This is a first edition of the Letters from Lord Chesterfield To His Son, written in 1774
The title page reads Letters Written By The Late Right Honourable Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl Of Chesterfield, To His Son, Philip Stanhope, Esq; Late Envoy Extraordinary At The Court Of Dresden: Together With Several Other Pieces On
Various Subjects. Published By Mrs. Eugenia Stanhope, From The Original Now
In Her Possession. In Two Volumes. London: Printed For J. Dodsley in Pall-Mall. M.DCC.LXXIV [1774]
The two volumes are bound in contemporary polished calf, with five raised bands, red and black labels with gilt titles and faded decorations on the spine, blank endpapers
with pencilled notes in both volumes and bookplates titled “Auchincruive”, which was a famous estate in Scotland and the name of the owner of the books inscribed on the first page of text in both volumes - his name was Richard Alex Oswald, he lived at Auchincruive, and was a Scottish merchant and slave trader.
Volume I has a half-title, a frontispiece of Lord Chesterfield, the title page, a two-page dedication to Lord North, followed by a five-page advertisement about the death of Lord Chesterfield and a statement about how his private letters intended for his son hopefully could be used for the betterment of other youth; the advertisement was written by Lord Chesterfield’s daughter-in-law, Eugenia Stanhope, after Lord Chesterfield died. She had married Lord Chesterfield’s son in secret because his son didn’t want his father to know that he had married Eugenia. Often in ill health, Philip Stanhope, the son, died of dropsy - heart failure - in France in 1768, when he was only 36 years old.
It was generally believed that only after his son died that Lord Chesterfield learned of the existence of Philip's wife and children. Lord Chesterfield received them kindly and took upon himself the cost of the education and maintenance of his grandsons and became very attached to them. When Lord Chesterfield died in 1773, his will provided for the two grandsons with a £100 annuity each, as well as £10,000, but he left Eugenia nothing. Faced with the problem of supporting herself, she sold Chesterfield's letters to a publisher, J. Dodsley, for 1500 guineas. Lord Chesterfield never intended them to be published, and the result was a storm of controversy because of their perceived “immorality”.
Chesterfield was a statesman and orator who sat in the House of Commons for forty years; he initially supported Walpole as prime minister, then bitterly turned against him. His abiding interest in the later half of his life was the education of his son, Philip, and that’s where these letters come from. The early death of his son led to his father’s decline, and Lord Chesterfield died five years later.
Volume I is 568 pages long and Volume II is 606 pages long, with an errata leaf for the first volume after the last page of Volume II. There are five points of issue on the errata leaf, and four of the five are uncorrected, which makes these two volumes first editions in the first state, and one point of issue is corrected, which falls into the second state.
The second volume has an added bonus: a letter from the Edinburgh Advertiser dated May 19th - [1]775 is inserted near the front free endpaper, and this letter is about a character that was supposed to have been drawn by Lord Chesterfield for Dr. Samuel Johnson’s "A Dictionary of the English Language". Lord Chesterfield had a spat with Dr, Johnson about payment and publicity for the dictionary - Lord Chesterfield invested a little bit of money to back the project and Dr. Johnson felt snubbed because Lord Chesterfield never seemed to give it the publicity Dr Johnson had expected - and we don’t know if the character was supposed to be a real drawing or just a description of a character on paper, but the character was supposed to be a nobleman with a variety of traits, and this letter says to see Letter 76 in the first volume of these letters from Lord Chesterfield.
The two volumes are 4 To. and measure 11 5/8 x 9 1/4 in. wide apiece, and both volumes have occasional foxing and wear at the crown and heel and edges of the spines, and still a desirable first edition about the letters of Lord Chesterfield to his beloved son.