Atlas to Marshall's Life of Washington

5/11/24 - shared by Ron Gibbs at Bay Area Map (BAM) Group meeting at Rothman residence. Ron has written two historical novels about George Washington around the time of the revolution. More info on Ron’s website here.

An atlas made as a complement to the famous biography of George Washington, written by Supreme Court Justice John Marshall. From the collection of Jane and Ron Gibbs.

From Wikipedia: John Marshall (September 24, 1755 – July 6, 1835) was an American politician and lawyer who served as the fourth chief justice of the United States from 1801 until his death in 1835. Marshall remains the longest-serving chief justice and fourth-longest serving justice in Supreme Court history, and he is widely regarded as one of the most influential justices to ever sit on the Supreme Court. Prior to joining the Supreme Court (and for one month simultaneous to his tenure as Chief Justice), Marshall served as the fourth United States Secretary of State under President John Adams.

After his appointment to the Supreme Court, Marshall began working on a biography of George Washington. He did so at the request of his close friend, Associate Justice Bushrod Washington, who had inherited the papers of his uncle. Marshall's The Life of George Washington, the first biography about a U.S. president ever published, spanned five volumes and just under one thousand pages. The first two volumes, published in 1803, were poorly-received and seen by many as an attack on the Democratic-Republican Party.[119] Nonetheless, historians have often praised the accuracy and well-reasoned judgments of Marshall's biography, while noting his frequent paraphrases of published sources such as William Gordon's 1801 history of the Revolution and the British Annual Register.[120] After completing the revision to his biography of Washington, Marshall prepared an abridgment. In 1833 he wrote, "I have at length completed an abridgment of the Life of Washington for the use of schools. I have endeavored to compress it as much as possible. ... After striking out every thing which in my judgment could be properly excluded the volume will contain at least 400 pages."[121] The Abridgment was not published until 1838, three years after Marshall died.[122]

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