“REFLECTED ALMOST EVERYTHING THAT WAS IN THE NEW ENGLAND AIR” (HENRY JAMES)

HIGGINSON, Thomas Wentworth. The Writings of Thomas Wentworth Higginson. Cambridge: The Riverside Press, 1900. Seven volumes. Octavo, modern three-quarter brown morocco gilt, raised bands, marbled boards and endpapers, top edges gilt, uncut and partially unopened. $1300.

Limited large-paper first edition, number 93 of 200 sets, of the 19th-century American soldier and social reformer’s works, signed by the author on a tipped-in leaf in the first volume.

"A remarkable combination of the courageous man of action and the true scholar" (Kunitz & Haycraft, 366). Minister, solider and social reformer, Thomas Wentworth Higginson was a prolific author of essays, history, criticism and fiction. He "was one of the 'Secret Six'—abolitionists who raised money for Brown's planned slave insurrection at Harpers Ferry… [He] freed, enlisted, and trained former slaves," and "his regiment played a secondary role in the attack on Fort Wagner, South Carolina, where the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment, composed of free northern black troops, was repulsed with heavy losses… [and while he] discouraged Dickinson from publishing her poetry during her lifetime… he deserves much of the credit for bringing it to public attention after her death… Henry James aptly noted that his life 'reflected almost everything that was in the New England air" (ANB). With frontispiece portraits in Volume I, III and VII. Kunitz & Haycraft, 367.

One headcap with very minor repair. A fine set, handsomely bound.