropical paradise" that awaits the passenger. The Royal Hawaiian Hotel is a great place to stay; but "the most delightful spot for the visitor, and which he will be most reluctant to leave, is J. Williams & Co.'s Photographic Art Gallery and Curiosity Store on Fort street, in the heart of the city." Other destinations are recommended as well.

OCLC 21607352 [2- UC Berkeley, Bishop Museum Library in Hawaii]. Not in Eberstadt, Decker.                                                                                                           $750.00

 

65.   Hayden, E.S.: SPLENDID DAGUERROTYPE MINIATURES, TAKEN IN EVERY STYLE, BY E.S. HAYDEN, WHO WOULD RESPECTFULLY INFORM THE INHABITANTS OF ___________ THAT HE HAS TAKEN ROOMS IN _____________ AND IS NOW PREPARED TO TAKE LIKENESSES OF ALL WHO MAY FAVOR HIM WITH A CALL... [Boston? @1860]. Broadside, 6.25" x 9.75". Bold, multi-font text surrounded by elaborate ornamental border. Minor wear, Near Fine.

$250.00

 

66.   Hayne, Isaac W.: ARGUMENT BEFORE THE UNITED STATES CIRCUIT COURT, BY ISAAC W. HAYNE, ESQ., ON THE MOTION TO DISCHARGE THE CREW OF THE ECHO. DELIVERED IN COLUMBIA, S.C., DECEMBER, 1858. REPORT BY DOUGLASS A. LEVIEN. Albany: Weed, Parsons & Company, 1859. 24pp, stitched in original printed wrappers. Light edge wear, else Very Good.

 

     The Echo was an American slave ship; it had 320 Africans on board when it was intercepted near the Florida Keys by the U.S. Brig Dolphin and taken to Charleston. Crew members, jailed and charged with piracy for participating in the international slave trade, brought a writ of habeas corpus.

     Attorney General of South Carolina and an outspoken advocate for State Rights and slavery, Hayne was cleverly hired by the United States to oppose the writ. Here Hayne urges continued jailing of the crew despite the grand jury's refusal to indict them: the men should be held over until the next grand jury session in the upcoming term of court. Of greatest significance is Hayne's defense on constitutional grounds of the 1820 federal statute prohibiting participation in the international slave trade. Denying that it violated the reserved rights of the States, Hayne argues that Congress's enumerated powers include regulating commerce, making treaties, prohibiting piracy. Hayne was successful: the crew was tried the following year but, after quick jury deliberations, they were all acquitted. "This pamphlet is the only printed record available of Hayne's contribution to the case." [Finkelman].

FIRST EDITION. Finkelman 240. III Turnbull 277. Cohen, BEAL 13882. LCP 4677. Not in Sabin, Harv. Law Cat., Marke, Blockson, Work, Eberstadt, Decker.       $1,250.00

 

67.   [Hazard, Benjamin]: ARGUMENT IN THE CASE RHODE-ISLAND AGAINST MASSACHUSETTS. PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY. Providence: 1838. Stitched, 60pp, scattered foxing and light wear, untrimmed, Good+.

 

     Hazard made his argument in a case "of historic importance. In Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, the [Supreme] Court was called upon for the first time to decide whether it possessed jurisdiction under the Constitution to decide a conflict between two States of the Union, involving a disputed boundary line and the sovereignty over disputed territory." II Warren, Supreme Court in United States History 42-43. The Court adopted Hazard's position, which involved a sophisticated exposition of early Constitutional history, holding [over Chief Justice Taney's dissent] that it did have jurisdiction. See 37 U.S. 755 [1838].

     Daniel Webster was counsel for Massachusetts. Ironically, Massachusetts presented a State Rights argument, that the Court might lack the power to execute its judgment against Massachusetts. Hazard, seizing a delicious opportunity, responded, "What! Does Massachusetts threaten? Is Massachusetts ready to become a nullifying State, and to set up her own will in defiance of the decrees of this Court and the Constitution itself?"

FIRST EDITION. Cohen 11940.50 [2003 Supp.]. AI 50778 [5]. Not in Marvin, Harv. Law Cat., Eberstadt, Decker.                                                                                    $350.00

 

68.   Hinsdale, B[urke] A[aron]: THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. PREPARED BY B.A. HINSDALE, PRESIDENT OF HIRAM COLLEGE. [n.p.: 1880]. 4pp, folded. Caption-title [as issued], printed in double columns. Fine.

 

     A campaign biography of the 1880 Republican presidential candidate by one who knew him from the time Garfield was a professor at Hiram College in Ohio. Burke A. Hinsdale was his student; they became close friends. Hinsdale once said, "Then began to grow up in me an admiration and love for Garfield that has never abated, and the like of which I have never known. A bow of recognition, or a single word from him, was to me an inspiration." [Bundy: THE LIFE OF GEN. JAMES A. GARFIELD. New York: 1880. Page 30] Here he recounts the "great life" of Garfield.

Miles 603. OCLC 33885313 [5].                                                                    $150.00

 

69.   Holt, Joseph: LETTER FROM THE HON. JOSEPH HOLT, UPON THE POLICY OF THE GENERAL GOVERNMENT, THE PENDING REVOLUTION, ITS OBJECTS, ITS PROBABLE RESULTS IF SUCCESSFUL, AND THE DUTY OF KENTUCKY IN THE CRISIS. SECOND EDITION. Washington: Polkinhorn, 1861. 16pp. Disbound, else Very Good.

 

     This Border State lawyer, Buchanan's last Secretary of War, helped hold Kentucky in the Union. In his May 31, 1861 letter to his colleague James Speed, printed here, he expresses his "unspeakable gratification" at "the recent overwhelming vote in favor of the Union in Kentucky." Later Lincoln's Judge Advocate General of the Army, he opens a window on activities and emotions in Kentucky in the crucial months after Lincoln's election. The Cotton States, he charges, seeking to "enlist the natural bent" of the crucial Border States' sympathies, "resolved to precipitate a collision of arms with the Federal authorities." Holt insists that the "extraordinary and discreditable spectacle" of revolution is unnecessary, as slavery in States where it already exists is secure.

Coleman 1212 [this printing]. LCP 4914 [first edition].                                $125.00

 

70.   [Hornby, Charles]: ENGLISH ADVICE, TO THE FREEHOLDERS OF ENGLAND. PRINTED IN 1714. [London: Printed for J. Roberts in Warwick-Lane, 1715]. 30, [2 blank] pp, stitched, untrimmed. Lightly age toned. Very small worm hole runs through entire document [occasional loss of a letter], else Very Good.

 

     This is a parody upon Bishop Atterbury's 1714 tract entitled, "English Advice to the Freeholders of England." Despite the title, the imprint date of 1715 is at the bottom of page 29. This tract follows the Bishop's argument paragraph by paragraph, "putting a Whig application upon the rhetoric of the Prelate." The Bishop compared "The Merits of the Church-Party" with "The Merits of the Whigs" in parallel columns. This parody also employs parallel columns-- they compare "The Merits of the Whigs" with "The Merits of the Staunch Tory-Faction." [Scott: A COLLECTION OF SCARCE AND VALUABLE TRACTS... VOLUME THIRTEENTH. London: 1815. Page 521-559.]

     "Attributed by contemporaries to Charles Hornby. A pro-Whig parody upon Francis Atterbury's tract of the same title." OCLC.

OCLC 228763868 [2-Huntington Library, National Lib. Scotland].             $150.00

            Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

71.   Horsmanden, Daniel: A JOURNAL OF THE PROCEEDINGS IN THE DETECTION OF THE CONSPIRACY FORMED BY SOME WHITE PEOPLE, IN CONJUNCTION WITH NEGRO AND OTHER SLAVES, FOR BURNING THE CITY OF NEW-YORK IN AMERICA, AND MURDERING THE INHABITANTS... New York: Printed by James Parker, 1744. Quarto. [2], vi, 205, [3], 16 pp. Lacking the half title, as usual. Untrimmed in original plain, pale gray wrappers [backstrip mostly lacking]. Some occasional mild toning and dust, Near Fine. [with] Document signed by Horsmanden, dated 12 April 1768, laid in, as Chief Justice of the Province of New York. It attests that he has duly qualified Philip Livingston and three others to act as trustees of the estate of Abraham Depeyster, "late Treasurer." Book and document laid in a modern blue cloth slipcase, with gilt-lettered spine title on red morocco.

 

     The rare first edition, in unusually attractive condition, recording one of the most shameful occurrences in the history of New York City. Howes rated it a "c" for rarity two generations ago. The second edition was published at London in 1747. Before he became Chief Justice, Horsmanden, who had been law-trained in England, was one of the Judges in the trials which he describes here.

     "This is one of the most important printed records of the early history of New York City and the main source of information respecting the Negro Plot of 1741, an event which threw the city and even the colonies into a state of fear. 'Slavery,' says Eugene Lawrence, 'has nowhere presented itself in a more odious form than in early New-York. The slaves for a small provocation were whipped and tortured...It is supposed that they formed at this time about one sixth of a population of twelve thousand...The rumor of a plot drove the most reputable citizens into deeds of unexampled cruelty. It forms the darkest blot upon the history of New York.'

     "...Two thirds of the accused were found guilty, and from the list at the end of the book we learn that of these 18 negroes and 2 white persons were hanged, 13 negroes were burned at the stake, and 70 were transported." Church [internal quotes by Church are from 2 Wilson, Memorial History of New York 252].

Howes H652c. Evans 5413. Church 951.                                                       $25,000.00

 

72.   [Houston, Samuel]: SPEECH OF MR. HOUSTON, OF TENNESSEE, DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, ON THE MASSACHUSETTS CLAIM. MARCH 25, 1826. [Washington: 1826]. 23, [1 blank] pp. Caption title [as issued], disbound, stitched, untrimmed. Lightly toned and foxed, else Very Good.

 

     A pre-Texas Houston speech, delivered when he was a Congressman from Tennessee, announcing he was "decidedly opposed" to reimbursing Massachusetts for military expenses during the War of 1812.

AI 24900 [2].                                                                                                  $150.00

 

73.   Huntoon, Rev. Benjamin: ADDRESS DELIVERED ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST, JUNE 24, ANNO LUCIS, 5840, BEFORE OTTAWA LODGE OF FREE AND ACCEPTED MASONS. BY...OF PEORIA, ILLS. Ottawa [Illinois]: Weaver & Hise, Printers, 1840. 12mo, 16pp, stitched and disbound, lightly foxed. Contemporary signature in inner margin of title page. Good+.

 

     Reverend Huntoon discourses on the ancient roots, the democratic character, the morality and overall greatness of Freemasonry. The printers, George Weaver and John Hise, were the only game in town for Ottawa. They published "the Illinois Free Trader, a Democratic paper published in Ottawa beginning in 1840." Byrd 497. The first Ottawa imprint that Byrd records [Byrd 497], also 1840, is the Illinois River Baptist Association's convention, which occurred in September 1840. The resolution to publish Huntoon's speech and Huntoon's acceptance are dated June 24 and July 6, 1840, respectively. So Huntoon's speech was probably printed first.

     This pamphlet is rare, owned, evidently, only by AAS. Sabin lists several pamphlets by Huntoon, all on the subject of Freemasonry and all delivered in Massachusetts or Maine. Although NUC lists a number of his publications, it does not record this one.

Not in Byrd, Sabin, American Imprints, Eberstadt, Soliday, Decker, NUC. OCLC 81052667 [1].                                                                                                 $450.00

 

74.   [Hyer, G.W.]: BISHOP HOPKINS' LETTER ON SLAVERY RIPPED UP, AND HIS MISUSE OF THE SACRED SCRIPTURES EXPOSED. BY A CLERGYMAN OF THE PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CHURCH. New York: John F. Trow, 1863. Original printed pink wrappers, stitched, 44pp. Wraps a bit sunned, Near Fine.

 

     John Henry Hopkins was the first Protestant Episcopal Bishop of the Diocese of Vermont. He made the serious faux pas of arguing, in a book written after issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation, that slavery is sanctioned by holy scripture and hence is not a sin. Hopkins's outraged and embarrassed co-religionists issued several rebuttals, this one quite scarce.

     "Our respect is due to the office of a Bishop; but our pity is demanded for the man who lends the weight of that office to justify Heathen Slavery. And, it is with feelings of sadness that we enter into the work of 'ripping' what he calls 'the array of positive proof' to that kind of servitude."

OCLC 24802269 [6]. Not in LCP, Dumond, Work, Blockson.                     $250.00

 

75.   Illinois: JOURNAL OF THE CONVENTION, ASSEMBLED AT SPRINGFIELD, JUNE 7, 1847...FOR THE PURPOSE OF ALTERING, AMENDING, OR REVISING THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS. Springfield: Lanphier & Walker, 1847. 592pp, with scattered light spotting. Bound in contemporary quarter sheep [substantially worn]. Good+.

 

     The proposed Constitution, which the people would adopt by referendum in March 1848, is printed at pages 544-572. Stephen Logan, formerly Abraham Lincoln's law partner, participated actively in the Convention. Among many interesting discussions is a prohibition on migration of Free Negroes, or slave-owners with their slaves, into the State. The Convention defeated overwhelmingly a proposal to remove the word 'white' as a qualifier to eligibility of male citizens to vote; but divided, often closely, over other proposals that would bar Free Negroes from common civil rights.

FIRST EDITION. Byrd 1195. I Harv. Law Cat. 985. Cohen, BEAL 3074.            $450.00

 

76.   Illinois Anti-Slavery Society: PROCEEDINGS OF THE ILL. ANTI-SLAVERY CONVENTION. HELD AT UPPER ALTON ON THE TWENTY-SIXTH, TWENTY- SEVENTH, AND TWENTY-EIGHTH OCTOBER, 1837. Alton: Parks & Breath, 1838. 36pp, bound in 20th century marbled wrappers. At head of title, 'Alton Observer.- Extra.' Light scattered foxing, Very Good.

 

    Elijah Lovejoy edited the Alton Observer and ran a printing press in Alton, Illinois, a Mississippi River town sympathetic to the views of the Deep South. This Convention met at Alton to organize the Illinois Anti-Slavery Society, calling for participation by "all those in the state who believe that the system of American slavery is sinful and ought to be immediately abandoned." Lovejoy's support of the Society, and the Observer's outspoken anti-slavery stance, had enraged his neighbors; Lovejoy and his brother Owen were among the hardy Alton souls who signed the call for the Convention.

     In November 1837, soon after this Convention adjourned, an Alton mob sacked Lovejoy's office, destroyed his press, and murdered him. The crime galvanized the anti-slavery movement, not only because of the mob's lawlessness, but because the event demonstrated that Slavery and precious freedoms of speech and expression could not co-exist. Parks & Breath, publishers of this item after Lovejoy's death, carried on for a while the tradition of an anti-slavery presence in this hostile Southern Illinois town.

     "Contains names of 245 who signed the call for the convention. Page 5 mentions that press of Observer had been destroyed in Alton three times in space of little more than a year. Pages 21-23 contain constitution...The last issue of the Observer published by Lovejoy was that of August 10, 1837...This extra followed the last regular number and certainly was printed in Alton." Byrd.

FIRST EDITION. Byrd 391. Work 300. LCP 5103. Dumond 67. AI 50957 [5].                                                                                                                                        $2,000.00

 

77.   Indian Hill Cemetery: THE ADDRESSES, DELIVERED AT THE DEDICATION OF THE INDIAN HILL CEMETERY; WITH THE ARTICLES OF ASSOCIATION, BY-LAWS, &C., &C. Middletown: Charles H. Pelton, Printer, 1850. Contemporary plain wrappers [worn, spine shorn], large folding plan of the cemetery. 48, [2] pp. Scattered foxing, Good+.

 

     This Rural Cemetery was constructed to prevent the rising tide of urbanization from causing "desecration of the remains of friends and relatives." A list of Stockholders and their chosen cemetery lots is included; as are a list and brief biography of 'Indian Proprietors of Mattebeseck, and their Descendants, Whose Names Appear in the Town Records, from 1673 to 1749,' by Joseph Barratt. As OCLC notes, the final two pages are "misnumbered 3-4."

