SOUTHEY'S COMMON-PLACE BOOK. (Spine title: "Southey's | Com Place | Book | Vol. I | J.O. Banks.") [Southey's Commonplace Book.]

Warter, John Wood, 1806-1878 (editor). [Robert Southey, 1774-1843.] James Oliver Banks, 1829-1904 (original owner).

Published by New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1849.

i-vi, [10], vii-viii, 9-414, [10], 415-416 pages. Hardcover: H 23.75cm x L 15.5cm. Personalized half-leather binding for book's original owner per gilt stamped name "J.O. Banks" at spine heel. Pebbled black leather spine and board corners; marbled paper boards. Several surface nicks/abrasions to spine leather; spine's horizontal bands delineate three compartments with gilt stamped lettering plus four compartments with stamped centerpieces and delicate gilt stamped arrows at compartment corners; some rubbing to boards with slender wear along edges particularly at leather board corners. Marbled endpapers; purple ink name stamp "J.O. Banks." on front pastedown; handwritten antiquarian ink ownership inscription on front flyleaf "J.O. Banks | Tuscaloosa | 1850;" purple ink name stamp repeated at bottom margin of page v; varied foxing throughout. Binding is quite firm. Still an attractive very good copy. Odd interspersion of five blank leaves (as cited in the collation) at book's front and rear presumably done by the book's binder to balance out quires during the stitching process. Born in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama, James Oliver Banks (1829-1904) graduated with a bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Alabama in 1847 and 1850 respectively later followed by a medical degree from Jefferson College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Banks entered Civil War military service as a captain in September 1861 in Columbus, Mississippi with Company A, 5th Battalion, Mississippi Confederate Infantry rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel in October 1862 with the 43rd Mississippi Infantry participating in action at the Battle of Corinth and Vicksburg with final service in Alabama and Georgia. Banks was first married to Martha Jane Coleman (1833-1868) of Greene County, Alabama with whom he had five children (of which two passed in infancy) and, following her death, married Lucy Watkins Young (1841-1933) on May 11, 1870 with whom he had five children (all surviving to adulthood). Lucy Young was the last of ten children of George Hampton Young who owned the architecturally renowned Waverly Plantation on the west bank of the Tombigbee River between Columbus and West Point, Mississippi. No bookbindery ticket is present and thus the binding cannot be attributed to a specific shop or artisan. Although newspaper and book printing was well established in Tuscaloosa by 1850, it seems unlikely that a bookbindery could be viable in that small southern town during the antebellum period. Most likely the book was bound in Philadelphia (which had numerous binderies) while Banks was enrolled at Jefferson College or, as the book's spine decoration reflects a bit of French aesthetic more so than British (the latter being of greater influence among Philadelphia craftsmen), it is possible that the book was bound in Banks' frequent transit point of Mobile, Alabama which had several binders and, of course, a prominent French community. Seller Inventory # CVA-00780

Bibliographic Details

Title: SOUTHEY'S COMMON-PLACE BOOK. (Spine title: "...
Publisher: New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1849.
Binding: Hardcover