Description

[004693] [Mackenzie, Peter]; a Ten-Pounder. An Exposure of the Spy System Pursued in Glasgow During the Years 1816-17-18-19 and 20 with Copies of the Original Letters of Andrew Hardie WITH The Trial of James Wilson for High Treason WITH Trial for Libel WITH Reply to the Letter of Kirkman Finlay . Glasgow: Muir, Gowans and Co., 1832. First Edition. 8vo. Hardback. Good

Four items, bound from the original parts – An Exposure of the Spy System Pursued in Glasgow During the Years 1816-17-18-19 and 20 with Copies of the Original Letters of Andrew Hardie, (in fifteen parts), 1832, [3], 4-242pp; The Trial of James Wilson for High Treason, With an Account of His Execution at Glasgow etc.etc., 1832, (in three parts), [3], 4-48pp; Trial for Libel, in the Court of the Exchequer, Guildhall, London, etc. etc., (in four parts), c.1835, [1], 2-64pp; Mackenzie, Peter, Reply to the Letter of Kirkman Finlay, Esq. on the Spy System, (in one part), 1833 (second edition), [3], 4-16pp

Slightly later cloth, with an old paper label to spine, rebacked, corners bumped and worn. Inner joints reinforced, browned and lightly foxed, frontispiece browned with some light water staining to edges, contents list in ink to front pastedown, with short note to ffep, but text is generally clean

First named with a portrait frontispiece of ‘Richmond the Scottish Spy’

Coherent sammelband of pamphlets in parts relating to the Scottish ‘radical war’ of 1820, and the use / misuse of spies / agent provocateurs (see Beresford Ellis and Mac A’Ghobhainn, The Scottish Insurrection of 1820, passim). The libel trial relates to the naming of Richmond as a spy

Hardie was one of the leaders of the ‘Scottish Insurrection’ of 1820, where a mixture of desperate times for weavers, the aftermath of Peterloo and the Cato Street conspiracy and with the ‘help’ of agents provocateurs, led to a proclamation of a provisional government, leading to a short-lived strike and civil unrest. Hardie, with Baird, was convicted of high treason and was hanged and beheaded (apparently the last beheading in the UK) in Stirling, with many other transported to Australia

Goldsmiths’ 27584 (Exposure); 27585 (Wilson); and 28200 (Reply)