FIRST EDITION. Sabin 48870. OCLC locates eight copies under three accession numbers.                                                                                                          $150.00

 

78.   [Jackson, Robert?]: AN HISTORICAL REVIEW OF THE CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT OF PENNSYLVANIA, FROM ITS ORIGIN; SO FAR AS REGARDS THE SEVERAL POINTS OF CONTROVERSY, WHICH HAVE, FROM TIME TO TIME, ARISEN BETWEEN THE SEVERAL GOVERNORS OF THAT PROVINCE, AND THEIR SEVERAL ASSEMBLIES. FOUNDED ON AUTHENTIC DOCUMENTS. London: R. Griffiths, 1759. Original calf [lightly rubbed], rebacked in period style, with gilt-lettered red morocco spine label. viii, [18], 444 pp, with pages 441-444 bound out of order. Lightly foxed, upper blank margin of title leaf repaired without any text loss, else Very Good.

 

     The book is often attributed to Benjamin Franklin, "who must have had a hand in it" [Howes], but he firmly disclaimed the honor. Paul Ford nevertheless nominated Franklin, "for he was at that time the only person in London who had the knowledge and material for such a book; he was the only person interested in the writing of it, and was indeed virtually sent to London for just such work; and he was the person who paid the cost of publication, and distributed the copies." In any event, modern scholarship gives the credit to Franklin's London co-agent, Jackson.

     The book is a detailed source for the controversies on quit rents, paper money, the Penn family and its privileges, conflicts between colonial governors and popular assemblies, Indian relations, and the French and Indian War.

FIRST EDITION. Howes P204. Ford, Franklin 253. Stevens, Rare Americana 363. Bartlett, John Carter Brown Catalog 1217.                                                  $1,000.00

 

79.   [Jervis, J.B.]: LETTERS ADDRESSED TO THE FRIENDS OF FREEDOM AND THE UNION, BY "HAMPDEN." ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE NEW YORK 'EVENING POST'. New York: Wm. C. Bryant & Co., Printers, 1856. 20pp, stitched. Title page lightly foxed, else Very Good.

 

     Jervis, "well known to the whole country for his important achievements as a Civil Engineer," was a Democrat until the 1856 elections. He concludes that "slavery and freedom are antagonistic." Indeed, "the slaveholders are now the basis of an aristocracy, already bold and exacting, that must, if not checked, subvert the long cherished principles of individual freedom." In Kansas the "Buchanan democrats" have "spoiled the ballot-box, destroyed the presses of free State men, burned their habitations, plundered the property, imprisoned and murdered them, and all for the crime of espousing the cause of freedom." He urges his fellow anti-slavery Democrats to vote for Fremont.

     The pamphlet was also printed in a 12-page edition by the Fremont campaign.

FIRST EDITION. LCP 5302 [12pp]. Sabin 36072. Not in Dumond.           $275.00

 

80.   Kent, James: A COURSE OF READING, DRAWN UP BY THE HON. JAMES KENT, (LATE CHANCELLOR OF THE STATE OF NEW-YORK,) FOR THE USE OF THE MEMBERS OF THE MERCANTILE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION. New York: Wiley and Putnam, 1840. Original printed wrappers ['Chancellor Kent's Course of Reading'], stitched. 69, [1 blank] pp. Foxed, else Very Good. Ownership signature of Russell G. Talcott.

 

     Chancellor Kent's Course is designed for members of the Mercantile Association "who entered their professions in early life, without the guidance afforded by collegiate instruction." Kent's "catalogue of select books" is "adapted, in my judgment, to the diversified tastes and wishes of the members." The Chancellor assures that he is familiar with each of the books. "Indeed, I may say that eighteen-twentieths of them are in my own library, the gradual accumulation of the last fifty years."

     The subjects traversed include Ancient Literature, Modern Literature, American History, Travels, Voyages, Biography, Poetry, Fiction, Science, Constitutional and Commercial Law, Moral Science, Natural and Revealed Religion. These are the staples of what used to be called a Liberal Education. Kent includes detailed comments on many of the entries.

FIRST EDITION. AI 40-3710 [5]. Not in Cohen, Marke, or Harv. Law Cat. 

$600.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

81.   Knights of Labor: AN APPEAL TO THE WAGE-WORKERS AND BUSINESS MEN OF NEW YORK. ON BEHALF OF 300,000 HUMAN BEINGS WE APPEAL TO YOU TO RENDER FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE TO THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN BROUGHT TO THE VERGE OF STARVATION BY THE POWERS THAT IMPEDE THE BUSINESS INTERESTS OF THE COUNTRY AND IMPOVERISHES THOSE WHO ARE DEPENDENT UPON SAID INTERESTS. WE APPEAL TO YOU TO SET THE SEAL OF YOUR CONDEMNATION ON THE POLICY OF MR. CORBIN AND HIS ASSOCIATES; THE POLICY THAT WOULD FORCE THE PEOPLE INTO A POSITION OF ABJECT SLAVERY; A POSITION SO OUTRAGEOUSLY FOREIGN TO THE AMERICAN IDEA OF INDUSTRY, THAT DEATH ITSELF WOULD BE PREFERABLE...COMMITTEE OF ARRANGEMENTS K. OF L. OF NEW YORK AND VICINITY. [New York: 1888]. Broadside, 8 1/2" x 11". A couple of fold splits expertly repaired. Printed in several type styles and fonts. A contemporary manuscript letter on verso, on personal matters unrelated to the subject of the broadside. Good+.

 

    The Knights of Labor was established in 1869, and became a formidable opponent of powerful concentrations of capital. In 1884 and 1885 the Knights ordered strikes against Jay Gould's railroads. Here the Knights attack Austin Corbin, President of the Reading Railroad, against which the Knights ordered a strike in 1887. The strike was not successful; and the Reading Railroad then required, as a condition of employment, that prospective employees renounce all connection with the Knights of Labor or any other labor organization. This broadside calls Corbin's Company "the most cruel and inhuman corporation in the country," and urges attendance at a protest meeting on February 12, 1888.

Not located on OCLC.                                                                                   $350.00

 

82.   [Lafayette, Marquis de]: EPISTLE FROM THE MARQUIS DE LA FAYETTE, TO GENERAL WASHINGTON. Edinburgh: Printed by Mundell & Son..., 1800. [4], 32 pp. Disbound, shallow chip to blank edge of title leaf, one numerical rubberstamp. Else Very Good.

 

     "This exceedingly rare poetical piece was written during the lifetime of General Washington, but was not printed until after his death." Sabin. With Notes "by the Editor." ESTC says the poem is, "In fact by George Hamilton. Also erroneously attributed to Anne Bannerman."

FIRST EDITION. ESTC T115459 [12 locations]. Sabin 38570. OCLC 78226434 [1- Clements], 614442475 [1- U Aberdeen].                                                      $450.00

 

83.   Le Duc, W.G.: THE MINNESOTA YEAR BOOK FOR 1853. St. Paul: Published Annually by Le Duc & Rohrer, Booksellers and Stationers, [1853]. 12mo, folding map frontis: 'Map of Minnesota Territory 1853.' Original printed wrappers, stitched. 37, [17 advt.] pp. Persistent, generally light staining at lower forecorner. Light to moderate wear. Good+, with the map in Very Good shape. The running title is 'Minnesota Year Book, and Travelers' Guide.'

 

     The first annual printing was in 1851. This offering, unlike its predecessors, includes a rare folding map. It also has an almanac-style calendar, lists of 'Members and Acts of the Third Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Minnesota;' and describes Minnesota's geology, soil, climate, rivers, lakes, minerals, red pipe stone, agricultural products, fish, lumber, procedures for making land claims, "How to Spend a Day Profitably in Sight-Seeing," "How to Get to Minnesota." Clergy, schools, steam-boat arrivals are also listed.

     The advertisements recommend, not only St. Paul merchants and business establishments, but St. Louis ones as well. "The Merchants of St. Louis, whose advertisements will be found in the following pages, respectfully call the attention of the merchants of the Upper Mississippi" to the greatness of St. Louis as a commercial center. Several of the advertisements are for Le Duc and his partner, their book store and fishing equipment being prominently displayed; and for Le Duc himself, attorney and counsellor at law.

FIRST EDITION. Howes L179aa. Graff 2437. 138 Eberstadt 450. AII [MN] 63. Jenkins Full Howes 1501. OCLC 41475941 [1].                                                  $750.00

 

84.   [Leffingwell, Sam. L.]: TO WAR DEMOCRATS AND ALL UNION MEN. [Lebanon, Ohio? 1868]. Broadside, printed in three columns. 8.5" x 11". Light edge wear, Very Good.

 

     A rare broadside by a former employee of the Lebanon, Ohio Patriot, whose editorial page supported the Copperhead Clement Vallandigham's bid for a Congressional seat in the 1868 elections. The Democrat Vallandigham-- "the ever-present, ever-incessant and unwelcome destroyer of Democratic peace and quiet"-- was "the most despised of all traitors" during the Civil War, having used "every means to help traitors in the destruction of the Government." Supporting the rest of the Democratic ticket, headed by Seymour and Blair, he urges his fellow Ohio Democrats to "wipe from the mind of decent existence the polluted name of Clement L. Vallandigham."

Not located on OCLC.                                                                                   $600.00

 

85.   Lincoln, Abraham: BEARDLESS LINCOLN CAMPAIGN COVER, ADDRESSED TO MR. GEORGE L. WILLSON, TOPSHAM, ME. [n.p.: 1860s?]. Yellow cover, 3.25" x 5.25". Beardless portrait of Lincoln in oval border at upper left corner. Three cent rose postal stamp of George Washington at upper right corner with partial postmark over it [postmark illegible]. Right edge cut open unevenly with partial loss of blank edge of cover. Lightly dustsoiled. Very Good.

 

     Lincoln did not grow a beard until he was elected President in November 1860. The postal stamp was first issued in August 1861, as one of the new series of stamps issued after commencement of hostilities in order to "prevent the fraudulent use of the large quantity of stamps remaining unaccounted for, in the hands of the postmasters in the disloyal states." II Brookman, The United States Postage Stamps of the 19th Century.

     George L. Wilson [one 'L' in surname] is listed in the 1860 Federal Census as born around 1838, living with Arthur L. Wilson and family in Topsham, Maine, and working as a farm laborer. In the 1870 Federal Census he is a married farmer. The U.S. Civil War Draft Records for 1863-1865 and the U.S. Civil War Draft Registration Records for 1863-1865 confirm his birth year and personal information, and list him with Class I, 2nd Congressional District, under Capt. John S. Baker, Provost Marshall.

Milgram, Abraham Lincoln Illustrated Envelopes and Letter Paper 1860-1865, No. 9.

                                                                                                            $250.00

 

86.   Lincoln, Abraham: BEARDLESS LINCOLN CAMPAIGN COVER, POSTMARKED MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE, DEC. 5, 186[1?], ADDRESSED TO MR. A.W. CUNNINGHAM IN VIRGINIA, ILLINOIS [CASS COUNTY]. Chicago: Engraved & Published by Ed. Mendel, 162 Lake St., [1861?]. Orange cover, 3" x 5.5". Beardless portrait of Lincoln at upper left corner. Three cent rose postal stamp of George Washington at upper right corner, canceled with black target rubberstamp. Postmarked at Memphis, Ten., Dec. 5, 1861[?] [numbers partly obscured]. Light dust, Very Good.

 

     See the previous catalog entry for further discussion of this campaign cover. It is especially interesting that this envelope was posted in Memphis, with delivery addressed to Virginia, Illinois. Memphis was a major slave-trading center on the Mississippi River in the heart of  Tennessee's Confederacy. Cass County, Illinois, is about 35 miles west of Springfield, the focus of Lincoln's political and legal career.

     Andrew Cunningham [1806-1895] was born in Scotland to a well-to-do landowner. A tanner who settled in Cass County in 1835, he constructed and operated the first tannery in Cass County, one of the County's earliest and most important industries. His house, listed in the National Register of Historic Places, stands today. [Newton: 2 Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois, pages 675-678; and Wikipedia].

Milgram, No. 55.                                                                                             $1,250.00

 

87.   Lincoln Trade Card with Photo: GREAT BARGAINS IN NEW AND FASHIONABLE CLOTHING, CLOTHS, FURNISHING GOODS, HATS, CAPS, &C., AT| BROWNELL & HOWLAND'S,| NO. 119 UNION STREET, NEW BEDFORD.| WOOLEN REMNANTS! WOOLEN REMNANTS! |ARE OFFERED AT PRICES WHICH ARE BOUND TO INSURE QUICK SALES.| ABRAHAM LINCOLN. [New Bedford? 1863-1865?]. Small advertising collector's card, 2.5" x 4", printed on card stock using different typesettings. Photograph of bearded Abraham Lincoln inlaid at center, oval 1/2" x 3/4", surrounded by deeply embossed ornamental border. At foot of verso is small paper label, 9/16" x 13/16", of Salisbury Bros. & Co., Manufactures of Carte de Visites of Noted Persons, of Providence, R.I. Verso shows signs of gluing into an album with light paper loss from removal affecting two very small areas of Salisbury label [partial loss of one word and part of the border]. Else Very Good.

 

     This photograph is from a portrait of a seated and bearded Lincoln attributed to Alexander Gardner and taken in November 1863 or February,1864.

     The June 1860 Federal Census Non-Population Schedules lists this clothing company in New Bedford's Ward 4, with $8500 inventory value. A copy of the Whaleman's Shipping List for 6 October 1863 has an advertisement for Brownell & Howland at its Union Street address; the tailoring department is "under the direction of Mr. Alexander Millman, late of the firm of Hillman & Tripp, and... Mr. George Hall, late of the firm of Hall & Worth, as salesman..." The 1865 Directory of New Bedford lists Reuben R. Howland of Brownell & Howland; and Millman as the Company's tailor.  $275.00

 

88.   Lodge, Henry Cabot [editor]: THE WORKS OF ALEXANDER HAMILTON. CONSTITUTIONAL EDITION. New York: Knickerbocker Press, [1903]. 12 volumes, each in original half brown morocco and marbled boards, gilt-lettered spine titles, and raised spine bands. Port. frontis in volume one, with original tissue guard. Occasional mild text spotting in volume one, else clean and Near Fine.                                $375.00

 

89.   Lusk, William: THE OHIO REGISTER, AND WESTERN CALENDAR, CONTAINING AN ALMANACK FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1821... Columbus: Published by the Author. Monitor Office, David Smith, Printer, [1820]. 60pp, stitched in later marbled wrappers. Lightly toned, untrimmed, small chip at last leaf, affecting a letter or two. Else Very Good.

 

     In addition to the usual astronomical data, this early Ohio Register prints a description of Cincinnati, a woodcut of "the anatomy of a man's body," lists of Federal officers, Ohio officers by County [including Justices of the Peace], postal rates, names and locations of Ohio postmasters, Masonic lodges and officers, Militia officers. An Index is included at the end.

Drake 9065 [4]. AI 2595 [3]. Not in Thomson, Eberstadt.                            $400.00

 

90.   Man, A Plain Practical: REMARKS ON THE AUCTION SYSTEM, AS PRACTISED IN NEW-YORK: TO WHICH ARE ADDED NUMEROUS FACTS IN ILLUSTRATION. BY A PLAIN PRACTICAL MAN. New York: 1828. 56pp, loosened. Inner blank margins of first several leaves quite worn, but a complete text. Toned, Good.

 

     The Preface, dated December 1828, explains that the author contributed this pamphlet to the New York Anti-Auction Committee, which sought to stamp out public auctions in New York. He argues that the auction "system holds out strong temptations to violate integrity." Auctions are "paralyzing the efforts, and rendering futile the plans of regular merchants, by the constant fluctuations in the prices and qualities of goods."

