R. E. Lee.: A Biography.

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,, 1934-36. I well remember my delightful tour of the Richmond battlefields in your company First edition, first printing, presentation copy to Winston Churchill, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper of Volume One "To Rt. Hon Winston Churchill in honest envy of the style in which he has narrated the life of another great captain of our race. Douglas Southall Freeman". Churchill was very knowledgeable about the American Civil War. Much of his History of the English-Speaking Peoples is devoted to it where Churchill particularly praised Lee as the South's pre-eminent figure: "one of the noblest Americans who ever lived, and one of the greatest captains known to the annals of war". Douglas Southall Freeman was Churchill's guide to the battlefields of the Civil War during Churchill's visit in 1929. His biography of Lee was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1934. His inscription refers to Churchill's ongoing biography of the First Duke of Marlborough. Freeman wrote to Churchill on 23 October 1934 "I took the liberty, upon the appearance of my R. E. Lee to send you the first and second volumes, with a brief inscription. I hope the books reached you and if you have opportunity to glance through them, I hope they may recall the day when some of your Richmond admirers had the privilege of carrying you over the battlefields around this city" (Gilbert, p. 886). Churchill responded on 3 November 1934 "I am most complimented to receive the copy of "Robert E. Lee" which you have been so kind to send me and upon the inscription which you have added to your work. I am now in the process of reading it and find it a work of absorbing interest upon a subject of which I already have some knowledge. I well remember my delightful tour of the Richmond battlefields in your company and our memorable dinner that evening" (ibid., p. 908). Provenance: the bookplate of Winston Churchill and that of his son Randolph Churchill's is on the front pastedown of the first volume; Winston Churchill's is also in the second and third; there is residue from deliberate or accidental loss of Randolph's in second and third volume, and of both Winston and Randolph's in the fourth volume. The set was afterwards in the collection of Steve Forbes. Four volumes, octavo. Original red cloth, spines lettered in gilt. Spines lightly sunned. A near-fine set. Martin Gilbert, The Churchill Documents, volume 12, 2012.