Description

ULTRA RARE, LIKELY ONE OF A KIND, COMPILATION OF ORIGINAL ARTICLES WHICH APPEARED IN THE CENTURY MAGAZINE BETWEEN 1883 AND 1890 AUTHORED BY NICOLAY AND HAY ON THE LIFE OF LINCOLN. John Nicolay and John Hay were President Lincoln's private secretaries. These two individuals were provided the private papers of Abraham Lincoln and from them, and other materials, produced a series of articles on the life of Abraham Lincoln which were published between 1883 and 1889 in The Century Magazine. The volume of The Century Magazine in 1883 in which the first article appeared was Vol 33, and the final article by the pair was in Vol 39, published in 1889. In 1890, The Century Magazine produced a coveted 10-Vol bound set of the original magazines which contained each magazine published between 1883 and 1889 which included all the Nicolay and Hay articles, and of course a treasure trove of other articles which appeared in the magazines. I have been unable to find the particular single volume which is offered in this listing. These are original Nicolay and Hay Century Magazine articles alone in this time frame. I can't claim this is the complete set of the Nicolay and Hay articles - it may just be an important subset collected by an individual for this privately bound collection. There is the single title page which includes the title, Life of Lincoln, the identification of the two authors, and the private binder Geo. E. Williams of Washington DC. It also notes the year of publication, 1892, on the title page. The next page is a facsimile of a handwritten poem, presumably about President Lincoln. Then the articles begin. A listing photo shows the Lincoln portrait and the Preface to this entire serialized series, titled, Abraham Lincoln : A History. The very last Nicolay and Hay article is from Vol 39, p. 561, titled, "The Capture of Jefferson Davis - The End of Rebellion - Lincoln's Fame". The book ends with 3 articles which appeared after this last article, and are not authored by Nicolay and Hay. They are: Vol 39, p. 586, titled, Pursuit and Capture of Jefferson Davis by I. The Commander of the Union Cavalry (article ended with the name of this commander presumably, James Harrison Wilson), II - By An Eye-Witness (ending with the name, Wm. P. Stedman) Vol 40, p. 305-311, Memoranda on the Life of Lincoln Vol 40, p. 371-382, Greeley's Estimate of Lincoln, An Unpublished Address by Horace Greeley. Obviously, I have not done any compilation of all the articles in this collection - there may be others also not authored by Nicolay and Hay such as these last three. Listing photos show examples of title pages of Nicolay and Hay articles, some interesting pages that includes parts of the articles but also back sides of the leaf with curious pieces. Found in the flip-through is a newspaper articles pertaining to one of the articles by Nicolas Hay. It is included with the book. The book was found with front and rear boards fully detached but the spine and text block were very solid and clean. The boards were reattached and the leather refurbished and sealed. What results is an attractive and sturdy complete 3/4 Leather book with a compelling interior! The boards now show light to moderate corner and edge wear. The front and rear have 2 blank endpaper leaves. Here is a longer history of the work of Nicolay and Hay in Century Magazine, found online: "Abraham Lincoln: A History, by President Lincoln’s private secretaries, John Nicolay and John Hay, stands even today as the most massive single work ever written on the sixteenth president. The publication of the ten-volume set by the Century Company in 1890 gave the public the first comprehensive life based upon Lincoln’s own papers – papers that Robert Todd Lincoln made exclusively available to Nicolay and Hay. No other biographers had access to these papers until James G. Randall in 1947. The list of great Lincoln writers who did not have access to Robert’s collection includes Albert Beveridge and Carl Sandburg. The publication of the ten volumes in well-known green cloth binding did not, however, represent the first opportunity for the public to sample the work. Century Magazine, the publication that created the famous compilation, Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, published the chapters of Abraham Lincoln: A History serially during the 1880’s. By the time students of Abraham Lincoln’s life read Nicolay and Hay in 1890, they could already have read much of the story in the Century...." B113