Not in Sabin, American Imprints, Rink, Eberstadt. OCLC locates a number of institutional copies.                                                                                               $250.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

91.   Marcy, Randolph B.: EXPLORATION OF THE RED RIVER OF LOUISIANA, IN THE YEAR 1852. BY RANDOLPH B. MARCY, CAPTAIN FIFTH INFANTRY U.S. ARMY; ASSISTED BY GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN, BREVET CAPTAIN U.S. ENGINEERS. WITH REPORTS ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE COUNTRY, AND NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS. Washington: Nicholson, 1854. 33d Cong., 1st Sess. HED ___. Original dark cloth [some chipping]. Pages xv, [1 blank], [1]-286, 12 full-page Landscape illustrations, 10 full-page Geological Sections, 6 full-page Paleontology engravings, 18 full-page Zoology plates, 19 full-page botany plates [plate 18 not published, as issued]. The map volume is not present. Scattered foxing. Good+. Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard's copy, signed on the front free endpaper: "G.T. Beauregard. Corps of Engineers. New Orleans. La."

 

     A foundation work in the exploration of the American West, "still of great authority." Raines. "Marcy's official report on his expedition to the headwaters of the Red and Canadian rivers in Louisiana, northern Texas, and New Mexico, providing a major source on the region's natural history, Indian tribes, and prospects for establishing forts and a railroad route." Jenkins Full Howes. "Written by one of the greatest 19th century American explorers, this is one of the most interesting accounts of an original exploration of unknown parts of Texas." Jenkins BTB. It provides "authentic information regarding the peculiar customs of the Indians of the southern plains." Field. "Marcy's report abounds in topographical and geographical detail." Wagner-Camp. Plate XVIII of Botany was not published.

Howes M276. Wagner-Camp 226:3. Raines 146. Jenkins Full Howes 1647, Basis Texas Books 135. Field 1006.                                                                          $450.00

 

92.   Mason, Mrs.: ELLEGIAC POEMS, SACRED TO FRIENDSHIP. BY MRS. MASON. [Greenwich, Mass.: J. Howe? 1803]. [12] pp. Caption title [as issued], stitched, untrimmed, uncut. Lightly tanned, minimal foxing. Small hole through second leaf [no text loss]. Else Very Good.

 

     Three sad poems on the deaths of young people: "On the Death of Mr. Ranslure Clark who Died of Putred fever Oct. 25, 1802. in the eighteenth year of his age;" "On the Death of Daniel Clark who died Feb. 4th, 1803. In the Ninth year of his age;" and "On the Death of Mary Weld Clark who died of the Measles May, 19th 1803. Aet. Sixteen Months."  With "An Address to Christian Parents in affliction," by the Rev. Joseph Blodget at pages [10-12].

     American Imprints, locating only the AAS copy, suggests the imprint and date.

Stoddard, Unrecorded Wegelin 158. AI 4590. Not in Wegelin.                   $250.00

 

93.   Mather, Samuel: AN APOLOGY FOR THE LIBERTIES OF THE CHURCHES IN NEW ENGLAND: TO WHICH IS PREFIX'D, A DISCOURSE CONCERNING CONGREGATIONAL CHURCHES. BY...PASTOR OF A CHURCH IN BOSTON, NEW ENGLAND. Boston: T. Fleet, for Daniel Henchman, 1738. Original calf with raised spine bands [some rubbing] and a dulled spine title label. pp [8], ix, [1 blank], [errata leaf], 116 [i.e., 216]. Lacks the free endpapers. Rubberstamp at lower blank margin of title page, 'withdrawn' stamp on the front pastedown. Title leaf with a blank margin tear [and repair]. Scattered spotting, Good+.

 

     Mather argues for "the Royal Favour and Protection in the undisturb'd Enjoyment of the Liberties of our Churches and Schools." His preface, in the form of a dedication to "Mr. Holden, one of the Directors of the Bank of England, at London," emphasizes "that it would by no Means do well for [the King] to take away from the People of New-England any of their Privileges," which were "confirm'd unto them by the Charter, which was granted to this Province by King William and Queen Mary of glorious and immortal Memory." Mather explains the governing principles of New England's Congregational churches, and their differences with-- and advantages over-- the "National churches in various Kingdoms and Countries, with an Uniformity of Doctrine and of Discipline." Those national churches require "the Aid of the secular Powers," but the Congregational way is independent of them.

FIRST EDITION. Evans 4275. Holmes, Minor Mathers 60 [reproducing the title page at page 113]. Brinley Sale 1323.                                                                           $1,000.00

 

94.   McArthur, Arthur: ADDRESS BY THE LOYAL DEMOCRACY OF WISCONSIN, TO THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE. REPORTED BY ARTHUR MCARTHUR, AND ADOPTED IN CONVENTION AT JANESVILLE, SEPTEMBER 17, 1863. Milwaukee: Daily Wisconsin Steam Printing Establishment, 1863. 13, [3 blanks] pp. Stitched and disbound, small ink accession number in blank portion of title leaf, else Very Good.

 

     The Reporter and Chairman, Arthur McArthur, was the father of the Hero of Missionary Ridge, the 18-year-old Arthur McArthur [later changed to MacArthur], 1st Lieutenant of the 24th Wisconsin Infantry who won the Congressional Medal of Honor for valor at the Battle of Chattanooga in 1863. The Reporter's grandson, also a Medal of Honor winner, was General Douglas MacArthur.

      Arthur Senior was a War Democrat who later became a Republican and a Grant appointee. Here Wisconsin's War Democrats, meeting two months after the fall of Vicksburg and the Battle of Gettysburg, emphasize the patriotic duty "of unflinchingly supporting the Federal Government in its perilous struggle for existence." They lament that the National Democratic Party, with its "querulous carpings...has been betrayed into a position destructive of its usefulness, dishonorable to its patriotism, and entirely inconsistent with its history and achievements." The Address urges the repudiation of the Northern traitors, and support for the national administration.

FIRST EDITION. AII [WI] 42. Not in Sabin, Dumond, Bartlett, LCP, Monaghan.

$850.00

 

95.   [Merrell, H.B.]: NEW ORLEANS, DECEMBER 14TH, 1857.| DEAR SIR:| UNDERSTANDING THAT YOU HOLD ACCEPTANCES OF MESSRS. BEEBEE & CO., OF NEW YORK, UPON BILLS OF EXCHANGE DRAWN BY ME, I TAKE THE LIBERTY OF PLACING BEFORE YOU A STATEMENT OF FACTS.| I HAD EVERY CONFIDENCE, UP TO THE TIME I RECEIVED THE VERY UNEXPECTED INTELLIGENCE OF THEIR FAILURE, THAT BEEBEE & CO., WERE RICH BEYOND QUESTION AND AS SAFE AS ANY BANK ON WALL STREET. I HAD TO MY CREDIT WITH THEM AT THE TIME OF THEIR SUSPENSION, OF CASH REMITTANCES [AND INTEREST IN MY FAVOR] THE SUM OF ABOUT $530,000... I HAVE DONE AND I AM STILL WILLING TO DO ALL THAT CAN BE HONORABLY EXPECTED OF ME TO PAY MY CREDITORS TO THE EXTENT OF MY ABILITIES AND TO OBTAIN A DISCHARGE.| I AM, YOURS RESPECTFULLY, H.B. MERRELL. New Orleans: December 14, 1857. Printed broadside, 7.75" x 9.75". Several small holes [affecting one letter], light old folds, light scattered spotting. Signed in type by H.B. Merrell. Good+.

 

     Beebee & Co. was one of the most prominent bullion dealers in the United States, with banking and exchange houses in Chicago, New York and Philadelphia. The Company failed during the Great Panic of 1857, and took Merrell down with it. The firm of H.B. Merrell & Co. is listed in the 1855 New Orleans Directory as a dealer of "Fancy French Goods, etc." This broadside letter was doubtless sent to Merrell's multiple creditors to explain his defaults and to promise payment under terms proposed here by Merrell.

     An unusual, ephemeral illustration of the terrible effect of bank failures during one of America's most serious depressions.                                                                 $250.00

 

96.   [Michie, Thomas Johnson]: THE VIRGINIA SCRIVENER, BEING A COLLECTION OF FORMS OF BONDS, CONTRACTS, CONVEYANCING, AND OTHER INSTRUMENTS OF WRITING, CAREFULLY SELECTED FROM THE MOST APPROVED AUTHORS, AND ACCOMPANIED BY PLAIN AND WELL ESTABLISHED EXPLANATORY RULES OF LAW: TOGETHER WITH THE MODE OF AUTHENTICATING DEEDS FOR RECORD IN ALL THE STATES OF THE UNION: ADAPTED TO THE USE OF THE PEOPLE OF VIRGINIA. PREPARED BY A GENTLEMAN OF STAUNTON. TO WHICH ARE PREFIXED THE CONSTITUTION OF THE U. STATES, AND THE BILL OF RIGHTS, AND NEW CONSTITUTION OF VIRGINIA. Staunton, Va.: Kenton Harper, Publisher, 1833. Contemporary full calf [some rubbing, bit of chipping at spine extremities] and spine lettering. 181pp, scattered foxing, old private bookplate. Good+.

 

     Forms and explanations to reduce transaction costs for "the plain farmer and mechanic."

FIRST EDITION. Haynes 12195. Swem 6142. 382 NUC 0548513 [8]. BEAL 8153. Not in Marvin, Marke, Harv. Law Cat., or AI.                                                         $450.00

 

97.   Miller, Anne Fitzhugh: SOMETHING FOR SOMETHING AT THE SUFFRAGE HEARING BEFORE THE JOINT JUDICIARY COMMITTEE AT ALBANY FEBRUARY 19, AND AT WASHINGTON, MARCH 3, 1908. AN ARGUMENT BY ANNE FITZHUGH MILLER  PRESIDENT GENEVA (ONTARIO COUNTY) POLITICAL EQUALITY CLUB. [Geneva, NY? 1908]. Pale blue sheet folded to oblong 3 1/2" x 6", with text in darker blue type. Near Fine.

 

     Ms. Fitzhugh speaks plainly for "3,714 signed suffragists" of Ontario county, New York. "Year after year" New York women have come to Albany. "In tones of appeal, in tones of warning, we repeat the grand and awful phrase, 'Taxation without representation is tyranny.' ...Do you realize that a part of every dollar you receive from the state, and a part of every dollar you expend for the state is forced from citizens who are prohibited by the state from giving their consent that you receive and disburse their money?" She states the case "in a nutshell-- The law compels us to give, and you seem willing to take our 'Something for Nothing.' "                                                                               $150.00

 

98.   Miller, Arnold W.: THE STATUS OF THE BAPTIZED CHILD. THE SUBSTANCE OF A DISCOURSE PREACHED BY APPOINTMENT OF THE SYNOD OF VIRGINIA ON THE 8TH OF OCTOBER, 1859, AND PUBLISHED AT ITS REQUEST, BY THE REV. ARNOLD W. MILLER, PASTOR OF THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, PETERSBURG, VA. Petersburg: Printed by A. F. Crutchfield & Co., 1860. Original printed front wrapper, stitched, 84pp. Small hole in front wrapper [not affecting text], spine wrapper shorn, light toning, lacking the rear wrapper. Else Very Good.

 

     A long and learned discourse, with elaborations on circumcision in "the Jewish Church." Miller argues "that the Infants of Church-members are born members of the Church," and that they "are born members of particular churches and not of the Church catholic."

FIRST EDITION. Haynes 12227. Not in Sabin.                                           $250.00

 

99.   [Mills, John T.]: THE LOYAL ROAD TO PEACE, AND THE DISLOYAL ROAD TO RUIN. PRESIDENT LINCOLN ON DEMOCRATIC STRATEGY. [np: 1864]. 4pp, folded, caption title [as issued]. One very minor chip at the upper blank forecorner, else Fine.

 

     Judge Mills reports on his interview with President Lincoln in which Lincoln explained that the Democrats' victory will destroy the Union: "There are now in the service of the United States near 200,000 able-bodied colored men, most of them under arms, defending and acquiring Union territory. The Democratic strategy demands that these forces be disbanded, and that the masters be conciliated by restoring them to slavery." Mills thus "saw that the President was not a mere joker, but a man of deep convictions." Pages 3-4 demonstrate that the Democrats' platform, declaring the War a failure, has won the support of Jefferson Davis.

FIRST EDITION. Monaghan 331. OCLC 4774021 [8]. Not in Bartlett or Sabin.

                                                                                                            $375.00

 

100.   Mitchell & Lewis Co.: THE MITCHELL. THIS JUSTLY CELEBRATED WAGON MANUFACTURED BY MITCHELL & LEWIS CO., LIMITED, RACINE, WIS., IS THE RECOGNIZED STANDARD ALL OVER THE WORLD.| IT HAS A REPUTATION ESTABLISHED AS "MONARCH OF THE ROAD." THIS TITLE HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED AND MAINTAINED, BECAUSE IT IS MADE AS NEAR PERFECTION AS A WAGON CAN BE MADE... BUY YOUR WAGON OF S.R. BUFORD & CO., VIRGINIA CITY, MONTANA, AGENTS FOR THE MITCHELL WAGON. [Virginia City MT? Racine, WI? @1880-1890]. Broadside, 8.5" x 11", color, illustrated. Printed with different typesettings. An illustration of the wagon is printed at the head of the broadside, green with yellow trim and red undercarriage and wheels. The name and address of S.R. Buford & Co. is also in red. This circular lists nine reasons for buying the Mitchell wagon. Fine.

 

     This broadside was likely printed in the late 1880s or early 1890s. An advertisement by Mitchell & Lewis & Co. for a similar model wagon with some similar wording is found in the Handbook of Agriculture, Volume 6, by Wisconsin Farmer Institutes, 1892, page 277.

     Henry Mitchell was a native of Scotland. He served several years as an apprentice, then emigrated to America. He settled near Chicago, and became the first wagon manufacturer in the Northwest. In 1864 his son-in-law, William T. Lewis, joined him in the business; its name changed to Mitchell & Lewis Co. The business became one of the largest in the country. S.R. Buford was a leading Virginia City citizen and businessman, who owned a dry goods store.                                                                           $175.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

101.   Mitchell, S. Augustus: MITCHELL'S TRAVELLER'S GUIDE THROUGH THE UNITED STATES, CONTAINING THE PRINCIPAL CITIES, TOWNS, &C. ALPHABETICALLY ARRANGED; TOGETHER WITH THE STAGE, STEAM-BOAT, CANAL, AND RAILROAD ROUTES, WITH THE DISTANCES, IN MILES FROM PLACE TO PLACE. ILLUSTRATED BY AN ACCURATE MAP OF THE UNITED STATES. Philadelphia: Augustus Mitchell, 1836. 78pp + folding color map showing roads, distances, rail, steam and canal routes, 17" x 22." Bound in original gilt-lettered, decorated red morocco [rebacked]. A couple of short fold splits to the map expertly repaired on blank verso. Very Good.

Howes M690. Phillips, Maps of America 890.                                               $750.00

 

102.   National Democratic Union Club of Harrisburg: AFRICAN SLAVERY REGARDED FROM AN UNUSUAL STAND-POINT. TERRITORIAL ABSTRACTIONS IGNORED AS NOW IMMATERIAL, AND A MORE RADICAL ISSUE RAISED. ADDRESS OF THE NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC UNION CLUB OF HARRISBURG, TO THE DEMOCRACY OF PENNSYLVANIA. [Washington: Lemuel Towers, 1860]. 8pp, caption title [as issued]. Untrimmed and generously margined. Blank edges chipped and brittle, Good+.

 

     The Address warns that the Republican "enemy" is "rapidly drifting into the embrace of ultra-Abolitionism," animated by "that vague belief in the equality of all races of men." The Republicans base their belief on the "absolutely false" assumption "that the negro is fit for liberty and ought to have it." The Address predicts that, "hereafter we may expect that true science will teach the world much more correct ideas in reference to races."

     The Address is signed in type by R.J. Haldeman, Chairman Executive Committee, and dated from Harrisburg in March, 1860.

