Description

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. With Twenty-seven Illustrations on Wood by George Cruikshank, Esq. London: John Cassell, Ludgate Hill, 1852. There is a title-page vignette “Topsy and Eva” plus a full-page portrait of Mrs. Stowe as a frontispiece (the twenty-eighth illustration). 8vo. Collation: 3 initial blanks; frontispiece; title-page; preface to the American edition; contents and list of illustrations; introduction; “Mrs. Stowe and Her Family”; and “Results”; 391 pages of text, the verso of page 391 is a list of publisher’s advertisements for ladies’ books; 1 final blank; in this copy the original dark green figured cloth covers and spine of this illustrated English edition are bound in at the end.

Frontispiece portrait of Mrs. Stowe and the illustrated title-page.

Bound in full tan calf, gilt-ruled, re-backed, remains of the original back-strip laid back down. Top page edge only gilded. Gilt-ruled leather book plates of philanthropist Alva B. Gimbel pasted down on the inside front cover and again on the recto of the initial blank. Very occasional marginal spotting, but still a good copy, this illustrated abolitionist classic has a description of the efforts in England to assist Mrs. Stowe with her fund-raising efforts in the one-page account titled “Results.” Cohn, 777. (Cohn states this Cruikshank-illustrated edition appeared originally in 13 parts in paper wrappers and was then issued in “black” cloth with uncut edges.) Die Bilderwelt im Kinderbuch, 2189. In its day, the only book to out-sell Uncle Tom’s Cabin was the Bible.