Siege of Richmond First Edition - George B. Mcclellan - Bauman Rare Books

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Siege of Richmond

George B. MCCLELLAN | Joel COOK | Robert E. LEE

Item#: 111287 We're sorry, this item has been sold

Siege of Richmond

"ONE OF THE MOST REMARKABLE ON RECORD": FIRST EDITION OF COOK'S FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT OF THE PENINSULA CAMPAIGN: THE SIEGE OF RICHMOND, 1862, IN ORIGINAL CLOTH

(MCCLELLAN, George B.) COOK, Joel. The Siege of Richmond: A Narrative of the Military Operations of Major-General George B. McClellan During the Months of May and June, 1862. Philadelphia: George W. Childs, 1862. Octavo, original pebbled dark green cloth.

First edition of the famed war correspondent's important eyewitness account of the 1862 Peninsula Campaign, the first offensive of McClellan's newly formed Army of the Potomac.

Joel Cook was a reporter for the Philadelphia Press who was embedded with McClellan's Army of the Potomac during the unsuccessful Peninsula Campaign. Cook's "excellent" contemporary history covers the Army's organization and transpordation, conditions in the peninsula, the Battle of Seven Pines (i.e., Fair Oaks), the siege, and the retreat and Seven Days Battles (Nevins I:73). A lasting outcome of this otherwise inconclusive campaign was the promotion of Robert E. Lee to commander of Confederate forces. Lee immediately displayed his aggressive instincts as he harried the Union forces throughout their withdrawal, known as the Seven Days Battles. Even at the time Cook presciently notes: "The wounding of General Johnston was one of the best things for the enemy which had ever happened. A more marked change for the better never was made in any body of men than that wrought in his army by the sensible actions of General Lee." In his introduction, historian Benson J. Lossing writes of the Peninsula Campaign: "the magnitude of the forces engaged and of the stake at issue, invested that campaign with momentous interest from the beginning. Lossing singles out Cook's work as a war correspondent and praises Siege of Richmond as "one of the most remarkable on record." Dornbusch III: 1538. Seagrave, 246. Price, Literature of Journalism 1461. Owner signature.

Text fresh with light occasional soiling, tiny bit of marginal dampstaining, lightest edge-wear. faint dampstaining to original cloth. A near-fine copy.

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Aquatint Copperplate process by which the plate is “bitten” by exposure to acid. By changing the areas of the plate that are exposed and the length of time the plate is submerged in the acid bath, the engraver can obtain fine and varying shades of gray that closely resemble watercolor washes. Although the name contains the word “tint”, this is a black-and-white printing process; aquatint plates can often be hand colored, however.
Armorial Used to describe a binding bearing the coat of arms of the original owner, or with bookplates incorporating the owner’s arms.
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