Sabin 29605. Not in LCP,  Blockson.                                                                        $375.00

 

103.   National Republican Party in Rhode Island: EXAMINATION OF CERTAIN CHARGES AGAINST LEMUEL H. ARNOLD, ESQ, THE NATIONAL REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE FOR GOVERNOR, BEING A REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE, APPOINTED APRIL 12, 1831. Providence: 1831. 28pp. Loose gatherings, untrimmed. Toned with scattered foxing, else Very Good.

 

     Arnold won his election for Governor as an anti-Jackson man. This Report denounces the "inferior class of printing presses" which advocate the election of Arnold's opponent and print articles "teemed with gross personal abuse, and with direct charges or insinuations affecting his moral character and principles." In particular, the Report rebuts in detail the "defamatory" charges that Arnold used his official position to engage in corruption and fraud in his dealings with a Bank.

AI 8373 [5].                                                                                                    $275.00

 

104.   [New Orleans]: COMPTROLLER'S REPORT, EMBRACING A DETAILED STATEMENT OF THE RECEIPTS AND EXPENDITURES OF THE CITY OF NEW-ORLEANS, FROM JANUARY 1ST, 1853, TO JANUARY 1ST, 1854. ALSO A LIST OF OUTSTANDING WARRANTS ON THE TREASURER: AND AN ESTIMATE OF PROBABLE RECEIPTS AND EXPENDITURES FOR THE YEAR 1854, &C. New Orleans: Printed at the Daily Delta Book & Job Office, 1854. 231pp. Bound in modern mauve library cloth, stamped with gilt spine title and accession number. A couple of rubberstamps in blank margins of the title page, and within blank areas of the text.  Printer's flaw at lower forecorner of page 84 affects a few words. Good+.

 

     A detailed look at the financial status of New Orleans-- levee dues, licenses, taxes, public schools, street paving, printing, real estate receipts, jails, railroads, fines, coffee houses, drays and carts, cemeteries, balls and entertainments, chain gangs, shell roads, compensation, markets, law charges, lighting, etc. etc.

Not in Jumonville.                                                                                           $150.00

 

105.   New York: THE REPORT OF AN ACTION OF ASSAULT, BATTERY AND WOUNDING, TRIED IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE FOR THE PROVINCE OF NEW-YORK, IN THE TERM OF OCTOBER, 1764, BETWEEN THOMAS FORSEY, PLAINTIFF, AND WADDEL CUNNINGHAM, DEFENDANT. New York: Printed by John Holt, 1764. 4to. Disbound with scattered spotting. The complete copy is paginated [2], iv, 68 pp. Our copy lacks the half title, half the title leaf [which obliterates 'The Report...Tried'], and the final page [title page and final page supplied in facsimile].  Else Good+.

 

     The case is significant for its assertion of the primacy of the jury system in colonial America. Publication occurred to emphasize to New Yorkers "the pernicious Consequences" of British interference with local juries "by a Method entirely new, unconstitutional and illegal."

     Forsey had sued Cunningham for an assault and battery; a jury of their peers found for Forsey and assessed damages against Cunningham. Unhappy with the large amount of damages, Cunningham sought an appeal. He did not claim that the trial court committed any errors of law; he simply argued that the jury had misconstrued the facts. Allowing the appeal would have diminished the role of the jury in favor of appellate judges' assertions of their royal prerogatives. Nevertheless, Lieutenant Governor Cadwalader Colden permitted Cunningham to appeal. New Yorkers in 1764, already angered by British control of local affairs, found this interference with the role of the jury intolerable. They challenged Colden's decision to allow the appeal; in late 1765 the New York Assembly agreed. 

Shipton & Mooney 41438. Bristol B2464. NAIP w021834 [6, including the AAS copy, which is defective]. Cohen 11975.                                                             $450.00

 

106.   New York: REPORT OF THE STATE ENGINEER AND SURVEYOR ON THE CANALS OF THE STATE OF NEW-YORK, FOR 1855. Albany: 1856. Original printed wrappers with wrapper title [as issued]. Stitched, 224pp. One plate, one enormous folding map. Wraps a bit edge-chipped and a light rubberstamp, occasional light text toning, Very Good.

 

     The great New York canal system is "a source of just pride to every good citizen." Its advantages and scope are reviewed here.                                                 $275.00

 

107.   [New York Volunteer Militia]: MUSTER ROLL OF CAPTAIN HARRISON HOLLIDAY'S COMPANY, IN THE 30TH REGIMENT, [__ BRIGADE] OF THE NEW-YORK VOLUNTEER MILITIA COMMANDED BY COLONEL EDWARD FRISBY ORGANIZED UNDER A LAW OF THE STATE OF NEW-YORK, ENTITLED "AN ACT TO AUTHORIZE THE EMBODYING AND EQUIPMENT OF A VOLUNTEER MILITIA, AND TO PROVIDE FOR THE PUBLIC DEFENSE," PASSED APRIL 16, 1861; AND CALLED INTO THE SERVICE OF THE UNITED STATES BY THE PRESIDENT... FROM THE ___ DAY OF ____ 1861, [DATE OF THIS MUSTER] FOR THE TERM OF

_______ UNLESS SOONER DISCHARGED. [Troy, New York: 1861]. Broadsheet, 16.5" x 20". Printed muster roll for Company E, completed in manuscript in several columns: names of soldiers, rank, age, enlistment information, period of enlistment [all for two years], number of miles to place of rendezvous, and Remarks. Certified and signed by Harrison Holliday, as Captain of the "Poughkeepsie Volunteers," June 1, 1861, at Camp Union, Troy, N.Y. Old folds. Very Good.

 

     Members of Company E of the 30th Regiment were enlisted for two years under the command of Capt. Harrison Holliday and Lieut. Edgar S. Jennings. They were mustered in on April 26, 1861, at Poughkeepsie, New York. This muster roll lists one Ensign, four Sergeants, four Corporals, two Musicians [added later in pencil], and 68 Privates. Captain Holliday died on September 17, 1862 from wounds received at the Battle of Antietam. Lieut. Jennings took over the position of Captain until he was dismissed on April 14, 1862. Sergt. Sherman took over the position of First Lieutenant until he was dismissed on March 5, 1863. 

     The 30th Regiment left immediately to serve in the defenses of Washington, D.C., where they stayed until March of 1862. It later took part in the Battles of Groveton, Bull Run, South Mountain, Antietam, Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville. During its service, this Regiment lost six Officers and 72 Enlisted men as a result of death from combat, and two Officers and 31 Enlisted men as a result of disease. [New York Division of Military and Naval Affairs.]                                                                      $250.00

 

108.   Newton, Israel: DR. I. NEWTON'S ANTI-BILIOUS BITTERS, MUCH IMPROVED OF LATE. A PLEASANT CORDIAL STOMACH BITTER, PREPARED UNDER THE PARTICULAR DIRECTION OF I. NEWTON, NORWICH, VT. THEY ARE ALSO FOR SALE IN BOSTON, NEW YORK AND PHILADELPHIA, AND BY THE DRUGGISTS GENERALLY... ISRAEL NEWTON. Norwich, VT: January, 1846. One sheet, containing four uncut handbills or broadsides, identical in wording but several variations in type styles. 12" x 17 3/4". A couple of small fox spots, Near Fine.

 

     OCLC's entry for the University of Vermont explains that a handbill was "Intended to be packaged with boxes containing medication." OCLC 15232344. "Sheet contains four handbills with description and directions for use of bitters and 4 bottle labels." OCLC 209941964. The "prophylactic power" of the concoction is extolled.

OCLC locates five copies of this item, under three accession numbers.        $275.00

 

109.   North Carolina: PROCLAMATIONS BY THE GOVERNOR OF NORTH CAROLINA: TOGETHER WITH THE OPINION OF CHIEF-JUSTICE PEARSON, AND THE REPLY OF THE GOVERNOR. Raleigh: Standard Steam Book and Job Print., 1870. Original printed wrappers [spine and inner margin wear], stitched, 36pp. Lightly toned, lightly worn, Good+ or so.

 

     The subject of these proclamations is the Ku Klux Klan, the dangers it poses to law and order in North Carolina, and its threat to subvert its "constitutionally established" government. "The right of the people to have arms in their houses" is "sacred to freemen"; but "when, in time of peace, weapons of an extraordinary character are imported into the State by political organizations, and deposited and distributed in a secret manner among persons whose spokesmen deny the authority of the existing government, and who publicly declare that all government, to be authoritative and binding, must proceed alone from one race of our people...it is the duty of every officer and every citizen to be more than usually vigilant."

     Governor Holden warns of treason, publicizes the recent Act prohibiting persons from going masked or in disguise "with intent to terrify or frighten any citizen or community," proclaims that certain counties which have been taken over by the Klan are in a state of "insurrection", documents Klan atrocities, and orders the arrest of certain Klansmen. Justice Pearson, responding to a writ of habeas corpus from jailed Klansmen, agrees that the Governor has power to declare an insurrection but not to suspend the Great Writ. Holden refuses to obey; Pearson gracefully recedes, recognizing the limits of his judicial authority.

FIRST EDITION. Thornton, Official Publications 1911.                              $450.00

 

110.   North Carolina: REPORT OF THE CONVENTION COMMITTEE TO THE LEGISLATURE OF NORTH-CAROLINA, 1816. Raleigh : Printed by Tho. Henderson, Jun. State Printer, 1816. 7, [1 blank] pp. Folded, untrimmed, uncut. Tanned, else Very Good.

 

     In this rare Report, the Committee fulfills its mandate to determine whether changed conditions since 1776 warrant a Convention to amend North Carolina's Constitution. Growth in western Carolina's population has resulted in an "inequality of representation," a violation of "the first principles of a republican system of government...that a majority should govern." North Carolina's plan of representation is based, not on population, but on "the mere territorial limits of counties." Revision is thus necessary.

OCLC 38658645 [3], 26281654 [2]. Not in AI, BEAL, or Sabin. Not located in Thornton Official Publications.                                                                                      $450.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

111.   Offley, G.W.: A NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE AND LABORS OF THE REV. G.W. OFFLEY, A COLORED MAN, LOCAL PREACHER AND MISSIONARY, WHO LIVED TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS AT THE SOUTH AND TWENTY-THREE YEARS AT THE NORTH; WHO NEVER WENT TO SCHOOL A DAY IN HIS LIFE, AND ONLY COMMENCED TO LEARN HIS LETTERS WHEN NINETEEN YEARS AND EIGHT MONTHS OLD; THE EMANCIPATION OF HIS MOTHER AND HER THREE CHILDREN; HOW HE LEARNED TO READ WHILE LIVING IN A SLAVE STATE, AND SUPPORTED HIMSELF FROM THE TIME HE WAS NINE YEARS OLD UNTIL HE WAS TWENTY-ONE. Hartford, Conn.: 1859. Original printed wrappers, stitched, 24pp. Front wrap and early leaves spotted, Good+.

 

     The first edition of a rare slave narrative. An expanded printing issued in 1860. Greensbury Washington Offley was born in Maryland in 1808 to a free black man and a slave woman. "My mother was born a slave in the State of Virginia, and sold in the State of Maryland." The boy's father purchased him, then freed him at age 21. This Narrative describes his life in slavery, gives a biographical sketch of his parents, explains his religious views, and asserts that "we may be oppressed by man, but never morally degraded...And if any man is accepted with his God, then oppression, nor prejudice, or prisons, or chains, or whips, or anything formed by man, cannot degrade us."

Not in LCP, Work, Dumond, Blockson, Sabin. Dumond 86 and Sabin 56789 list the 1860 printing only. OCLC records six locations under three accession numbers. $1,750.00

 

112.   [Ohio Plat and Survey of Property Near Tuskarawas River]: PLAT AND SURVEY OF GEOE. MILLER'S LAND, 1820.| LOT NO. 5| BEGINNING AT THE N.E. CORNER OF SAID SECTION AND N.W. CORNER TO HEGBEES SURVEY AND RUNNING S ALONG THE E.B. OF SAID SECTION 136.92 CHAIN TO A STAKE IN SAID SECTION LINE AND N.E. CORNER TO WINDLE MILLERS LOT NO. 1 FROM THERE W ALONG THE N.B. OF SAID WINDLE MILLERS LAND 13.94 CHAIN... [Ohio]: 1820. 7.5" x 12.5". [4] pp, loose, entirely in manuscript. Title on first page in calligraphy, second page blank, third page contains detailed survey of Lot No. 5 and plat map of Lots 1-5, fourth page has appraisals of the five lots. A diagram shows a large plat of land divided into five sections: W. Miller, No. 1,  102.1.19 acres; D. Miller, No. 2, 187.2.11 acres; F. Miller, No. 3, 219.2.28 acres: I. Miller, No. 4, 158.2.00 acres; and T. Miller, No. 5, 190.0.21 acres. Old folds, several short splits and a few small holes [minimal loss]. Good+.

 

     The survey is of farmland along the Tuskarawas River in central Ohio. The original owners were probably local Native Americans. The Tuskarawas runs into the Ohio River; it was of great importance as a transportation route in 19th century America. The plat and survey divvies up George Miller's land for his immediate family members. The written text is detailed and carefully lays out the boundaries with reference to trees and local landmarks. A road is noted and shown crossing the lands in the direction of the village of Coshocton.                                                                                                    $250.00

 

113.   Paine, Elijah; and Duer, William: THE PRACTICE IN CIVIL ACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS AT LAW IN THE STATE OF NEW YORK, IN THE SUPREME COURT, AND OTHER COURTS OF THE STATE; AND ALSO IN THE COURTS OF THE UNITED STATES. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. [with] VOL. II. New York: G. & C. & H. Carvill, January 1, 1830; October 1, 1830. Two thick octavo volumes, in contemporary blue paper over boards, rebacked in pale cloth, original spines and original spine labels laid down. ix, [3], 660, [1]; x, 765, [1 blank], lxxvi pp. Scattered foxing, covers with light soil and wear, slight inner margin weakening. Annotated in margins and endpapers by contemporary owner. Good+ or Very Good.

 

     Paine was a New York Superior Court judge, a graduate of Harvard Law School, and worked for a time with Henry Wheaton, the Official Reporter of the United States Supreme Court. William Duer was active in Whig politics and was a lawyer based in Oswego, New York.

FIRST EDITION. Marvin 550. Cohen 9181. Marke 302. II Harv. Law Cat. 287.

                                                                                                            $750.00

 

114.   Paine, Thomas: A LETTER ADDRESSED TO THE ABBE RAYNAL, ON THE AFFAIRS OF NORTH-AMERICA. IN WHICH THE MISTAKES IN THE ABBE'S ACCOUNT OF THE REVOLUTION OF AMERICA ARE CORRECTED AND CLEARED UP. London: Ridgway. M,DCC,XII [i.e., 1792].  36pp. Disbound, Very Good with minor wear.

 

     A later printing of Paine's great work defending the American Revolution, with the printing date stated incorrectly and page 10 numbered '01.' Page 35, frequently printed as '3', is corrected here.

Sabin 58222n. Howes P25, Adams Controversy 82-66 (not noting this edition). 437 NUC 0023262 [3].                                                                                                   $250.00

 

115.   [Parsons, Aaron A.]: MANUSCRIPT LEDGER OF AARON A. PARSONS, TINSMITH, OF STAFFORD, CONNECTICUT, 1848-1851. Stafford, CT: 1848-1851. Tall ledger, 9" x 13". Hand-numbered pages begin at 44 [some leaves removed at beginning] and end at 240, followed by 3 blank pages [with a couple of leaves removed at the end, probably also blanks]. Two additional loose slips of accounting on different paper laid in. Bound in contemporary tooled and brushed leather with raised spine bands [rubbed, worn through at corners], gilt title and ownership initials on black spine labels [rubbed], marbled endpapers. Light scattered spotting, else clean and legible. Small rectangular cut-out at bottom of last two leaves [no text loss]. Very Good.

