GILBRALTAR, A History of the Late Siege -- personal copy of Bazil Gordon (1768-1847)

A HISTORY OF THE LATE SIEGE OF GILBRALTAR With a description and Account of That Garrison, from the Earliest Periods.
JOHN DRINKWATER
Spilsbury and Son, London, 1790, Fouth Edition

JOHN DRINKWATER (1762 – 1844) was an eyewitness to the Great Siege of Gibraltar, during the years of the American Revolution, as Spain attempted to wrest Gibraltar from Great Britain. Compiled from daily observations of Drinkwater and others.

ILLUSTRATED :
10 engraved, folding plans, charts and views, plus
laid-in engraved plate of the east view of Gibraltar

FORMAT : 11” x 8 1/4” half folio,
Binding : 18th c full calf, gilt medallions on ribbed spine (boards detached)

PROVENANCE : Bookplate of Samuel and Bazil Gordon, dated January 11, 1811.
The overlaid bookplate of his son Douglas H. Gordon traces descent through the family.

BAZIL GORDON OF LOCHDOUGAN
(b 1768, Kelton Parish, Scotland; d 1847, U.S, Virginia)

Emigrated circa 1783 with brother Samuel to Falmouth, Virginia, where the brothers traded tobacco.
THEIR FORTUNES WERE MADE IN THE WAR BETWEEN ENGLAND & SPAIN WHICH IS THE SUBJECT OF THIS BOOK, which the 1811 bookplate marks as their personal copy.
Bazil purchased Wakefield Manor in Rappahannock County, Virginia, the family's main home for generations, birthplace of his son Douglas H. Gordon (whose bookplate was added later)

At the time of his death in 1847, Bazil Gordon's net worth was estimated in the millions, at a time no other American had a recorded financial worth over one million dollars. He is known as "America's First Millionaire".


.................................................................................... $ 675.