Mar 21, 2024 - Sale 2663

Sale 2663 - Lot 273

Price Realized: $ 8,125
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,000
(LITERATURE.) Phillis Wheatley. The first magazine printing of her patriotic poem "His Excellency Gen. Washington," in an issue of "The Pennsylvania Magazine or American Monthly Museum." Pages [153]-200. Octavo, 8¼ x 5¼ inches, disbound; lacking map, moderate foxing and wear, moderate dampstaining not affecting Wheatley page; uncut. Philadelphia, April 1776
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On 26 October 1775, the poet Phillis Wheatley sent George Washington this poem, with a cover letter confessing that his appointment "to be Generalissimo of the armies of North America, together with the fame of your virtues, excite sensations not easy to suppress." The poem is a stirring expression of patriotism in its own right, rendered more poignant by the life history of the author: born in Africa, brought to America in chains, and manumitted from slavery less than two years before the composition of the poem. It concludes:

"Whoever dares disgrace / The land of freedom's heaven-defended race! / Fix'd are the eyes of nations on the scales / For in their hopes Columbia's arm prevails / Anon Britannia droops the pensive head / While round increase the rising hills of dead . . . . / Proceed, great chief, with virtue on thy side / Thy ev'ry action let the goddess guide / A crown, a mansion, and a throne that shine / With golds unfading, Washington! be thine."

Washington "sent Wheatley's letter and poem to Joseph Reed in Philadelphia on 10 Feb. 1776, and Reed apparently arranged to have it published in the Pennsylvania Magazine" (The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, volume 2, pages 242–244). The poem appears on page 193 of this monthly Philadelphia-printed magazine along with Wheatley's letter, all headed "The following Letter and Verses, were written by the famous Phillis Wheatley, the African Poetess, and presented to his Excellency Gen. Washington." The poem had also appeared in the 30 March 1776 issue of the Virginia Gazette daily newspaper (also arranged personally by Washington). Robinson, Wheatley Bio-Bibliography, pages xx and 29.