 

     This ledger was kept by Aaron A. Parsons of Stafford Springs, Connecticut. Parsons, identified in the two loose papers provided with the ledger, was a blacksmith and/or tinsmith with a thriving business. This volume contains entries dating from 1848-1851, the majority of which involve the repair and restoration of metalware. Entries include soldering and repairs made to a vast array of items including tea kettles, coffee pots, lead pipe, pumps, cylinders, milk pans, lamps, ovens, boilers, tin ware, oil cans, trunks, etc. Also includes entries for material used in the business as well as general goods bought and sold [coal, coffee, pipe, wire, rivets, castings, raisins, nutmeg, sheets of lead and tin, candle sticks, etc].

     The ledger is filled with the names of individuals and companies, including Horace Kellogg, Silas Babcock, Chauncey Smith, Staffordville Co., Lemuel Ingalls, Valley Co., Bacon & Smith, M.B. Harvey, Willington Thread Co., Hydeville Co., H.J. Whitney, Howe & Converse, Mineral Springs Co., Brown & Stroud, Granite Mill Co.,  Charles Whitney, Henry S. Whitney, Benjamin Salisbury, Joseph Blodgett, and many others.

                                                                                                            $600.00

 

116.   Pennsylvania: THE ACTS OF ASSEMBLY OF THE PROVINCE OF PENNSYLVANIA, CAREFULLY COMPARED WITH THE ORIGINALS. AND AN APPENDIX, CONTAINING SUCH ACTS, AND PARTS OF ACTS, RELATING TO PROPERTY, AS ARE EXPIRED, ALTERED OR REPEALED. TOGETHER WITH THE ROYAL, PROPRIETARY, CITY AND BOROUGH CHARTERS; AND THE ORIGINAL CONCESSIONS OF THE HONOURABLE WILLIAM PENN TO THE FIRST SETTLERS OF THE PROVINCE. PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF ASSEMBLY. Philadelphia: Printed and Sold by Hall and Sellers, 1775. Folio. xxi, [1 blank], 536, 22, [12], 3, [1 blank] pp, as issued. Light tanning, scattered foxing, occasional minor edgewear. Signature of owner at head of title page. Rebound in modern calf, Very Good.

 

     A chronological compilation of the colonial laws of Pennsylvania from 1700 through 1775, preceded by the earliest Charters.  

Evans 14364. Hildeburn 3147. Tower Collection 754.                                  $2,000.00

 

117.   Petersen, Fred'k A.: MILITARY REVIEW OF THE CAMPAIGN IN VIRGINIA & MARYLAND, UNDER GENERALS JOHN C. FREMONT, N.P.  BANKS, IRWIN MCDOWELL, FRANZ SIGEL, JOHN POPE, JAMES S. WADSWORTH, WM. H. HALLECK AND GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN. IN 1862, BY...A CONTRIBUTION TO THE FUTURE HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. New York: Tousey, [1862]. 55pp, stitched in original printed wrappers with wrapper title [as issued]. Lightly foxed, Very Good. [with] MILITARY REVIEW OF THE CAMPAIGN IN VIRGINIA & MARYLAND ... PART II.  1863. 69, [3 blanks] pp. Stitched in original printed wrappers with wrapper title [as issued]. Wraps dusted, else Very Good.

 

     Nevins says these two pamphlets are a "passionate, one-sided defense of McClellan; of little use, except as a lawyer's brief reflecting the strong feelings of the times." Nevertheless, the books review in detail the War's military operations in Virginia and Maryland during 1862.

FIRST EDITIONS. Howes P265. I Nevins 40. Haynes 13994.                    $275.00

 

118.   Pettibone Campaign Supply Company: ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF UNIFORMS, BADGES, BANNERS, AND CAMPAIGN EQUIPMENTS OF EVERY DESCRIPTION. FOR REPUBLICAN CLUBS. MANUFACTURED BY THE PETTIBONE CAMPAIGN SUPPLY CO., CINCINNATI, O. [Cincinnati: 1888]. 'Catalogue No. 3' printed at head of front wrapper and title. Original printed pale blue wrappers, stitched. 44, [1], [1 blank] pp. Mild wear to the wrappers. A Fine copy, beautifully illustrated, of a rare and interesting Catalogue.

 

     This exceptional trade catalogue is fully illustrated throughout, with nine pages in brilliant color. The frontis color plate is of the Harrison-Morton 1888 presidential ticket; others depict military and campaign uniforms, banners, and hats. Black-and-white illustrations are campaign banners for Blaine, Sherman, Ohio Governor Foraker, and the Harrison-Morton team; and an array of other Company products. The Company assures readers that it also issues catalogues for Democrats.

     This rare, attractive, and unusually fine trade catalogue is evidently unrecorded.

Not located on OCLC, or in Romaine or Winterthur.                                                $1,750.00

 

119.   Pope, Thomas: A TREATISE ON BRIDGE ARCHITECTURE; IN WHICH THE SUPERIOR ADVANTAGES OF THE FLYING PENDANT LEVER BRIDGE ARE FULLY PROVED. WITH AN HISTORICAL ACCOUNT AND DESCRIPTION OF DIFFERENT BRIDGES ERECTED IN VARIOUS PARTS OF THE WORLD, FROM AN EARLY PERIOD, DOWN TO THE PRESENT TIME. New York: 1811. 288pp, half title, illus. 18 plates, most with some foxing. Text lightly tanned, first few leaves spotted. Modern marbled boards with cloth spine, printed paper label on upper spine. Good+ or so.

 

     Pope's plan for a great "flying pendant lever bridge" over the Hudson is divided into four parts: a Historical Account; Mathematical Description of the flying pendant lever bridge invented by the author; General Remarks on the nature and strength of timber; Description of the author's patent chain bar arc for buildings. This is only the second American book on bridge building, the first having been Peale's Essay on Building Wooden Bridges [1797].      

     Pope surveys the world's great bridges, and includes handsome engravings of the Hampton Court Bridge, Wearmouth Bridge, Bridge of the Louvre, as well as his proposed bridge over the Hudson. Pope's patented design became the basis for the cantilever bridge.

FIRST EDITION. Rink 2658. AI 23721. Condit, American Building Art 66-87. Hitchcock 947.                                                                                      $1,000.00

 

120.   Priestley, Joseph: THE CONDUCT TO BE OBSERVED BY DISSENTERS IN ORDER TO PROCURE THE REPEAL OF THE CORPORATION AND TEST ACTS, RECOMMENDED IN A SERMON, PREACHED BEFORE THE CONGREGATIONS OF THE OLD AND NEW MEETINGS, AT BIRMINGHAM, NOVEMBER 5, 1789. Birmingham: Printed by J. Thompson. Sold by J. Johnson... [1789]. 16pp, scattered foxing. Good+, in modern wrappers.

 

     Priestley urges repeal of all laws which penalize Dissenters from the Church of England, "a church by which we are oppressed." Such laws are "disgraceful to our country," and place us in "servitude, not enjoying the privileges of other citizens and freemen."

ESTC T31164.                                                                                                $250.00

 

121.   Priestley, Joseph: A GENERAL VIEW OF THE ARGUMENTS FOR THE UNITY OF GOD; AND AGAINST THE DIVINITY AND PRE-EXISTENCE OF CHRIST, FROM REASON;- FROM THE SCRIPTURES;- AND FROM HISTORY. Philadelphia: Thomas Dobson, 1794. 12mo. 24pp, stitched, untrimmed and uncut. Minor soil, Near Fine.

 

     Priestley "was the chief early protagonist of the Unitarian movement in the United States." DAB.

Evans 27554.                                                                                                  $200.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

122.   Raphall, M.J., Rabbi: SERMON BY REV. DR. M.J. RAPHALL, RABBI; DELIVERED IN THE GREENE ST. HEBREW SYNAGOGUE, N.Y. JANUARY 4, 1861. Baltimore: James Lucas & Son, 1861. 20pp. Disbound, else Very Good.

 

     Rabbi Raphall delivers a sermon, also published in a more common New York edition, "to expose a pernicious fallacy": scripture does NOT denounce slaveholding as a sin. The Sectional Crisis has its origin in "the difference of opinion respecting slave-holding, which one section denounces as sinful, aye, as the most heinous of sins, while the other section upholds it as perfectly lawful." Tracing the history of slavery, Raphall says that, "next to the domestic relations of husband and wife, parents and children, the oldest relation of society with which we are acquainted is that of master and slave." Citing "the doom of Ham's descendants," he asserts that the Bible places slavery "under the same protection as any other species of lawful property." However, Raphall notes one crucial distinction between biblical slavery and Southern slavery: although the "Bible view of slavery" treats the slave as a human being with rights that must be respected, Southern slavery treats him "as a thing, and a thing can have no rights." Raphall's advice is for northerners to shut up, and for southerners to adopt Biblical slavery.

     "When the wide publicity and editorial comments on his address threatened to give an impression that American Jews as a class were pro-slavery, rabbis and Jewish laymen alike emphatically controverted his views. His loyalty to the Union remained beyond question, however, and one of his sons served as a commissioned officer in the Union army." DAB.

Singerman 1724. Sabin 67913n. LCP 8644. 481 NUC 0059197 [6].                        $1,500.00

 

123.   Reconstruction: THE REPUBLIC: A MONTHLY MAGAZINE, DEVOTED TO THE DISSEMINATION OF POLITICAL INFORMATION. VOLUME I, FROM MARCH TO DECEMBER, 1873. [offered with] VOLUMES II, III, IV, V, VI, VII. MARCH 1873 - DECEMBER 1876. Washington: The Republic Publishing Company, 1873-1876. Seven consecutive volumes, each in matching contemporary half brown morocco and marbled boards. Endpapers with bookplate, occasional rubberstamp; each title page with a faint blindstamp. Very Good.

 

     An excellent and rare source for the last years of Reconstruction and the Grant Presidency's final term. The magazine aimed "to uphold the Republican Party as the most appropriate, if not the only, means of obtaining reformatory legislation." The final issue appeared in June 1877, with the eighth volume.

     An enormous amount of contemporary material appears on the Civil War, including the horrors of Andersonville; Reconstruction in the defeated South; the fortunes and misfortunes of the Republican Party in the southern States; the condition of the freedmen and Southern resistance to Reconstruction; congressional and presidential elections; paper money, currency, tariffs, and banking; constitutional and legal changes.

Lomazow 822. OCLC 191227493 [2- AAS, Universita...Naoernberg].        $850.00

 

124.   Rees, Thomas: A NEW SYSTEM OF STENOGRAPHY, OR SHORT HAND. Philadelphia: Re-Printed by James Humphreys, from the Sixth London Edition, 1800. 3 1/2" x 5 1/4". 14, [2 blanks] pp, plus two leaves of plates [one of them folding, entitled, 'A Table of the manner of joining the Characters']. Stitched in contemporary plain wrappers [ownership signatures] Wrappers detached but present, widely scattered foxing. Else Very Good.

 

     The only 18th century American printing of this little pamphlet. Evans and NAIP say the attribution to Rees, a Unitarian minister, is "evidently in error," though the title page says he is the author. Whoever he was, the author explains in his Preface his intention to redress the deplorable inattention to "the least cultivated" yet "one of the most useful accomplishments which a man can possess." He demonstrates his system's use of the alphabet, consonants, diphthongs, triphthongs, etc. 

Evans 38364. Rink 1982. NAIP w013844 [6].                                              $1,250.00

 

125.   [Republican, A]: A LETTER TO JAMES FENNER, ESQ. [Providence? 1811?]. 8pp, bound in later marbled wrappers. Spotted, top margin trimmed closely but without affecting text, Good+.

 

     A rare, spirited attack on Governor Fenner, a Rhode Island Republican who had previously been United States Senator. When this pamphlet issued, Fenner had just finished his first term [of several] as Governor. The pamphlet does not mince words: Fenner is "inveterate, morose, implacable, and arbitrary." He is possessed by "weaknesses," "wayward temper," and is "rotten at the core." The anonymous author seeks to dissociate Republicans from "your views, your apostacy and persecutions; and...from any connexion or affinity with such principles as have governed your conduct." Examples of Fenner's unprincipled expediency are detailed. "You have proved the curse and the Judas of the Republican cause."

Bartlett [RI] 123. Sabin 24069. OCLC 54150578 [1- Yale]. Not in American Imprints.

                                                                                                            $450.00

 

126.   [Republican Party]: THE SHORTER CATECHISM OF NEGRO EQUALITY. [np: 1855-1864?]. Broadside, 6" x 9", spotted, a couple of small holes. Good or so.

 

     A scarce, ephemeral Republican Party broadside charging that Democrats, despite their claims that Republicans are the party "of negro equality," have themselves been the chief supporters of measures to enfranchise Negroes. "Who gave the negroes the right of suffrage in New York? The Democratic Party...Who married a negro woman, and by her had mulatto children?- Richard M. Johnson, a good Democrat" and Martin Van Buren's Vice President. "Who, with the above facts and many others staring them in the face, are continually whining about 'negro suffrage' and negro equality? The Democratic Party. All these things were done by Democrats, and yet they deny being in favor of negro equality, and charge it upon the Republicans-- just like the thief who cries 'stop thief' the loudest."

     The suggested date derives from the broadside's reference to Reuben Wood, a former Governor of Ohio and Chief Justice of the Ohio Supreme Court, who "is still a leader of the Democratic Party." Wood died in 1864. During Wood's judicial tenure, he decided to make "mulattoes legal voters in Ohio."

LCP 07196965 [3]. LCP 9401-2 [other printings].                                         $375.00

 

127.   Rhodes, John: THE SURPRISING ADVENTURES AND SUFFERINGS OF JOHN RHODES, A SEAMAN OF WORKINGTON: CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF HIS CAPTIVITY AND CRUEL TREATMENT DURING EIGHT YEARS WITH THE INDIANS, AND FIVE YEARS IN DIFFERENT PRISONS AMONGST THE SPANIARDS IN SOUTH-AMERICA. BY A GENTLEMAN PERSONALLY ACQUAINTED WITH THE UNFORTUNATE SUFFERER. New York: Printed for R. Cotton, by G. Forman, 1798. vii, [8]-250 [i.e., 252] pp. Pages 249-252 incorrectly numbered 247-250 [as issued]. Bound in contemporary full leather [front hinge cracked]. Small repair to one leaf, light to moderate fox, Good+.

 

     OCLC notes that "the narrative is in the first person and the statement is made on p. 10 that it is from Rhodes' own manuscript journal." But, Eberstadt says, "Rhodes holds something of a record in the number of captivities he claims to have endured." Ayer says the story is "probably fictitious." Field is inclined to agree, but notes that "it contains some curious details of the customs of the Indians of Central America."

FIRST EDITION. Evans 34461. 122 Eberstadt 306. Ayer [Supp. I] 123. Field 1299 [1799 ed.].                                                                                                               $850.00

 

128.   [Rollo, A.S.]: THE NEW PANTHEON OR THE AGE OF BLACK. New York: Rollo, 1860. Original glazed wrappers [oxidized, thus dulling the lettering]. 47, [1 blank] pp. Otherwise, about Fine.

 

     The author's hot anger and bitterness spill forth in verse against John Brown, "religious pretenders," "a class of small literati," "a motley class of sentimentalists in politics and morals," and others who support abolitionism. These preachers of "discord and destruction...have just enough of the milk of human kindness to nourish one species of the human family, while the blood that courses in their own veins is turned into a channel of discord against their own race."

     The poem inveighs, "That if cotton now is king of Southern people/ Nigger is God on every Northern steeple." And, "Five hundred thousand heads, or so, was all/ Marat required to mark an Empire's fall;/ Three hundred thousand Southern throats, well hacked,/ The Marat of the hour demands, well backed...A pike and torch in every Negro's hand/ To kill the master and lay waste the land."

