NARRATIVE OF MR. JOHN DODGE DURING HIS CAPTIVITY AT DETROIT. Reproduced in facsimile from the second edition of 1780. With an introductory note by Clarence Monroe Burton.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa: The Torch Press, 1909. 4to., 64 pp., illustrations. Printed on handmade laid paper, untrimmed and unopened. Cloth-backed boards, with titling in gilt along the spine, with printed paper label on the upper board. Near fine. One of sixty copies for sale from a total edition of sixty-three. Item #5860
In his firsthand account, John Dodge, a trader originally from Connecticut, relates his abduction from his home in Sandusky by British soldiers and their Wyandot allies, January 1776, accused of siding with the rebels. He was imprisoned in Detroit under British Lieutenant Governor Henry Hamilton, who offered bounty of Dodge's scalp (Governor Hamilton, a.k.a., "Hair Buyer", paid bounties for American scalps). He was held in a "loathsome dungeon", during a severe winter, tortured and repeatedly threatened with execution. While on restricted parole in Quebec, 1778, Dodge escaped, managed to reach Philadelphia, where petitioned Congress on the severe conditions in the western frontier.
Howes D-399. The first obtainable edition. Ayer Collection 78.
Price: $200.00