AMERICANA TO 1820

Considering theA--------n R---------n

•  Although this is labelled "Second Edition," it is printed from the same setting of type as the first edition. (Another edition of 1778, also labelled "Second Edition," is indeed entirely reset and has a shorter collation.) The work attempts to convey the substance of several Parliamentary speeches concerning the American controversy, with at least one Cassandra saying the Franco-American alliance cannot last, and another doubting the war can have any lasting effect on the British economy.

•  Adams, American Controversy, 78-102b; Sabin 95788. Some foxing; six-digit number stamped on title-page. Spine renewed with paper and later wrappers applied. Without the half-title or the final blank. A very good copy.

Thomas à K forAmerican Methodists
    Ownership Marks to Dream On?

•  Early American printing of John Wesley's abridged version of the Imitatio Christi, following the London first edition of 1741. This was one of a series of works published by John Dickins, an early Methodist preacher, for the use of Methodist Societies in the U.S.; Dickins's publishing operation eventually became the Methodist Publishing House, still in business today as the United Methodist Publishing House.

Provenance: An interesting array of ownership inscriptions: “Abigail Davis Book Given her By her Friend [Master?] Vaughan” — “Abigail Davis Book”— “Abigail Davis” — “Abigail Vaughan, Her Book,” this last written largest of all.  (“Reader, I married him”?)

•  Evans 27179; ESTC W33646.   Contemporary sheep, binding overall showing scuffs and small cracks. Endpapers and fly-leaf with early inked ownership inscriptions; title-page verso institutionally rubber-stamped. Pages age-toned and spotted, with intermittent pencilled bracketing; a few leaves starting to separate. (20808)

SomeoneHad to Be . . .
   . . . NORTH CAROLINA's First

Single-click either image for an enlargement.

•  Somebody had to be North Carolina’s first native born poet and the task/honor was Joseph Thomas’s, and he did it with A Poetical Descant! It is scarce, having been printed in small format in a small town by a very small-time printer for a rather small audience. Thomas’s other publications include a hymnal and short works of theology (totally fitting given that he was an itinerant preacher), and an autobiography.

•  Wegelin, American Poetry, 1168; Shaw & Shoemaker 39076. Recent quarter cloth with blue-green paper sides, in the style of early 19th-centry American books. Ex–mercantile library with a few stamps, including on title-page. Two letters of title abraded and mostly invisible, yet, still, a clean copy.

By the Author ofThe Maternal Physician

•  First edition: Christian-themed prose and poetry, including a section of acrostics, written by the author of the Maternal Physician. The work was printed by the earliest printing press in Vermont — the Daye Press, which was originally brought to Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1638 and then moved to various locations in Connecticut and New Hampshire before being re-established in Vermont by Alden Spooner, son of pioneering New England printer Judah Spooner. Alden Spooner’s role in Long Island printing (he published the Long Island City Star for many years) began the year following this publication.

Provenance: This copy belonged to Hannah Diggins, whose name is inked on the front and back free endpapers.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 13308. Original “shingle” binding with quarter sheep and paper-covered sides; binding worn and darkened, sides stained, corners chipped, front joint starting from foot. Front free endpaper with inked inscription as above. Pages darkened and stained; one leaf with short tear from lower margin, with loss of a few letters.

Selling (Forming) Mississippi (& Alabama)

•  Via this agreement, Georgia turned over to the U.S. its claim to land south of Tennessee and west of the “Chatahochie” River, for the express purpose of creating the future state of Mississippi; the new territory would eventually result in the creation of Alabama and Mississippi. In return it received the sum of $1,250,000. A sticking point, but one ultimately resolved, was the problem of land in Georgia set aside for the Creek Indians by a treaty in 1798. Click the image for an enlargement.

This is the true 1802 printing: In 1804 it was reprinted in 8 pages as a preface to other related documents (Report of the Commissioners appointed in pursuance of An Act for the Amicable Settlement of Limits with the States of Georgia ... : 29th November, 1804 (p. [9]-28); and Documents accompanying the Report of the Commissioners on the Georgia Mississippi Territory, Ceded to the United States: Feb. 10, 1803 (p. [29]-140)). That 8-page reprint is sometimes found by itself without its required accompaniments and in fact is miscatalogued in Shaw & Shoemaker (3343).

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 3344. Recent paper wrappers. Slightly age-toned, otherwise clean.

Abolishing “Traffick” — Proposing “Colinization”

•  Resolution authorizing the president to negotiate with foreign governments to abolish the slave trade and to negotiate with Great Britain to establish a colony in Sierra Leone for free blacks. Government document: House document (United States. Congress. House); 14th Congress, 2nd session, no. 77. Printed at head of title: [77].