FIRST EDITION. LCP 7072.                                                                                    $450.00

 

129.   [Ruffin, Edmund]: ANTICIPATIONS OF THE FUTURE, TO SERVE AS LESSONS FOR THE PRESENT TIME. IN THE FORM OF EXTRACTS OF LETTERS FROM AN ENGLISH RESIDENT IN THE UNITED STATES, TO THE LONDON TIMES, FROM 1864 TO 1870. WITH AN APPENDIX, ON THE CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES OF THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE SOUTH. "IF THIS BE TREASON, MAKE THE MOST OF IT." PATRICK HENRY- 1765. Richmond, Va: J.W. Randolph, 1860. Original publisher's cloth, with gilt-lettered spine title. ix, [1 blank], 416, 14 [publisher book lists] pp. Front inner hinge weakened, early leaves with some scattered margin foxing, else Very Good.

 

     As one of the foremost Southern Nationalists, Ruffin had the honor of firing the first shot to open the Civil War at Fort Sumter. When the War ended, he blew his brains out. His book, written before the election of 1860, presents Ruffin's "general propositions and argument in a novel." Its plot, in "a series of letters from an English resident in the United States" [Howes], is laid out in unusual detail by Howes.

     The  book illustrates, he says, the truth of his "main propositions-- that a northern sectional party, and majority, directing the action of the federal government, need not exercise any unconstitutional power, or commit any 'overt act' of usurpation, to produce the most complete subjection and political bondage, degradation, and ruin of the South; and that whenever the South shall choose to resist such oppression and impending subjugation, its means for safe and perfect defence, and for full retaliation of hostilities and injury, for achieving independence, and for securing the subsequent preservation of peace, and unprecedented prosperity-- all will be as certain as can be any events of the future, or as the most ardent southern patriots would desire." Neither Howes nor Haynes collates the advertising leaves at the end.

FIRST EDITION. Howes R493aa. Haynes 16150. LCP 9003.                    $1,250.00

 

130.   [S.H. Greene & Sons]: CHILDREN'S HANDKERCHIEF "SKIP ROPE" [Warwick RI? 1880-90s?]. Cotton cloth, 12.5" x 13.5". Printed in red and black on cream white background. A scene of five girls jumping rope in their dresses and fancy shoes, with trees and birds in the background. At the bottom of the picture are the words "SKIP ROPE" with a jump rope woven through the letters. A border of flowers and leaves surrounds the picture, and the entire kerchief is surrounded by a plain red border. Very light spotting at the top, edges have minor fraying. A small white box in the lower red border printed, "Martha Washington. S.H. Greene & Sons." Very Good.

 

     Simon H. Greene [1799-1885] and Edward Pike founded the Clyde Bleachery and Print Works in 1825 in Warwick, Rhode Island. They first engaged in bleaching and finishing white cotton goods, and expanded the plant to print in eight different colors. Upon Pike's death in 1842, Greene bought the Company, and continued the business with his sons. The Company used Martha Washington's likeness and name on cigar and handkerchief labels. Greene evidently sought thus to appeal to women, especially women unable to vote who would express their political views by wearing Greene's political bandanas from the Martha Washington line. Martha Washington is credited as having created the first American bandana in 1775.

Beard: 100 YEARS OF WESTERN WEAR. 1883. Page 25.                       $175.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

131.   Saint Paul & Duluth Railroad: DULUTH SHORT LINE. THE DIRECT ROUTE BETWEEN ST. PAUL, MINNEAPOLIS AND DULUTH, WEST SUPERIOR AND LAKE SUPERIOR POINTS. [Chicago]: July, 1896. Five panels, folded to 4" x 8 1/2". Unfolded, it measures 19 1/2" x 8 1/2". Its unfolded verso is an extremely attractive 'Bird's-Eye View of the Lake Region of Minnesota and the Saint Paul & Duluth R.R.' The Bird's-Eye View is colored in green and shows the route between Duluth on Lake Superior and Minneapolis-St. Paul, with towns and other points of interest along the way. The panels on the recto consist of time tables, engravings of the Sleeping Cars and Chair Cars, and information about the railroad. Light fold wear, Very Good.    $250.00

 

132.   [Sargent, John Osborne]: COMMON SENSE VERSUS JUDICIAL LEGISLATION; BEING THE REVIEW OF A LAW RECENTLY ENACTED BY THE SUPREME COURT OF MASSACHUSETTS. BY A LAYMAN. New York: Putnam, 1871. Original printed wrappers. [offered with] [Sargent, John Osborne]: THE RULE IN MINOT'S CASE AGAIN: AS RESTATED WITH VARIATIONS BY THE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT OF MASSACHUSETTS. BY A LAYMAN. New York: Putnam. 1871. Each pamphlet with original printed wrappers [worn along inner margins and spine]. Stitched, 34pp. Light blindstamp and light wear, Good+.

 

     Sargent speaks out against "this conspiracy against the English language," i.e. the Massachusetts Supreme Court's utterly obfuscating the duty of Trustees to distribute cash and stock dividends to the proper beneficiaries.

Sabin 76979.                                                                                                   $100.00

 

133.   Sherlock, Thomas: THE TRIAL OF THE WITNESSES OF THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS. N.B. NOT ONLY MR. WOOLSTON'S OBJECTIONS IN HIS SIXTH DISCOURSE ON OUR SAVIOUR'S MIRACLES, BUT THOSE ALSO WHICH HE AND OTHERS HAVE PUBLISHED IN OTHER BOOKS, ARE HERE CONSIDERED. Philadelphia: Printed by H. Tuckniss, for Ezekiel Cooper, no. 118, North Fourth-Street, near the Methodist Church, 1800. 12mo. 128, 15, [1 blank] pp. Bound in original sheep [lightly rubbed] with gilt spine bands. Mild spotting, Very Good. The last 15 pages, continuously signed, print "An Extract of a Short and Easy Method with the Deists." With contemporary bookplate on front pastedown: 'The Property of Shubael and Anna Cady, Providence'; rear pastedown has printed bookplate, accomplished in manuscript, showing S. Cady's loan of the book to the Circulating Library in Griswold; ownership inscription of Cady on front free endpaper.

Evans 38496. NAIP w028197.                                                                       $175.00

 

134.   [Small, George G.]: WILD OATS, AN ILLUSTRATED JOURNAL OF FUN, SATIRE, BURLESQUE, HITS AT PERSONS AND EVENTS OF THE DAY. New York: Collin & Small, 1872-1876. Forty-one non-consecutive issues [details upon request], each 16pp. Illustrated. Folio, 11" x 15", printed in four columns per page. Bound in quarter-leather with marbled paper-covered boards [some rubbing, front joint cracked at head]. Text lightly toned with light scattered foxing, light edgewear [occasional short closed tears, usually at fore-edges]. January 5, 1876 issue has a large section of the final column cut out of pp.5-6, and some wear with loss of a few letters. The Christmas Annual, 1872-1873, has an expertly repaired closed tear along a center horizontal fold [no text loss]. Bookplate on front pastedown. Very Good.

 

     This Journal was a venture by the publishing firm of Winchell & Small, soon to become Collin & Small. George G. "Bricktop" Small was the editor. Publication began around 1870 and ceased in 1881. Originally issued monthly, it soon became a popular bi-weekly and, by mid-October 1874, a weekly. Wild Oats was, as it proclaims here, "The best and only original comic paper published in America. It deserves the great reputation it has gained as the Punch of America, always noted for its hard hits and the excellency of its illustrations. Its spirited and telling pictorial satires have become an acknowledged power in society. Nor does its value depend alone on its illustrations. Its reading matter is of high literary merit, being original and first-class in all respects." The quality of its articles is suggested by the fact that the August 23, 1876 issue, which is NOT offered here, contains the first appearance in any form of Mark Twain's 'Tom Sawyer.' 

     Examples of articles found in the issues offered here: "Candid Confederate;" "White and Indian;'" "Daddy Rice 'father of negro minstrelsy;'" "The Black Detective...An exciting local black romance;" "Army Sketches- Capturing Emmittsburg with an Ammunition Train by Lt. J. Dark Chandlee." The issues are filled with cartoons and other illustrations such as: a New York Custom House cartoon- "Confound these railroad worms they're plague eating up our crops, have to apply CA squeeze;" prohibition cartoon- "Truth on the Face of It;" "The Niggers must be thinned out to make room for the down trodden white league;" cartoon of Thomas Nast, the famous political cartoonist, "Tommy sees snake again - A T-Nast-Y Cartoon" which shows Nast facing snakes with "sham reform politics and the press" written on them.

Lomazow A812. OCLC 191310327 [1-AAS], 25760246 [8].                       $850.00

 

135.   Smedes, William C.: SPEECH...DELIVERED AT APOLLO HALL, VICKSBURG, MISS., ON THE 27TH DAY OF OCTOBER, A.D. 1860, UPON THE RIGHT OF A STATE TO SECEDE FROM THE UNION. AND OTHER POLITICAL TOPICS. Vicksburg: Printed at the Job office of M. Shannon, Proprietor of the Whig, 1860. 40pp. Stitched and disbound. Title page a bit dusted, with two rubberstamps in blank margins. Blank foremargins with shallow but persistent chip, but a clean text. Presentation inscription "with the respects of The Author" to Rev. H.J. Van Dykes. Good+.

 

     Smedes was a well-connected and articulate Mississippi lawyer. Before the War he practiced law for a time with his friend S.S. Prentiss, was an original backer of the Southern Railroad Company of Mississippi, and served as its President during the War until his death in 1863. He also was reporter of decisions for the Mississippi Superior Court of Chancery and the Mississippi Supreme Court, and actively participated in the Protestant Episcopal Church's Diocese of Mississippi.

     An old Southern Whig, left behind by the growing strength of State Rights, Smedes speaks only a week before the presidential elections. He gloomily surveys the field of candidates. He loathes the "unhallowed ambition" of Lincoln, who "would weigh his own self-exaltation against the peace and safety of his whole country...A Kentuckian by birth, he has brought dishonor on his State and himself by accepting a nomination from a party, whose principles, if carried out, would degrade one half the nation." Smedes' favorite candidate is John Bell, who "stands on the only National and truly conservative platform," a true descendant of the great Whig Henry Clay.

     Smedes acknowledges that secession is "the undoubted right of every oppressed people." But the mere election of a Republican president does not create such a right, for it will present "no imminent danger to us or our section." Though such an event would be "a gross wrong upon us and insulting to us, it produces no direct hazards." Moreover, secession will not benefit the South. He warns against "wild and dangerous schemes, whose end no man can foresee," and urges his audience to turn aside from "wild, hair-brained adventurers."   

Sabin 82246. Not in LCP, Owen, Monaghan, Work, Bartlett, Cohen, Harv. Law Cat. OCLC locates seven copies under two accession numbers.                                    $850.00

 

136.   Smith, Gerrit: SUBSTANCE OF THE SPEECH MADE...IN THE CAPITOL OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, MARCH 11TH AND 12TH, 1850. SECOND EDITION, ENLARGED. Syracuse: V.W. Smith, Printers, 1850. 38pp. Stitched in original printed yellow wrappers. Wrappers smudged, else Very Good.

 

     Speaking only a few days after Webster's Address endorsing the Compromise of 1850 and its Fugitive Slave Act, Smith says, "Slavery is too iniquitous and foul and monstrous a thing to be, by any possibility, embodied and sheltered in the forms of law." Interpreting broadly Lord Mansfield's opinion in the Sommersett case and applying it to the Colonies, he insists that there was no "legal" slavery in the Colonies at the time the Constitution was adopted. Hence "the Constitution did not legalize any."

     Such legal legerdemain turns the Constitution into an anti-slavery instrument. The publisher's preface to this edition praises Smith's imaginative arguments "against the doctrine of the constitutionality of American slavery."

Dumond 103. Cohen 9993. Sabin 82670. Not in LCP, Work, Blockson. See LCP Supp. 2126 for the 30-page first edition, which issued from Albany.                $275.00

 

137.   Spooner, Lysander: A DEFENCE FOR FUGITIVE SLAVES, AGAINST THE ACTS OF CONGRESS OF FEBRUARY 12, 1793, AND SEPTEMBER 18, 1850. Boston: Bela Marsh, No. 25 Cornhill, 1850. 72pp. Original printed wrappers [some wear along spine and inner margin]. Most copies are prefaced with a four-page printing of the 1793 and 1850 Fugitive Slave Acts. This one lacks those preliminary pages. From physical examination, they were never bound in. Else Very Good.

 

     Robert Cover calls Spooner the "most notable" of a group of utopians who argued that "the Constitution outlaws slavery, even in Alabama." Justice Accused, page 156. Spooner argues that fugitive slave laws are unconstitutional, because they deny the alleged fugitive a trial by jury, permit ex parte and summary testimony, authorize decisions to be made by a constitutionally impermissible tribunal, and prohibit resort to habeas corpus. Spooner explains, in more or less lawyerly fashion, each of these arguments.

FIRST EDITION. Dumond 104. Work 335. LCP 9699. BEAL 10181. Sabin 89607. Not in Blockson, Harv. Law Cat., Marke.                                                                $175.00

 

138.   [Standing Army]: THE NECESSITY OF A PLOT: OR, REASONS FOR A STANDING ARMY. BY A FRIEND TO K.G. [London: 1720?]. 16pp. Caption title [as issued]. Disbound, lightly toned, else Very Good.

 

     Disputes about the wisdom and necessity of a standing army were ignited by John Trenchard's 1697 Argument that a standing army destroyed law and liberty. Trenchard would "most memorably" influence the Revolutionary War generation, which ranked his work "with the treatises of Locke as the most authoritative statement of the nature of political liberty and above Locke as an exposition of the social sources of the threats it faced." Bailyn, Ideological Origins of the American Revolution, pages 36, 62.

     This response, by a self-described Friend to King George, rebuts Whiggish fears of an excessively powerful monarch, surveys the dangers which beset England, and concludes "that there is no Sort of Reason in the World that we should lull our selves into so happy, or to speak more justly, unhappy a Security, as to be without a Standing Army."

FIRST EDITION. ESTC T39722.                                                                 $500.00

 

139.   [Standing Army]: TWO ARGUMENTS NEVER BROUGHT YET; WHICH ARE A FULL ANSWER TO SOME SPEECHES, SAID TO BE MADE IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, AGAINST CONTINUING THE PRESENT ESTABLISHMENT OF THE ARMY. London: Printed for William Boreham, 1718. 21, [2 advts], [1 blank] pp. Disbound with some margin-foxing, else Very Good.

 

     ESTC says that authorship is "sometimes attributed to Daniel Defoe," a defender of the Army. Disputes about the wisdom and necessity of a standing army were ignited by John Trenchard's 1697 Argument that a standing army destroyed law and liberty. This response charges that opponents of a standing army seek "to have the Administration Exposed, as aspiring to an Arbitrary Military Disposition of Government." The author argues, "First that this is no time of peace; and therefore an Army is absolutely necessary....Secondly, that the Army now Establish'd, is not more in Number, comparing the Present Circumstances of the Nation with those after the Peace of Ryswick, than were then granted to King William."

FIRST EDITION. ESTC N27718.                                                                 $275.00

 

140.   Stark Mills: REGULATIONS TO BE OBSERVED BY ALL PERSONS EMPLOYED BY THE PROPRIETORS OF THE STARK MILLS. [Manchester, NH: 1870s]. Broadside, 6 3/4" x 8 1/2". Ten paragraphs printed within a border, and signed at the end in type by Phinehas Adams, Agent; with space at the bottom of the broadside for the employee's signature, signifying that he "hereby agree[s] to conform to the foregoing Regulations." Near Fine. 

 

     The Stark Mills was organized in the late 1830's; Adams, who was prominent in the political and cultural life of Manchester and New Hampshire, became its agent about ten years later, and remained there for more than thirty years. The Regulations required employees to be punctual. "They are not to be absent from their work without consent, except in case of sickness, and then they are to send the Overseer word of the cause of their absence." As the proprietor of an early Company Town, Stark Mills required all employees "to board in one of the boarding houses belonging to the company, unless permitted by the agent to do otherwise, and to conform to the regulations of the house where they board." Moreover, "any one who is habitually absent from public worship on the Sabbath" will not be employed.

