THE NEW LETTER WRITER or Art of Polite Correspondence: Embracing letters on Love, Courtship, Marriage, &c.

12mo, pp. 12; stitched as issued in the original blue printed wrappers with woodcut on upper panel, minor chipping at head of upper wrapper, otherwise a very good copy.


First edition of this rare 'Letter writer' published in the coastal town of Devonport. Examples of letters are included 'From a servant-man to his Sweetheart'; 'From a Gentleman to a widow'; 'From a Journeyman Tradesman to his Sweetheart'; 'From a Young Man to the Parents of a Young Lady'; 'From a Friend to another in Confinement for Debt'; and 'Letter from a Bashful Lover to his Mistress', most of which are then supplied with an example of a 'favourable' answer.

Devonport, being a district of Plymouth, was made up of several dockyards in the mid nineteenth century, and as might be expected, a haven for sailors and tradesmen, for whom the present pocket guide would have been particularly useful. Samuel and John Keys were stationers at Devonport, both the sons of Elias Keys a printer, publisher, stationer and binder who set up the Columbian Printing Office at 7 St James St. Almost all their publications were in someway derivative of similar books by the major London publishers but modified to satisfy their own local market.

OCLC records two copies, at Nottingham in the UK, and McGill in North America.