Apr 13, 2023 - Sale 2633
/

Sale 2633 - Lot 122

Price Realized: $ 1,375
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(MILITARY.) [Zebina Kinsley.] Manuel of Military Pyrotechny, for the Use of the Cadets of the U.S. Military Academy. 24 folding plates. 55 pages of lithographed manuscript text. Folio, original 1/2 calf over marbled boards, minor wear; title edited in pencil with author's name added in ink, 1 x 5-inch portion of title page excised, minor foxing, two pencil portraits on front flyleaves, and pencil notes on rear flyleaves; uncut; inscribed thrice by cadet Thomas McCobb Hill on front free endpaper, with his surname on the front board. West Point, NY, 1831
Set Alert for Similar Items

Additional Details

First edition. This textbook was produced at West Point for educating cadets on the production and use of military signals. It appears at first glance (and likely at second glance) to be a manuscript, but it was actually produced entirely by lithograph. West Point had a small printing press which produced several textbooks during this period, of which this was the first. A colophon on page 55 reads "Lithographed by J.C. Poortermans, West Point Military Academy, 1831." Poortermans was a native of the Netherlands, apparently produced only two editions of this work while at West Point, and by 1833 was an artist and illustrator in South Africa.

Lithography was invented in Germany in 1798, and some of the earliest lithographic books were printed for German military training (Twyman, Lithographed Books, page 60). The process first came to America in 1819, and was used almost exclusively for illustrations in the major publishing centers of New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. This may be the first example of American lithography outside of those centers, the first on a non-commercial press, and the first in which not only the illustrations but also the text were reproduced by lithography.

At the rear of the volume is a sort of short partial diary entry dated 29 February 1832 by an unknown cadet, charming in its own right: "I am in the section room, have just been skinned in this book. It is Muster Day, have one more muster remaining . . . hope to see the river open by next week. All this at West Point. . . . Zeb is trying to show how to cast iron cannon. He will have to fess." Two pencil portraits can also be seen: a small caricature of "Lieut. P", and a full-length portrait signed "del. by Cadet Waller, Feb. 28th 1832."

Not in Shaw & Shoemaker. OCLC only shows one example of this exact title in OCLC (University of Virginia), although 6 other records list a "Manual" which is probably just ignoring the error in the original. None are traced at auction.