     OCLC records but a single location of this rare item at, of all places, the University of Oklahoma.

OCLC 181181315 [1].                                                                                    $450.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

141.   [Starr, Frederick]: LETTERS FOR THE PEOPLE, ON THE PRESENT CRISIS. 1. SLAVERY IN MISSOURI--- RAPIDLY DECLINING. 2. NEBRASKA TERRITORY--- WHERE IS IT? AND WHAT IS IT? 3. THE AMERICAN INDIANS--- HOW SHALL THE GOVERNMENT TREAT THEM?  4. THE PACIFIC RAILROAD--- WHERE SHALL IT RUN? AND REASONS WHY. 5. COMPROMISES--- HOW KEPT, AND WHAT THEIR EFFECTS. 6. THE TRUE PATRIOT'S DUTIES--- TO BE PERFORMED WITHOUT DELAY. [New York? 1853]. 52pp, stitched, blank corner of one leaf torn. Very Good.

 

     The consensus nominee for authorship is Starr. Each of the nine Letters is signed, 'Lynceus,' the grandson of Perseus and one of the Argonauts; he was distinguished for his keen sight, and could even see underground. The Note to the Reader is by one A.H.K., who says he received the Letters "from an esteemed friend." The author assures his audience that "slavery is fast crumbling, and is soon to fall in Missouri," whose major city, St. Louis, is "the future metropolis of the nation." In great detail, he buttresses his argument with a plethora of data.

     He also urges, with much supporting information, the speedy organization of the Nebraska Territory, discusses the Indian population there and its proposed disposition, and demonstrates that an organized Nebraska is essential for the future Pacific Railway. He warns "every time-serving, slave-adoring doughface" that Nebraska must be Free Territory. "If the south will not pass the Wilmot proviso on Nebraska, and thus re-enact the Missouri Compromise," then the North will work to "repeal all the particular provisions of the fugitive SLAVE LAW."

Sabin 40581. LCP 9754. Not in Blockson, Dumond, Work, Eberstadt, Decker.                                                                                                                              $450.00

 

142.   Stillman, Samuel: A SERMON PREACHED BEFORE THE HONORABLE COUNCIL, AND THE HONORABLE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS-BAY, IN NEW-ENGLAND, AT BOSTON, MAY 26, 1779. BEING THE ANNIVERSARY FOR THE ELECTION OF THE HONORABLE COUNCIL. BY... PASTOR OF THE FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH IN BOSTON. Boston: Fleet and Gill, 1779. [3]-38 pp, lacking the half title and final blank. Bound in modern marbled wrappers, light wear, toned, Good+. 

 

     Stillman had been an original trustee of Rhode Island College [later Brown University]. After the Revolution he was one of Boston's twelve delegates to the Convention to ratify the U.S. Constitution. This is a significant Revolutionary War sermon, emphasized by his admonition, "Let us not amuse ourselves with a prospect of peace, and in consequence thereof abate in our preparations for the war. If we should, it may prove greatly injurious to the freedom and glory of this RISING EMPIRE." He advocates separation of Church and State, the abolition of slavery, and the extinction of religious establishments, ideas which would be substantially incorporated into the Massachusetts Constitution the following year.

     About this speech DAB writes, "The General Court invited him to preach the annual election sermon in 1779 when the most vital public concern was the policy of the constitutional convention. Stillman frankly argued the necessity of inserting in the constitution of the state a Bill of Rights and provision for the separation of church and state, since only by this procedure could the sacred rights of conscience be secured." The Massachusetts Constitution, drafted by John Adams and adopted in 1780, is the oldest extant State constitution; it served as the model for many others, with the Declaration of Rights advocated here by Stillman.

FIRST EDITION. Evans 16537. Vail, New England Election Sermons 22. Not in Gephart, Newberry Library, Stevens Rare Americana, Church.                  $850.00

 

143.   Story, Isaac: AN EULOGY ON THE GLORIOUS VIRTUES OF THE ILLUSTRIOUS GEN. GEORGE WASHINGTON, WHO DIED AT MOUNT VERNON, DECEMBER 14TH, 1799, IN THE 68TH YEAR OF HIS AGE- RIPE IN HONOUR AND FULL OF GLORY. WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF THE INHABITANTS OF STERLING, AND DELIVERED BEFORE THEM ON SATURDAY, THE 22D OF FEBRUARY, 1800. Worcester: Printed by Isaiah Thomas, Jun., April, 1800. 23, [1 blank] pp. Attractive woodcuts. Disbound, light foxing, else Very Good. Presentation inscription, "T. Bigelow Esq from your friend & brother, The Author."

 

     Story was cousin to the jurist Joseph Story. Isaac died at age 28, about three years after delivering this eulogy, a laudatory biography of Washington. 

Evans 38567. Stillwell 224.                                                                            $275.00

 

144.   [Strong, Nehemiah]: STAFFORD'S ALMANAC, FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD, 1785... MERIDIAN OF NEW-HAVEN, LAT. 41 DEG. 19 MIN. NORTH: LONGIT. 73 DEG. 14 MIN. TO THE WESTWARD OF THE ROYAL OBSERVATORY AT GREENWICH, [ACCORDING TO THE LATEST OBSERVATIONS] BUT MAY SERVE INDIFFERENTLY FOR ALL THE TOWNS IN CONNECTICUT, AND THE ADJACENT PARTS. New-Haven: Printed by Thomas and Samuel Green, [1784?]. [24] pp, stitched, untrimmed. Light tanning and foxing, occasional dogeared corner. Very Good. Contemporary manuscript writing in lower margin of title page: 'Abijah Brooks's Almanac given by Mr. John Thompson.'

 

     The almanac includes an account of Henry Jenkins, an Englishman, who was believed to have died at the age of 169; a 'Chronology of Aeras and  remarkable Events'; poetry, and the usual tables. 

Evans 18799. Trumbull 176. Drake 377. NAIP w022830 [11].                     $175.00

 

145.   [Sullivan, John H.]: SECOND TRIP UP THE TRAIL BY BRONCHO JOHN. WHAT IS A GENUINE COWBOY? WHAT ARE HIS RESPONSIBILITIES? WHAT IS HIS VALUE? IS HE NOT A DESPERADE? HE IS BORN OF HONEST PARENTS...IN ONE WORD, RIGHT, AND PROTECTS RIGHT AGAINST WRONG WITH HIS LIFE. [np: 1908]. Original printed wrappers [detached, badly margin-chipped] with wrapper title, 'Life and Adventures of Broncho John. His Second Trip up the Trail. By Himself.' 32pp. Text loosened but clean. Several full-page illustrations. Good.

 

     "Scarce." Adams. Tales of the Texas trail by the "successful Indian fighter, scout and guide in time of trouble with wild people." Sullivan advises that "a successful wild people fighter must be born for the business, he must be extremely humane, a great lover of all that depends on nature's protection. In his infancy he loves to mingle with wild birds and animals of the forests, plains and mountains."  

Howes S1125. Adams, Rampaging Herd 2199. OCLC 47038352 [5]. Not in Graff, Eberstadt, Decker, Soliday.                                                                         $250.00

 

146.   [Tappan, Lewis]: ADDRESS TO THE NON-SLAVEHOLDERS OF THE SOUTH, ON THE SOCIAL AND POLITICAL EVILS OF SLAVERY. New York: Am. & For. Anti-Slavery Society, William Harned, Agent, [@1849]. [2], 58pp. Stitched without wrappers, else Very Good.

 

     Another edition of this work, printed by Benedict in New York in 1843, is signed 'Lewis Tappan' at the end. This one is unsigned, and its publication date is unstated. A couple of the sources suggest 1849 for publication date, but without supporting that conclusion. In any event, this is probably the second edition. The earliest publication date which I have located of an Anti-Slavery Society item bearing William Harned's name, as here, is 1846.

         The Address seeks to exploit what seemed obvious to Abolitionists: "the injuries inflicted upon you and your children, by an institution which lives by your sufferance, and will die at your mandate. Slavery is maintained by you whom it impoverishes and degrades." Men like Tappan hoped that the vast number of non-slaveholders in the South would recognize that Slavery depresses wages, diminishes employment opportunities, discourages entrepreneurial pursuits, encourages a feudal and class-based society in which free labor is viewed with contempt, punishes free speech, and diverts capital to the purchase of slaves by the wealthiest Southerners.

Dumond 7. Sabin 81791. Not in LCP, Blockson.                                          $250.00

 

147.   Territory of Orleans: ACTS PASSED AT THE FIRST SESSION OF THE FIRST LEGISLATURE OF THE TERRITORY OF ORLEANS, BEGUN AND HELD IN THE CITY OF NEW-ORLEANS, ON THE TWENTY-FIFTH DAY OF JANUARY... [1806]. New-Orleans: Bradford & Anderson, Printers to the Territory, 1807. x, 221, [3 blanks] pp, lacking pages 21-22. English and French text on facing pages. Bound in very worn contemporary suede [loosening].Pages toned with scattered spotting. Good. [bound with] ACTS PASSED AT THE SECOND SESSION OF THE FIRST LEGISLATURE OF THE TERRITORY OF ORLEANS, BEGUN AND HELD IN THE CITY OF NEW-ORLEANS, ON THE 12TH DAY OF JANUARY... New Orleans: Bradford & Anderson. [1807]. ix, 207, [1 blank] pp [complete]. Toned and lightly worn, Good+.

 

     Second printing, with slightly different title and with type reset, of the First Session; and the first printing of the Second Session. These early statutes establish free public schools "in the several counties of the territory," define the age of majority, provide for a census of territorial inhabitants, regulate "the rights and duties of apprentices and indented servants,"  prohibit "the introduction of free people of color from Hispaniola, and the other French Islands of America into the territory of Orleans," and a host of other matters.

     Perhaps of greatest interest and significance is the First Session's passage of the Black Code, beginning at page 150, seeking to provide a baseline of humane treatment of slaves. "Every person is expressly prohibited from selling separately from their mothers, the children who shall not have attained the age of ten years." But the Code also places onerous burdens upon slaves, because "The person of a slave belongs to his master."   

Jumonville 143, 145.                                                                                       $1,000.00

 

148.   Thomas, Isaiah: ISAIAH THOMAS'S MASSACHUSETTS, CONNECTICUT, RHODE ISLAND, NEW HAMPSHIRE & VERMONT ALMANACK, WITH AN EPHEMERIS, FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1799. Worcester, Massachusetts: Isaiah Thomas, [1798]. 12mo, later stitching, [48] pp. Lightly toned, Very Good, with contemporary interleaves in the form of a daybook or diary.

 

     This Almanac lists vacation schedules at Dartmouth, Harvard, Rhode Island, and Williams Colleges; contains currency and interest tables, a list of stagecoaches from Boston to various points, tables of distances with inns and innkeepers, an advertisement for Isaiah Thomas's Worcester bookstore, cures for cancer and other health nostrums. The 13 pages of interleaves have entries on health, marriages, funerals, biblical citations, minor commercial transactions, and other daily matters. 

FIRST EDITION. Evans 34652. Drake 3599.                                               $350.00

 

149.   [Thomas, Isaiah]: THOMAS'S MASSACHUSETTS, CONNECTICUT, RHODE- ISLAND, NEWHAMPSHIRE & VERMONT ALMANACK, WITH AN EPHEMERIS, FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1798. Worcester: Isaiah Thomas, [1797]. 12mo. [48] pp. Stitched, cut of an angel on the title page, woodcuts corresponding to calendar months. Very Good, with contemporary interleaves in the form of a datebook or diary.

 

     With a 'Lawyer and Justices' Calendar,' an article 'On the origin of almanacks,' a cure for dysentery, pithy remarks on the subject of temperance; roads to various destinations [including Dartmouth College] from Boston, with list of innkeepers; a "Calendar for young farmers and gardeners," vacation schedules at New England colleges. This is the first edition. Subsequent editions were entitled 'Isaiah Thomas's Massachusetts...', "to avoid confusion with Robert B. Thomas's The farmer's almanac." NAIP.

     The thirteen interleaved pages deal with health, visits, minor commercial transactions, and a variety of day-to-day matters.

FIRST EDITION. Evans 32919. Drake 3590. NAIP w029845.                   $350.00

 

150.   Tucker, John: A SERMON PREACHED AT CAMBRIDGE, BEFORE HIS EXCELLENCY THOMAS HUTCHINSON, ESQ; GOVERNOR: HIS HONOR ANDREW OLIVER, ESQ; LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR. THE HONORABLE HIS MAJESTY'S COUNCIL, AND THE HONORABLE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, OF THE PROVINCE OF MASSACHUSETTS-BAY IN NEW-ENGLAND, MAY 29TH, 1771. BEING THE ANNIVERSARY FOR THE ELECTION OF HIS MAJESTY'S COUNCIL FOR SAID PROVINCE. BY...PASTOR OF THE FIRST CHURCH IN NEWBURY. Boston: Richard Draper, 1771. 63pp, with the half title. Later marbled wrappers. Some foxing, but about Very Good. Ink signature, 'Geo Leonard Jnr' on half title.

 

     Tucker preaches a powerful assertion of Americans' natural right to govern themselves, in the presence of the increasingly loathed Hutchinson and Oliver, who came-- particularly after the Boston Massacre the previous year-- to embody all that was arbitrary and evil in British absentee rule. Tucker emphasizes that "love of liberty," which God "himself has implanted in us," must be nurtured and accommodated "with the laws and government of human societies, whose constitution is consistent with the rights of men."

     Although he touches on subjects' duty to obey their rulers, the Address is an expression of the natural rights theory of government: "All men are naturally in a state of freedom, and have an equal claim to liberty. No one, by nature, nor by any special grant from the great Lord of all, has any authority over another. All right therefore in any to rule over others, must originate from those they rule over, and be granted by them."

FIRST EDITION. Evans 12256. Adams, American Controversy 86.           $850.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

151.   Vermont: REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE, MESSRS. EDMOND, OLIN, G. ROBINSON, NILES, HOYT, HOTCHKISS, AND ASA LYON, APPOINTED TO EXAMINE INTO THE DOINGS OF THE CANVASSING COMMITTEE; AND REPORT FACTS RELATIVE TO THE REJECTED VOTES. PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE HOUSE. Montpelier, Vt.: Printed by Walton and Goss, November, 1813. contemporary plain blue wrappers, stitched. 19, [1 blank] pp. Untrimmed and generously margined, light spotting and dusting, else Very Good.

 

     An interesting Report on the propriety of American soldiers' exercise of the suffrage during their military service. Despite a Vermont law permitting soldiers to vote, this Committee expresses grave doubts about its wisdom. Any law "which permits the standing army of the United States to exercise equal rights, with the citizens of the State of Vermont, in their annual elections...puts in imminent danger our republican institutions." A soldier, unlike a civilian freeman, "is no longer governed by his own will; but becomes subject to the controul and direction of others." The opportunity for Command Influence was demonstrated "in the case of the town of Colchester," when a select number of soldiers was marched to the polls and, according to the attached affidavit of Heman Allen, instructed to "vote in conformity to the wishes of Major M'Neil; who is understood to be attached to what is denominated the republican or war party."

     The Committee heard evidence that the soldiers "were liberally supplied by their officers with ardent spirits; and all intercourse between them and the citizens of the town of Colchester, prevented." It concludes unanimously that the votes of the soldiers were properly rejected.   

AI 30413 [5].                                                                                                  $250.00

 

152.   [Vizetelly, Henry]: VIER MONATE UNTER DEN GOLDFINDERN IN OBERCALIFORNIEN. Hamburg: B.S. Berendsohn, 1849. 32pp, stitched into contemporary plain pale green wrappers. Bit of light extremity wear, Very Good.

 

     "One of the most remarkable 'imaginary voyages' since Defoe." Howes. The first edition was published in London earlier in the same year, under the title, 'Four Months Among the Goldfinders of California.' This is one of two German translations, the other from Leipzig. Of this printing OCLC locates four institutional copies.

