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Very Rare Original "BUSHROD WASHINGTON" Copper-Plate Engraved Bookplate Re-Engraved from the Copper Plate for GEORGE WASHINGTON'S Bookplate
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Extremely Rare Original "Bushrod Washington" Copper-Plate Engraved Bookplate being a Restrike from the Original Copper-Plate Used by his Uncle “George Washington”, by changing the name engraved from George Washington to Bushrod Washington, Fine or better.
Rare original Copper-plate Engraved Bookplate of BUSHROD WASHINGTON (1762-1829), nephew of Founding Father and First President of the United States George Washington. Bushrod served as an Executor of George Washington's estate, inherited George Washington's papers, and Mount Vernon, taking possession in 1802 after the death of Martha Washington. This Bookplate which measures 5-1/8" x 3-1/4", is a restrike from the Original engraved Copper-plate used for making George Washington's personal bookplates, with "Bushrod Washington" engraved where "George Washington" had previously appeared. There are a few thin spots and an near invisible internal tear below "Bushrod Washington", the result of having been removed from the book inside cover in which it was once affixed along with other traces on the blank reverse. Well printed with sharp details, embossing of the original plate impression is easily seen surrounded by fully wide outer margins.
Bushrod Washington served as an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States from 1798 to 1829, and while on the bench was a staunch ally of Chief Justice John Marshall. In 1816, he Co-founded the “American Colonization Society”, which promoted the emigration of Freed Slaves to Africa and served as the organization’s First President, from 1816 until his death in 1829. The Bookplate of Bushrod Washington, nephew of George Washington, is also of much interest, and the manifest similarity of its design to some of the bookplates engraved by Henry Dawkins has led to the suggestion that he made this plate.
But to the mind of the writer, Dawkins was not a man of originality, and was a regular copyist when it came to Book-plates; the similarity of the plate of James Samuels to this plate is rather to his mind a further evidence of the clever adoption of a reasonably good design by Dawkins, than of his having been chosen by Judge Washington to engrave his book-plate. The design of this plate is more spirited than any{96} of the authenticated work of Dawkins; indeed, it surpasses the plate of General George Washington in that respect.
The arms are the same in these two Washington plates. In his “Barons of the Potomac and the Rappahannock” (published by the Grolier Club, 1892), Mr. Moncure Daniel Conway has referred to the older form of the arms as used by earlier members of the family.
The earliest shields held “Gules on a barre argent 3 Cinquefoiles of ye first.” The second step was made by changing to the{97} following, “Gules on a fesse sable 3 mullets.”
The last and the presently offered form is, “Argent, two bars gules: in chief three mullets of the second.” These last, it is claimed, suggested our National Flag.