AN IMPARTIAL HISTORY OF THE WARS OF IRELAND, WITH A CONTINUATION THEREOF, IN TWO PARTS; FROM THE TIME THAT DUKE SCHONBERG LANDED WITH AN ARMY IN THAT KINGDOM, THE 23D DAY OF MARCH, 1691, WHEN THEIR MAJESTIES PROCLAMATION WAS PUBLISHED, DECLARING THE WAR TO BE ENDED

London, England: For Ric. Ciswell, at the Rose and Crown, 1693. Leather-bound. GOOD. Quarto., 8" x 6 ¾". Contemporary panel calf, with rectangular floral box, fleurs-de-lis to tips. Rebacked, now with five raised bands (six compartments) and gilt short title. Thirteen foldout copper engravings of maps and plans, detailed battle scenes, (e.g., "A Ground Plat of London-Derry &c," which features the Lough of Yale, a Mile Scale, roads, forests, armies, compass, bridges, forts, etc.) Some creasing to foldouts, several with short, inconsequential splits, ink-marks or smudges.

Title of Part 1, dubbed below, "The Second Edition," is A True and Impartial History of The Most Material Occurrences in the Kingdom of Ireland During the Two Last Years, with the Present State of Both Armies. Minor scuffing of leather along interior edges but not much. The entirety easily readable and feels fine in the hands. Several sections underlined and with marginalia, and a few annotations, etc., with plentiful but unobtrusive checks-x-marks, etc., strewn throughout - evidence of the book being very closely studied.

Bookplate of one previous owner Samuel Kerrich, S.T.P. (Professor of Sacred Theology) pasted onto front pastedown, another opposite, that of I.B. Story, Doctor of Divinity (penciled note suggesting "Corick House" locates the coat of arms); purple ink-stamp of J.A. McCracken, Rathfriland, above that bookplate. Maggs Bros. LTD catalog entry laid in, suggesting the importance of this tome to the historiography of Irish and specifically Irish military history. In order, and with mistakes of pagination (noted below) but without textual interruption: Title page, an imprimatur of Printing Order from W. Bridgeman, Title Page to original publication, Page of Dedication (to Lord Viscount Morpeth and William Levson Gower, Sr.), Prefaec (spelled thusly, incorrectly), thus [1], 1-163 [3], [23] 2-152, 159, 269, 191, 162-169, 180, 172, 173, 184, 175-190, 185-192, 193-328 pp. [p. 114 is rendered 441].

Complete also with publisher's advertisements for other books published. At bottom of p. 163 is an "Advertisement" in the form of an apology for the printer's mistakes, and asks the reader's indulgence (must we indulge "Prefaec"?). E.S.T.C. provides insightful notes as to edition; the present tome would appear to be a reissue, maintaining the designation of [Donald] Wing in entries S5751 and S5748.

This reissue lacks the half-title, does have the imprimatur and advertisement, and does begin with An Impartial History . . . and then follows with A Continuation of the Impartial . . . A scarce, influential treatise on Ireland's history, and a good, solidly bound, clean, tank-like volume. Author was the Reverend George Warter Story (1664-1721), son of the Quaker Thomas Story (~1630-1721) and his first wife, Thomasin Constable. According to Barnard's entry about him in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Story was the Chaplain to the Regiment formerly Sir Thomas Gower's then the Earl of Drogheda's. He was an eyewitness of the remarkable passages recounted inside, providing a first-hand account of the wars in Ireland, especially in North Ireland, having "accompanied Meinhard, Duke of Schomberg, in August as Chaplain to Sir Thomas Gower's regiment of foot" and mustered near where the Battle of the Boyne was fought. He then served with Lord Drogheda until war's end. He writes compellingly of the "long march" to Ulster he and his companions made as his regiment retreated in loss from Limerick in November of 1691, to wit: "November the 16th, my Lord Lisburn's and my Lord Drogheda's Regiments March'd from Limerick, lying Encamp'd without the Town ever since the Army left that place, the former went towards Rose, and the other towards the North, the poor Men enduring a great of Hunger and Hardship on so long a March" (p. 285, Continuation). Story thus became an influential historian for County Limerick and the whole of Ireland, about equally regarding the human deaths and suffering and the social and economic costs to Ireland of warfare.