Howes V134. Cowan 75. Graff 4494 [London printing].                              $350.00

 

153.   Wabash Manufacturing Association: WABASH, IND., ITS ADVANTAGES AS A MANUFACTURING POINT. LOCATION, STONE, LIME, HYDRAULIC LIME, TIMBER, FUEL, RAILROADS AND CANAL, WATER POWER AND TURNPIKES, CHURCHES, SCHOOLS, SOCIETY, HEALTH, PRESENT MANUFACTORIES AND THOSE NEEDED. Wabash, Indiana: Republican Book and Job Printing Office`, 1870. 8pp, stitched in original printed wrappers. A couple of light institutional stamps [with 'withdrawn' rubberstamp], wraps with a bit of edge chipping. Good+.

 

     Yes, Wabash has it all, says this Association, emphasizing "that we particularly desire to impress the advantages of this place."

Not located on OCLC, or in Eberstadt or Sabin.                                           $150.00

 

154.   [Washington, George]: WOVEN COTTON TEXTILE: GEORGE WASHINGTON| FIRST IN THE HEARTS OF HIS COUNTRYMEN. [n.p.: n.d.]. Cotton cloth, 11" x 17".  Printed in red and blue on cream background. Portrait of President Washington in blue at center; words in red above and below portrait. Red borders at two sides and bottom. Minor fraying of edges. Light staining, else Very Good.

 

     Best guess for issuance of this broadside textile is late 19th century.       $175.00

 

155.   Watts, Isaac: A GUIDE TO PRAYER: OR, A FREE AND RATIONAL ACCOUNT OF THE GIFT, GRACE, AND SPIRIT OF PRAYER; WITH PLAIN DIRECTIONS HOW EVERY CHRISTIAN MAY ATTAIN THEM. Philadelphia: Thomas and William Bradford, [1770?]. 12mo. [2], ix, [1blank], [13]-228 pp. Later quarter morocco and pale papered boards. Contents with generally light foxing. Good+.

 

     "My design in this treatise has been to write a prayer-book without forms. And I have sought to maintain the middle way between the distant mistakes of contending christians." This is the second of three American 18th century printings, and certainly the scarcest. .

Bristol B3285. NAIP 039155 [7]. Not in Evans or Shipton & Mooney. Not at AAS.

                                                                                                            $350.00

 

156.   Webster, John W. : TRIAL OF PROFESSOR JOHN W. WEBSTER, FOR THE MURDER OF DR. GEORGE PARKMAN IN THE MEDICAL COLLEGE, NOVEMBER 23, 1849. SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT FOR SUFFOLK MARCH TERM. PRESENT CHIEF JUSTICE SHAW, ASSOCIATE JUDGES WILDE, METCALF AND DEWEY... STENOGRAPHIC REPORT, CAREFULLY REVISED AND CORRECTED. SPLENDIDLY ILLUSTRATED. Boston: John A. French, 1850. 91, (5) pp. Untrimmed, stitched in contemporary plain muslin wrappers. Engraved portrait of the murderer frontis. Illustrations, full page sketch of the victim on last page. A bit of margin smudging, Very Good.

 

     One of an array of publications on this sensational murder. Webster, a scholar and author, had borrowed $400 from Parkman (uncle of Francis Parkman) and secured the loan with a cabinet of minerals. Without repaying the loan, Webster pledged the minerals as security to a second lender. Incensed, Parkman argued with Webster and then disappeared. Parkman's bones were discovered in the furnace in Webster's lab. Webster was convicted and hanged.

McDade 1067. Cohen 13182.                                                                         $250.00

 

157.   Weld, Ezra: A SERMON, ON CHRISTIAN UNION; DELIVERED IN WRENTHAM, MAY 22, 1794, AT A PUBLIC FAST, APPOINTED BY THE CHURCH AND PASTOR, ON ACCOUNT OF THEIR ECCLESIASTICAL DIFFICULTIES; AND PRINTED BY THEIR MUTUAL DESIRE. BY EZRA WELD, V.D.M. PASTOR OF THE CHURCH IN BRAINTREE. Boston: E.W. Weld and W. Greenough, 1794. 30, [2 blank] pp. Disbound. Tanned with some foxing. Good+.

 

     Weld's task is "promoting the cause of order, and allaying the ferments of party contentions in the church." He urges that Christian Councils be "cautious, tender and dispassionate," whether those councils be "mutual, or ex parte."

Evans 28059.                                                                                                  $150.00

 

158.   West Indies: A VERY NEW PAMPHLET INDEED! BEING THE TRUTH: ADDRESSED TO THE PEOPLE AT LARGE. CONTAINING SOME STRICTURES ON THE ENGLISH JACOBINS, AND THE EVIDENCE OF LORD M'CARTNEY AND OTHERS, BEFORE THE HOUSE OF LORDS, RESPECTING THE SLAVE TRADE. London: Printed in the Year, 1792. 15, [1 blank] pp. Disbound, title leaf browned with a shallow fore-edge chip, else Very Good.

 

     An angry attack on "the Old Jewry Society" and other abolitionists-- "the Wilberforces, the Coopers, the Paines, and the Clarksons." Denouncing their "wild ephemeral theory" the author, identified at the end as 'Truth', accuses them of Jacobin Mobbery, and presents evidence that "the Negroes are in general treated with great humanity." Powerful social norms hold in "detestation" anyone who "used unnecessary severity." The effect on commerce of the abolition of the slave trade would be disastrous. "Two of the witnesses for the abolition group were then under charge of perjury." Ragatz.

FIRST EDITION. Ragatz 469. Sabin 99320.                                                            $350.00

 

159.   Western Photographs: SEVEN PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHS, TAKEN AT STUDIOS IN DENVER, SAN FRANCISCO, AND VIRGINIA CITY. @1880. Seven photographs: from Virginia City, Denver, and San Francisco, of men and women. The bottom margins and the verso identify the studio. Very Good.                       $150.00

 

160.   [Wilkes, John]: THE NORTH BRITON. VOLUME I. [with] THE NORTH BRITON. VOLUME II. [with] THE THIRD VOLUME OF THE NORTH BRITON. Dublin: 1764, 1764, 1765. [4], 240; [2], 244, [10]; [2], 192 pp [as issued]. The Advertisement on the verso of the title page to Volume III states: "This volume was privately printed in England, soon after the preceding two; but never published in that kingdom." Three volumes in contemporary calf, with elaborate gilt-decorated spines, gilt-lettered morocco spine titles, and raised spine bands. Light rubbing, text with minor foxing, Near Fine.

 

     The North Briton began publication as a weekly in 1762. "Week by week, the new periodical continued its attacks on the government. It showed itself bold, to start with, in printing the ministers' names in full, without the usual subterfuges of dashes and stars; and it grew bolder as it went on. Nothing, however, gave a handle to the authorities by which, even under the existing law of libel, the writers could be brought to book...At last, Wilkes overstepped the line in No. 45, which bitterly impugned the truthfulness of the speech from the throne regarding the peace of Paris. The long government persecution of the libeller, which followed the publication of No. 45, and which finally resulted in the abolition of the tyrannic system of general warrants, also snuffed out The North Briton." Cambridge History of English and American Literature, Vol. X, Ch. XVII, Sec. 5.

     "John Wilkes' career was crucial to the colonists' understanding of what was happening to them; his fate, the colonists came to believe, was intimately involved with their own... His Number 45 North Briton was as celebrated in the colonies as it was in England, and more generally approved of; its symbolism became part of the iconography of liberty in the colonies." Bailyn, Ideological Origins of the American Revolution 111.

ESTC T19479.                                                                                                $1,500.00

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.

161.   Williams, Solomon: THE BUSINESS, SCOPE AND END OF GOSPEL MINISTERS, TO PRESENT THEIR HEARERS PERFECT IN CHRIST JESUS. IN ORDER TO WHICH, THEY ARE TO PROPOUND JESUS CHRIST AS THE SUM OF ALL THEIR WARNING, AND TEACHING THEM IN ALL WISDOM. A SERMON PREACH'D AT MILLINGTON IN EAST-HADDAM, NOVEMBER 20TH 1745, AT THE ORDINATION OF THE REVEREND MR. HOBART ESTABROOK TO THE PASTORAL OFFICE THERE. N[ew] London: Printed & Sold by T. Green, 1746. [4], 42, [2] pp, with half title and final blank. Half title dusted, and repaired at lower blank portion. Stitched, scattered and generally light foxing. Laid in an attractive quarter morocco slipcase with marbled boards. Good+ or Very Good.

 

     "Dr. Williams possessed wide influence among the clergy of New England." VI Appleton 526. Here he emphatically warns that Ministers have "nothing to Preach but the Doctrine" of the Gospel. "Nothing is the Gospel but what Christ has Revealed as such, and his Doctrine that is written in His Word by His Appointment." In an attack on the popularity of the Great Awakening and the influence of his rival [and relative] Jonathan Edwards, Williams says, "And if any Man teaches us any other Doctrine which is not Revealed, under any pretence as a New Revelation; or perverts the Doctrine as Revealed, he is not therein a Minister of the Gospel, but an Abuser and Perverter of it."

Evans 5892. Trumbull 1682. NAIP 023127 [8].                                             $650.00

 

162.   Williams, William: THE GREAT DUTY OF MINISTERS TO ADVANCE THE KINGDOM OF GOD. AND THEIR COMFORT IN FELLOW-HELPERS TO THIS WORK. A SERMON PREACHED AT THE ANNUAL CONVENTION OF MINISTERS AT BOSTON, MAY 26, 1726. BY...PASTOR OF THE CHURCH OF CHRIST IN HATFIELD. Boston: Kneeland and Green, 1726. [4], 28pp. With the half title. Three attractive woodcut designs. Disbound, fore-edges untrimmed, half title dustsoiled. Clipped inscription, dated 1736, 'a New Years Gift.' About Very Good.

 

     "The Preaching of Christ is a main and essential Part of our Work, to set forth the Glory of Christ. And we have no reason to fear that it will be interpreted as if we were carrying on any treasonable design against the State, whilst we proclaim another King, even Jesus, that we extoll him as the best of Kings..." Williams warns his fellow ministers "that our Zeal be not mixed with Passion, or private interests of our own."

FIRST EDITION. Evans 2829.                                                                      $875.00

 

163.   Wilmington, N.C. Safety Committee: PROCEEDINGS OF THE SAFETY COMMITTEE: FOR THE TOWN OF WILMINGTON, N. C. FROM 1774 TO 1776- PRINTED FROM THE ORIGINAL RECORD. Raleigh, N.C.: Thomas Loring, 1844. 76pp, disbound, scattered spotting, foxed, Good+.

 

     The first printing of these Proceedings. The Committee seeks by moral suasion and not-so-gentle peer pressure to prohibit the importation of British goods into North Carolina, in accordance with resolutions of the Continental Congress; and to ban "every species of extravagance and dissipation, especially all horse-racing, and all kinds of gaming, cock-fighting, exhibitions of shows and plays and other expensive diversions and entertainments." Those who fail to cooperate are threatened with public exposure and obloquy.

     One Hereld Blackmore is persuaded to return to Granada certain slaves whom he brought into Carolina. Merchants are exhorted not to raise prices on increasingly scarce goods. And persons hoarding stores of gunpowder are asked to make it available at reasonable prices for defense of the town. Efforts to keep the Negroes disarmed and "in order" are reported. With resolutions, proclamations, and preparation for war.

FIRST EDITION. Thornton 15024. Gephart 9236. 666 NUC 0344203 [9]. Not in Sabin, Decker, Eberstadt.                                                                                           $500.00

 

164.   [Wolcott, Oliver]: (CIRCULAR.) TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OCTOBER 4TH, 1799. SIR, FOR THE PURPOSE OF CONCENTERING THE MONIES COLLECTED FOR THE SUPPORT OF MARINE HOSPITALS IN THE HANDS OF THOSE COLLECTORS WHO HAVE, OR SHALL BE APPOINTED AGENTS FOR DISBURSEMENTS, I SHALL FROM TIME TO TIME, GENERALLY ONCE IN EACH QUARTER, ADDRESS A LETTER TO YOU... [Philadelphia? 1799]. Broadside, 23cm x 19cm. Dated in ink October 4th 1799 [also at the head of the title]. Signed in ink by Oliver Wolcott, and addressed in ink to Joshua Head Esquire, Collector of the Customs for the District of Waldborough Massachusetts. Toned, Shallow edge chipping, Good+.

 

     An evidently unrecorded printed broadside explaining the procedures promulgated by the Treasury Secretary for remitting Seamen's Wages collected by the Collectors of the Customs for each District.

Not in Evans, Bristol, Shipton & Mooney, NAIP, or on OCLC.                   $450.00

 

165.   Yeatman, James E.: SUGGESTIONS OF A PLAN FOR ORGANIZATION FOR FREED LABOR, AND THE LEASING OF PLANTATIONS ALONG THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER, UNDER A BUREAU OR COMMISSION TO BE APPOINTED BY THE GOVERNMENT. ACCOMPANYING A REPORT PRESENTED TO THE WESTERN SANITARY COMMISSION...DEC. 17, 1863. St. Louis, Mo.: Rooms Western Sanitary Commission, 1864. 8pp, printed self-wrappers, lightly dusted, Very Good.

 

     Yeatman, President of the St. Louis Merchants Bank as well as President of the Western Sanitary Commission, came to St. Louis from Tennessee in 1842. Obviously imaginative and multi-talented, he quickly established a local branch of the Nashville Iron House and, in 1846, helped to found the Mercantile Library Association. Here he proposes an imaginative plan to lease "abandoned plantations" to "our small  farmers, loyal men from the Western and Northern States," in order to assure "a loyal and industrious population" in the lower South, and to provide "a better care of the colored laborers on the soil."

     The newly emancipated slaves would thus be protected by employers who were hostile to plantation slavery, and the Lower South's new inhabitants would help to obliterate the culture that had produced secession. Yeatman's proposal would, through strict protective legislation, guarantee minimum wages, sick pay, a right to contract for work, "Infirmary Farms" for medical care, a right to marriage, and universal public education. Moreover, he would establish "Homes for the aged and infirm negroes, and young, motherless children."

       This plan, of which this offering is the only edition, did not envision ownership and entrepreneurial responsibilities for the freedmen. Rather, it sought to avoid the inevitable hardships that would accompany emancipation without a significant national governmental buffer between the former slaves and their former masters.

FIRST EDITION. LCP Supp. 2563. Work 369. Not in Dumond or Blockson.

                                                                                                            $1,250.00

 

166.   Yerrinton, James M[anning] W[inchelle]: REPORT OF THE CASE OF GEO. C. HERSEY, INDICTED FOR THE MURDER OF BETSY FRANCES TIRRELL, BEFORE THE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT OF MASSACHUSETTS; INCLUDING THE HEARING ON THE MOTION IN ARREST OF JUDGMENT, THE PRISONER'S PETITION FOR A COMMUTATION OF SENTENCE, THE DEATH WARRANT, OFFICER'S RETURN UPON IT, AND THE CONFESSION. BY JAMES M.W. YERRINTON. Boston: A. Williams & Co., 1862. 267, [1 blank] pp. Original publisher's cloth, with a bookplate on front pastedown. Rebacked with dark tape. Else Near Fine, with a clean and bright text.

 

     "Hersey had been living in Weymouth with the Tirrell family since the sudden death four months before of their daughter and his fiancee, Mary Tirrell. A second daughter Betsy became pregnant by him, and he gave her a drug which he represented would cause an abortion. Actually, it was strychnine which he had obtained in Boston allegedly to poison a dog. He was convicted and hanged. The preface claims this to be the only (in 1862) published trial in which strychnine was detected by analysis in the deceased." McDade.

     This case is the report of the entire trial, including summaries of witnesses' testimony and the proceedings at the execution.

McDade 472.                                                                                                  $200.00

 

Want to place an order?  Call (203) 389-8111, fax (203) 389-9113, or email.