Description
The first edition of The Life And Times Of Sir William Johnson, Bart by William L. Stone, from the library of Lincoln’s private secretary and Secretary of State, John Hay.
Octavo, xv, [17]-555pp, [3]; xiv, [2], 544pp. Brown pebbled cloth, title stamped in copper on the spine. Frontispiece portrait with tissue cover in both volumes, one plate in each volume. Wear to tips of the spine, cloth worn along hinges, foxing to both frontispiece portraits. Internally clean, solid blocks.
(Field 1511) (Howes S1039)
From the library of Lincoln’s Private Secretary, John Hay, signed in both volumes. Volume II is signed and dated “John Hay / 1865.”
Sir William Johnson (1715-1774) was a British Army officer and Superintendent of Indiana Affairs in the American colonies. From Field: “By far the most valuable contributions to it are contained in the Appendix, in which are printed for the first time, and from the original MSS., two Journals, kept by Sir William, of expeditions to Niagara, Oswego, and Detroit, through the cantonments of the Six Nations, and the Ottawa Confederacy. An Account of the Language and Customs of the Six Nations, and, An Account of the Location and Numbers of Indian Tribes, both written by the Baronet, in the same volume.”
John Hay (1838-1905) served as the private secretary to President Abraham Lincoln until 1865. Along with John Nicolay, Hay would author a ten-volume biography of President Lincoln called Abraham Lincoln: A History. During the McKinley Administration, Hay returned to government as the United States ambassador to the United Kingdom, then later served as Secretary of State.
