Description
First edition of The Partisan Rangers: Memoirs of General Adam R. “Stovepipe” Johnson, edited by William J. David.
Octavo, [i-v], vi-xii, [2], 476pp. Maroon cloth, title stamped in gilt, decorative gilt cover. Floral endpapers. Complete with frontispiece portrait and 64 illustrated plates. Booksellers label on rear endpaper. Light wear to heel of spine, rubbing along bottom edge of front panel, solid text block. (Howes J-122) (Nevins I, p. 113) An exceptional copy.
Adam Rankin “Stovepipe” Johnson (1834-1922) was a Confederate Brigadier General during the American Civil War. Born in Henderson, Kentucky on February 6, 1834, he gained the nickname “Stovepipe” due to his use of stovepipe cannons in his early military career. Johnson started as a surveyor and mapmaker in the Texas frontier, but later joined Nathan B. ForrestÂ’s cavalry battalion in Kentucky. He was known for his daring cavalry raids and was instrumental in the Confederate capture of Newburgh, Indiana in 1862, which was the first town in the North to be captured by the Southern forces. In 1863, he reluctantly joined MorganÂ’s Raid into Ohio and saved 350 of his men after the Battle of Buffington Island. His military career was cut short in 1864 when he was blinded during a skirmish in Princeton, Kentucky. He returned to Texas after the war, where he founded a town and wrote his memoirs.
