ABOLITIONIST

Autograph Letter Signed from the geologist George Gibbs to Charles Sumner, abolitionist Senator from Massachusetts, regarding the French jurist Jean-Jacques Gaspard Foelix and Sumner's review.

Author: 
George Gibbs (1815-1873), American geologist and expert on Native American culture [Charles Sumner (1811-1874), abolitionist Massachusetts senator; Jean-Jacques Gaspard Foelix (1791-1853)]
Publication details: 
Greenwich, Massachusetts; 28 February 1836.
£150.00

2pp., 4to. Bifolium. 35 lines of text. Addressed, with postmark, on reverse of second leaf, to 'Chas. Sumner Esq. | Boston | Masstts.' Very good, on aged paper. Written while Sumner was lecturing at Harvard Law School, the year before his visit to Europe. Gibbs explains that he has made an arrangement by which Sumner can forward his periodical the Jurist 'to [the French jurist] Foelix &c. & receive others in exchange. Hudson the Proprietor of the Merchants News Room has an agent in Paris & one in Narn to whom he will transmit them.

Autograph Letter Signed ('Geo. S. Hillard') from George Stillman Hillard (later District Attorney for Massachusetts) to the abolitionist Rev. Samuel Joseph May, describing his acquaintance with the first Harvard Professor of German, Charles Follen.

Author: 
George Stillman Hillard (1808-1879), Massachusetts District Attorney [Rev. Samuel Joseph May (1797-1871), abolitionist; Charles Follen [Karl Follen] (1796-1840), first Professor of German at Harvard]
Publication details: 
Boston; 11 March 1840.
£280.00

4pp., 4to. Bifolium. 89 lines of text. Good, on lightly-aged paper. Addressed, with red circular postmark, on reverse of second leaf, to 'Revd. Samuel J. May | South Scituate'. Hillard describes 'Dr. Follen' as 'an intimate and dear friend to me'. He looks back 'with melancholy pleasure upon the happy hours' he spent in the society of 'so pure and elevated a being'. He has 'never known a better man; I do not know that I may not say, that I have never known so good a man.

Autograph Letter Signed ('Saml Roberts') from the philanthropist and abolitionist Samuel Roberts of Park Grange, Sheffield, to the poet James Montgomery.

Author: 
Samuel Roberts (1763-1848) of Park Grange, Sheffield, silversmith, author and philanthropist, abolitionist and friend of William Wilberforce [James Montgomery (1771-1854), poet and hymn writer]
Publication details: 
Park Grange, Sheffield, Yorkshire; 20 April 1837.
£280.00

3pp., 4to. Bifolium. Good, on lightly-aged paper. Addressed, with broken seal in black wax, on verso of second leaf, to 'James Montgomery Esqr'. 80 lines of text. He has been twice that day to Montgomery's Sheffield mansion the Mount 'to enquire about you - the first time in vain, and the second nearly so. There they are much as heretofore - but Miss Sarah meaning to write sermons you may have it before this.' Roberts declares: 'I think the present great Lions of the town are myself and mad dogs - perhaps you may think that they might be included under one head - yes - if that head was yours!

Autograph Letter Signed ('S. Judd') from the American novelist Sylvester Judd, expressing a desire to write for Maria Weston Chapman's abolitionist gift book 'The Liberty Bell'.

Author: 
Sylvester Judd (1813-1853), American novelist, best-known for his book 'Margaret' (1845) ['The Liberty Bell',abolitionist gift book edited by Maria Weston Chapman (1806-1885)]
Publication details: 
Riverside, Augusta; 28 August 1851.
£180.00

1p., 4to. Good, on aged paper. The letter (possibly addressed to the book's publisher) reads 'My dear Sir, | It would give me great pleasure to write for the "Liberty Bell," but I dare not at this moment say I could prepare anything in the time you mention. | Yours truly | [signed] S. Judd.'

Autograph Letter Signed ('Edw. Baines') to 'Robt. <Scarbrow?>'.

Author: 
Sir Edward Baines [Edward Baines junior] (1800-1890), nonconformist English newspaper editor and Member of Parliament
Publication details: 
3 Queen Sq | 1st. June <year?>.
£45.00

12mo, 2 pp. In bifolium. Good, on lightly-aged paper. Difficult hand. He has not considered the question carefully, but his impression is that 'the Monopoly of the printing of the Holy Scriptures in Scotland and Ireland might cease by the Kings Printers not only without injuring but with benefit to the public'.

Autograph Letter Signed ('George Stephen') to 'My dear Valentine'.

Author: 
Sir George Stephen (1794-1879), English abolitionist, lawyer and author
Publication details: 
22 August 1844; 17 Kings Arms Yard [London].
£85.00

Landscape 8vo (roughly 12 x 20 cm), 1 p, 8 lines. On creased and lightly aged paper. Text clear and entire. Stephen is afraid that Valentine's 'poor protegée will not [...] get much out of her claim!' Stephen cannot help her 'because litigation in a colony can only be conducted by a solicitor resident within it, and bad as we are reputed to be at home, they are far worse in the Colonies!' However he has 'written a strong professional letter for her that may perchance obtain an answer'.

Autograph Signature on fragment of letter.

Author: 
Sir Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice (1780-1863), 3rd Marquis of Lansdowne, Whig politician and abolitionist
Publication details: 
Without date or place.
£15.00

Dimensions of paper roughly one and three-quarter inches by five and a quarter wide. Aged, ruckled, and with traces of glue from previous mounting on reverse. Reads 'Your very faithful | servt | Lansdowne', and on reverse, '<...> as if I did so I shou<...> | be referred to the answer <...>'.

Syndicate content