Harper’s Weekly, A Journal of Civilization. [Harper’s Weekly’s Complete Coverage of the American Civil War: January 1, 1861-December 30, 1865].

$8,800.00

Item Number: 142619

New York: Harper & Brothers, January 1, 1861-December 30, 1865.

Rare continuous run of 260 issues of Harper’s Weekly, covering the entirety of the American Civil War. Folio, five volumes, bound in full buckram with morocco spine labels lettered in gilt, illustrated with hundreds of wood-engraved illustrations, many from noted American illustrators including portraits of Union and Confederate Army Generals and Officers, battlefield scenes, maps, city views, and dozens of satirical caricatures and cartoons, many from noted American illustrators. Of note are dozens of illustrations by American painter Winslow Homer early in his career, including the “Great Sumter Meeting in Union Square,” “The Sharpshooter,” and “The Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln.” Also of note are hundreds of illustrations by Thomas Nast, considered the “Father of the American Cartoon,” including several Christmas scenes, including the first modern depictions of Santa Claus, beginning in the January 1863 issues. In very good condition. Bookplates. A very rare and fascinating literary and political chronicle covering all of the war’s major events and battles.

Published by Harper & Brothers from 1857 until 1916, Harper's Weekly was the most widely read journal in the United States throughout the period of the Civil War. The Weekly had supported the Stephen A. Douglas presidential campaign against Abraham Lincoln, but as the American Civil War broke out, it fully supported Lincoln and the Union. A July 1863 article on the escaped slave Gordon included a photograph of his back, severely scarred from whippings; this provided many readers in the North their first visual evidence of the brutality of slavery. The photograph inspired many free blacks in the North to enlist in the Union army.