The Letters of Junius, Complete in One Volume: A New Edition, With..

1788. Letters (and Polemics) from Junius Junius. The Letters of Junius. Complete in One Volume. A New Edition. With A Copious Index. London: [s.n.], 1788. 394 pp. Octavo (6-3/4" x 3-3/4"). Contemporary mottled calf, gilt fillets and lettering piece to spine, gilt tooling to board edges. Light rubbing and a few minor nicks to boards, moderate rubbing to extremities, front joint cracked and mended at head, rear joint starting at head, light creasing to spine, chip to lettering piece, corners bumped and worn, front hinge cracked, illegible ownership stamp to front pastedown, early ownership signature ("Wm. S. Godfree") to front free endpaper. Light toning to interior, light foxing and soiling in a few places, a few partial cracks to text block, some leaves loosening slightly at foot but secure, tear to fore-edge of leaf P6 (pp. 175-176) affecting text without loss. $200. * Later edition. A collection of 69 letters critical of the government of King George III written by popular anonymous writer and polemicist Junius and published from 1769 to 1771. 29 are addressed to "the Printer of the Public Advertiser," a London newspaper, and the rest to individuals such as Sir William Blackstone and the Duke of Grafton (a frequent target). The first authorized publication as a set was in London in 1772, with many editions, both authorized and unauthorized, following. It resulted in the prosecution of the publisher, Henry Sampson Woodfall, for seditious libel; the jury found Woodfall guilty of publishing the Letters, but Lord Mansfield, the presiding judge, declared a mistrial and Woodfall escaped imprisonment. English Short-Title Catalogue T11021.