Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase

Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase

$1,495.00
Skip to product information
Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
  • Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase
Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase

Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. First Trade Edition (1939). Warmly Inscribed Presentation Copy to Nelson Griswold, with Bookplates, Reader’s Notes, and Original Slipcase

$1,495.00
Abraham Lincoln: The War Years
Four volumes, complete
Carl Sandburg
Harcourt, Brace and Company, New York, 1939
First edition, first printing (trade issue)
Authorial presentation copy, warmly inscribed by Sandburg, 1939

From the library of Nelson Griswold, with his bookplate in each volume
With Griswold’s typewritten reading notes and pencil-bracketed passages
With laid-in pages from the 4 December 1939 TIME feature on Sandburg
Original publisher’s slipcase

A first trade edition of Sandburg’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Lincoln biography, complete in four volumes and in the original slipcase. This is not the numbered limited edition of 525 copies. It is the first trade printing, issued the same year, and a presentation copy inscribed by Sandburg to Nelson Griswold in the year of publication.

Inscribed on the front free endpaper of Volume I:

Nelson Griswold
my friend, herewith
is perhaps the longest
“feature-picture story”
ever done on lovable
Old Abe –
Carl Sandburg
1939

Each volume carries Griswold’s engraved bookplate. Laid in are his original typewritten notes on 4 × 6 sheets, one for each volume, listing page numbers that correspond to neat pencil brackets in the text. Also laid in are original leaves from the 4 December 1939 issue of TIME, including the feature “Your Obt. Servt.,” with photographs of Sandburg at work.

Bibliographic details

Author: Carl Sandburg
Title: Abraham Lincoln: The War Years
Publisher: Harcourt, Brace and Company
Place: New York
Date: 1939

Edition: First edition, first printing, stated “First Edition After Printing 525 De Luxe Copies”
Volumes: Four, complete
Binding: Original dark blue cloth, gilt spine titles
Slipcase: Original publisher’s slipcase

Provenance

Nelson Griswold’s copy, with his bookplate in all four volumes and Sandburg’s 1939 inscription to him as “my friend.” The set has descended in the family. According to Griswold’s nephew, the books have remained with the family since publication; he identifies his uncle as city editor of the Buffalo Evening News and a friend of Sandburg. The inscription’s journalistic phrasing is consistent with that family account.

The notes and marked passages record Griswold’s own reading of the work. Together with the bookplates, the contemporary inscription, and the 1939 TIME leaves, they form a coherent owner’s archive rather than a later-signed set.

Warm, dated, work-referencing inscriptions on the 1939 trade edition are uncommon. Most signed copies of The War Years are either the deluxe issue of 525, signed only on the limitation page, or trade copies signed later and more briefly.

A complete inscribed first-trade set with family provenance, reader’s notes, and publication-year magazine material.

You may also like