?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 10,000 - $ 15,000
(AMERICAN REVOLUTION.) The Gentleman's Magazine, complete from 1775 to 1782. 36 maps and plans, 80 plates, complete per plate lists. 8 volumes (Volumes XLV through LII) including collective title pages and index supplements. 8vo, uniform early 20th cloth, minor wear; occasional minor wear and foxing to contents; uncut, last 4 volumes partially unopened. Plates but not text leaves collated. London, 1775-1782
The first and foremost of Great Britain's general-interest magazines, in a run spanning the main fighting of the American Revolution from Lexington through Yorktown. Among the highlights is the possible first British periodical printing of the Declaration of Independence in the August 1776 issue. The "Declaration of American Independency" appears on pages 361 and 362, signed in type by John Hancock and Charles Thompson. The Declaration is also discussed in a later article titled "Account of the Proceedings of the American Colonists": "Whether those grievances were real or imaginary, or whether they did or did not deserve a parliamentary enquiry, we will not presume to decide. The ball is now struck, and time only can shew where it will rest."
Among the maps are "A Plan of the Town and Chart of the Harbour of Boston" (January 1775); "A Map of 100 Miles round Boston" (June 1775); "A New and Correct Plan of the Town of Boston" (October 1775); "A Map of the Country Round Philadelphia Including Part of New Jersey and New York" (September 1776); "Sketch of the Country Illustrating the Late Engagement in Long Island" (October 1776); "A Map of Connecticut and Rhode Island" (November 1776); "Map of the Progress of His Majesty's Armies in New York, During the late Campaign" (December 1776); Scull and Heap's "Map of Philadelphia and Parts Adjacent" (December 1777); "Map of Hudson's River, with the Adjacent Country" (January 1778); and "A Chart of Delaware Bay and River" (July 1779).
The folding plates include "The Siege of Rhode Island, Taken from Mr. Brindley's House" (February 1779). In September 1781, just before the final siege of Yorktown, the magazine published an article titled "The Pensylvanian Fire-Places, Commonly Known by the Name of American Stoves, Invented by Dr. Franklyn" (page 453), illustrated with a plate of Benjamin Franklin's "American Stoves on the Improved Construction." Text illustrations include the "Plan of the Redoubt and Intrenchment on the Heights of Charles-Town (Commonly Called Bunker's Hill)" (September 1775, page 416)
