[JOHNSTON, Andrew Gregory].

Letters to a Nobleman

Item #83611

[JOHNSTON, Andrew Gregory]. Letters to a Nobleman, Proving a Late Prime Minister to Have Been Junius; And Developing the Secret Motives Which Induced Him to Write under That and Other Signatures. With An Appendix, Containing a Celebrated Case Published by Almon, in 1768. London: Printed for Messrs. Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1816. xv, 195, 55pp. 2 folding tables. Appendix with separate title page. ALS laid in. Modern three-quarter calf and marbled boards. Very good. A thorough, if misguided, attempt to establish that former Prime Minister William Henry Cavendish Bentwick, duke of Portland, was the pseudonymous political pamphleteer Junius. The accusation was first made in response to his public quarrel with the duke of Grafton, but was soon dismissed. Bentick's death in 1809 renewed public curiosity in the matter, hence the present work. Johnston grounds his argument in that fact that Junius seems to have been unduly concerned with the questionable transfer of land from the duke of Portland to Sir James Lowther, but the DNB dismisses the claim as "absurd." The appendix reprints Almon's 1768 publication of that land transfer case. The folding tables, present here, are usually lacking. The ALS laid in is a presentation letter from a R. Ranking to the noted London legal writer Francis Const.

Price: $350.00