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 42596; Library Company, Afro-Americana, 10583.   Removed from a nonce volume. Lightly pencilled librarian's notation on p. [1]. Very mild foxing.  (18436)

Back to Africa?

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•  An early document of the American Colonization Society, founded in December 1816. Concerns the feasibility of negotiating with Great Britain to establish a colony of free blacks in Sierra Leone. Government document: House document (United States. Congress. House); 14th Congress, 2nd session, no. 78. Printed at head of title: [78].

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 42738; Library Company, Afro-Americana, 10602.   Removed from a nonce volume. Lightly pencilled librarian's notation on p. [1]. Leaves separated.  (18440)

An Irish-AMERICAN'S Service & Claims

•  Oliver Pollock, an Irish-born American merchant, claims remuneration for losses sustained in his capacity as commercial agent for the United States at Orleans during the American Revolution.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 14058. Removed from a nonce volume. Librarian's lightly pencilled notation on title-page. Stray brown spots. Very good. (18017)

North Carolinians . . . Petition Congress

•  The petitioners seek to have Plymouth, North Carolina, made a port of entry; the committee recommends against it.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 14060. Removed from a library-style pamphlet binding and in new wrappers.

Indiana Already Wants to Join the Union — 1812

•  Concerns a resolution to admit Indiana into the Union as a state. The territory was then in the midst of great population growth of settlers and still being convulsed occasionally by wars and battles with the Native American population, etc., but was of stature to seek admission as a state — which it achieved in 1816.
Click the image for an enlargement.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 27339. In modern wrappers, old sewing holes; age-toned.

Militia, Provide Yourselves Each with a
“Good Musket or Firelock”

•  A reading copy of the bill, with each line numbered. At head of title: “VI. In Senate of the United States. December 22d, 1812. Agreeably to notice. Mr. Smith, of Maryland, obtained leave to bring in the following bill, which was read and passed to the second reading.” Click the image for an enlargement.

“[A]fter the passing of this act, the militia of the United States shall be composed of all able bodied white male citizens of the respective states, resident therein, who shall respectively be of the age of twenty years and under the age of forty years.”

Scarce: Only one holding located via OCLC (at US Navy Department Library, Naval Historical Center); not in RLIN.

•  Not in Shaw & Shoemaker.   Removed from a nonce volume. Uncut copy. Ink numeral at top of first page. A few light spots. (13790)

Treasury Department Copy

Click the interior images for enlargements.

•  Extremely detailed accounting of appropriations and expenditures. Both reports were submitted by Samuel Meredith, the first treasurer of the United States; both of these government documents are not commonly seen in institutional holdings save in microform.

Provenance: A Treasury Department Library copy, with bookplate of that institution on the front pastedown. Gilt-stamped leather labels on spine state “1798” and “First Comp’t Office”; gilt-stamped leather labels on front cover state “Register’s Office” and “Treasurer's Accounts.”

•  Evans 34885, 36541, & 36595. Contemporary or very early19th-century library sheep, spine and front gilt-stamped on green and red leather labels (as described above); binding much rubbed and abraded, with some peeling of leather and loss at head and foot of spine; front cover detached. Remnants of old paper label adhered near inner edge of front cover. Pages clean save for some offsetting.

Freedom of the Press — Philadelphia, 1800

• Was it slander or libel, or exercising the freedom of the press (or both) — when on 19 February 1800 William Duane published an article concerning the secret activities occurring in Senate caucuses? In any case the senators were not pleased! In this publication they quote the offending passages and then order Duane to appear before them to defend “his conduct” and the Aurora’s for having published “the aforesaid false, defamatory, scandalous, and malicious assertions and pretended information.”

At the heart of the controversy was Duane’s support of Jefferson for president and his exposure of the notorious Ross election bill by which the Federalists sought to thwart Jefferson’s bid for that office.

• Evans 38856; ESTC W021879. Removed from a nonce volume. Clean and in nice condition.

“United States Register” —For English Reference, 1794

•  Uncommon British reprint of an American work originally printed in Philadelphia. Although no calendrical information is present, much other material commonly found in almanacs is: lists of government officials by state, population statistics (categorized by free white males and females, slaves, and “other persons”), and duties payable on assorted goods.

•  ESTC T105844. Period-style quarter calf with marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label and gilt-ruled raised bands. Title-page and a few others stamped by a now-defunct institution. Some offsetting to margins of first and final leaves, pages otherwise clean. A nice little Anglo-Americanum, very evocative of its era.

TO Part XX . . .

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