November 17, 2020 Early Arms & Militaria: Age of Exploration, Empire & Revolution
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 11/17/2020
[Attributed to Peter Horry or Mason Locke Weems]. "A Conversation Between General Marion & a Whig Boy." Folio, 2 pp., laid paper with iron gall ink, the sheet folded vertically to comprise two working pages on each side. This appears to be the original, working or final manuscript draft of a humorous anecdote relating to an event in Marion's Revolutionary War career, as later published as a chapter in Horry and Weems's "Life of ...Marion." A backwoods lad is sent by his father to alert Marion to a gathering of Tory partisans up the Little Pedee River and an amusing interview takes place with the general. [with] Horry, Peter and Mason Locke Weems. "The Life of General Francis Marion, A Celebrated Partizan Leader, In The Revolutionary War, Against the British and Tories, in South-Carolina and Georgia." Philadelphia: Joseph Allen, 1841. Octavo, 251pp. plus six hand-colored plates, full leather with leather spine label in gilt. General Francis Marion, "The Swamp Fox," was one of the leading American commanders in the Revolution in the South. His brilliant operations in the Carolinas kept thousands of British troops tied down and contributed immensely to ultimate American victory. Plain and unassuming, he was widely beloved by his contemporaries, and after his death this book began the process of his ascent to legend. Horry, his second-in-command for part of the war, supplied many of the facts, although he was allegedly disgusted by Weems' flowery passages and later disclaimed any connection with the book. What he disliked, others embraced, and the book went through many editions. This edition not in Howes. From a private Charleston, South Carolina collection. JLK