The Garrett Family’s Annotated 1878 Crosby

Crosby, Sylvester S. THE EARLY COINS OF AMERICA; AND THE LAWS GOVERNING THEIR ISSUE. COMPRISING ALSO DESCRIPTIONS OF THE WASHINGTON PIECES, THE ANGLO-AMERICAN TOKENS, MANY PIECES OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN, OF THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES, AND THE FIRST PATTERNS OF THE UNITED STATES MINT. Boston: Estes & Lauriat, 1878. 4to [30 by 24 cm], original brown half morocco, gilt double fillets; spine with five raised bands, ruled, lettered and decorated in gilt; marbled endpapers and page edges. (2), v, (5), (11)–381, (1) pages; 110 wood engravings in the text; 2 folding heliotype manuscript facsimiles; 10 fine heliotype plates of coins and tokens. Binding worn, with spine split at tail with some loss; contents shaken, with a few signatures detached. Worthy of restoration. Good to very good. The Garrett Family copy, with T. Harrison’s bookplate and annotations that appear to have been written through the mid-1910s. The annotations include notes on the plates identifying the various coins depicted, as well as specific varieties where applicable. Marginal notes in the text identify topics and specific coins discussed. Also included are notes on numbers known of various rarities. The notes are mostly in pencil and seem to span a fair amount of time. While no references appears to be made to later die studies of the various state coppers, there are scattered references to the 1914 exhibition catalogue published by the American Numismatic Society, a publication that appeared more than 25 years after the death of T. Harrison Garrett but well within the time period in which John Work Garrett was collecting. An interesting copy of this landmark work, with a fine provenance. State with overprinted coin numbers on Plate IV; scarce state with photographically reproduced handwritten coin numbers on Plate V (present, according to Newman, only on “a few specimens,” though seemingly more common that he thought). Coin 15a on Plate VII hand-numbered in pencil, apparently as always. Without the handwritten correction, occasionally seen, to Miss Eliza Susan Quincy’s name in the subscribers’ list on page 381. Clain-Stefanelli 12115*. Davis 291. Grierson 218. Sigler 603. Ex T. Harrison Garrett Library, with his bookplate; ex Carl W.A. Carlson Library, with his bookplate; ex Kolbe Sale 64, lot 328; ex Jeff Hosford Library, with his bookplate; ex Kolbe & Fanning’s 2011 New York Book Auction, lot 423 (at $7500 hammer).