322 pp. Engraved portrait frontispiece and portrait plate of Henry Flipper. (8vo) 19x13.4 cm (7½x5¼") green gilt-decorated cloth, endpapers replaced. First Edition. The scarce First Edition of this autobiography is now a cornerstone of African-American military history. Association copy, with ownership signatures of Stephen Vincent Benét's father James Walker Benét and the Pulitzer Prize winning author's brother William Rose Benét. The ownership inscription is dated 1779, a year before James Walker Benét graduated from West Point. William Rose Benét was a writer, editor and co-founder of The Saturday Review of Literature. Born a slave in Georgia before the Civil War, Henry Ossian Flipper (1856-1940) was appointed a Cadet at the US Military Academy during the Reconstruction era. While he was the fifth Black Cadet to enter West Point, he was the first to survive years of racial harassment and to graduate in 1877. After being commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant in the 10th Cavalry Regiment, thus becoming the first African-American officer to command “Buffalo Soldiers” on the western frontier, he wrote this book about the personal challenges he had faced at the Academy. But his ordeal was not over. Six years later, having serving ably in the Indian Wars, Flipper was charged with embezzlement, court-martialed for “conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman”, and dismissed from military service. He spent the rest of his life as a successful engineer and died in 1940 without seeing the military exoneration for which he had long fought. Another half century passed before Flipper was posthumously given an honorable discharge and presidential pardon.
322 pp. Engraved portrait frontispiece and portrait plate of Henry Flipper. (8vo) 19x13.4 cm (7½x5¼") green gilt-decorated cloth, endpapers replaced. First Edition. The scarce First Edition of this autobiography is now a cornerstone of African-American military history. Association copy, with ownership signatures of Stephen Vincent Benét's father James Walker Benét and the Pulitzer Prize winning author's brother William Rose Benét. The ownership inscription is dated 1779, a year before James Walker Benét graduated from West Point. William Rose Benét was a writer, editor and co-founder of The Saturday Review of Literature. Born a slave in Georgia before the Civil War, Henry Ossian Flipper (1856-1940) was appointed a Cadet at the US Military Academy during the Reconstruction era. While he was the fifth Black Cadet to enter West Point, he was the first to survive years of racial harassment and to graduate in 1877. After being commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant in the 10th Cavalry Regiment, thus becoming the first African-American officer to command “Buffalo Soldiers” on the western frontier, he wrote this book about the personal challenges he had faced at the Academy. But his ordeal was not over. Six years later, having serving ably in the Indian Wars, Flipper was charged with embezzlement, court-martialed for “conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman”, and dismissed from military service. He spent the rest of his life as a successful engineer and died in 1940 without seeing the military exoneration for which he had long fought. Another half century passed before Flipper was posthumously given an honorable discharge and presidential pardon.
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
