A special presentation copy
 
Memoranda During the War
Walt Whitman
Camden, 1875-6
 
First edition, first printing, the separately published second issue(the first issue was bound within Two Rivulets). Original plum cloth, green endpapers, all edges gilt. Spine lightly sunned, minor stains on the covers and endpaper margins, small abrasion on rear cover. Remembrance copy leaf with a detailed presentation to his sister, two portraits of Whitman, and advertisement leaf in the rear. Overall, a fresh Very Good copy housed in a custom case.
 
Memoranda is a compilation of Whitman’s journal entries during the Civil War - a cataclysm that profoundly affected him as it did the rest of the nation. It’s estimated that no more than 100 copies of this issue were published, and this copy has a lofty provenance - a loving inscription to his younger sister, Mary. At 19, she married a shipbuilder, moved to Greenport, Long Island, and had 5 children. She appeared in several of his early stories, and she represented the close, normal family life he idealized. Walt’s visits to her home were a respite from the realities of the broader Whitman family difficulties. 
 
Whitman inscriptions are readily available as he liberally signed his works, but copies inscribed for his family are scarce and special. 
 
$33,800
 
Ref:
 
Whitman Archive, Paula Garrett
Walt Whitman's America: A Cultural Biography, David Reynolds