This post was written by Kelly Bennett a Business Specialist and Claire D’Mura a Science Specialist in the Science & Business Reading Room.
In the Library’s 225-year history there have been two notable fires which destroyed its collections. The most famous of these fires happened during the War of 1812, when the Library of Congress collections burned along with the U.S. Capitol. The collections were reestablished with the purchase of the private library of Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826). At the time of the purchase, Jefferson’s collection contained 6,487 volumes in the fields of politics, history, science, law literature, fine arts, and philosophy. On Christmas Eve of 1851, another fire destroyed the Library’s collections stored in the Capitol, but this time it was due to a faulty chimney flue. Unfortunately, this fire burned two-thirds of the books from Thomas Jefferson’s collection. The Library has not had a significant fire since.
As the Library of Congress continues to acquire material, some of the titles from Jefferson’s library that were lost in the fire have returned to the shelves. This year, the Library acquired one business title and two agricultural titles that were part of Thomas Jefferson’s original collection.
Discourse of Trade, Coyn and Paper Credit, and of Ways and Means to Gain, and Retain Riches, by John Pollexfen (1697)
The Library acquired Discourse of Trade, Coyn and Paper Credit, and of Ways and Means to Gain, and Retain Riches, written by John Pollexfen, and first published in 1697. John Pollexfen (c. 1638-1715) was a successful self-made British merchant who first entered Parliament in 1679. An early Whig, he opposed both monopolies and laissez-faire free traders. In his only recorded speech in Parliament, he vehemently attacked the monopoly held by the East India Company.
Pollexfen wrote two economic treatises, of which A Discourse of Trade, Coyn, and Paper Credit… was one (Dictionary of Political Economy, Vol. III, 150). It was originally published anonymously but reprinted with his initials in 1700. According to Pollexfen, “some are of opinion that Laws for Regulating of Trade are unnecessary…[just] as too many Limitations of Trade may be inconvenient, so too much Liberty dangerous” (Discourse, 147-150). It also includes his thoughts on the East India Company and the “debauchery, immoralities and corruptions” brought about by the import of Indian luxuries (Discourse, 166). “Our Landed Men, should reform their depraved appetites and be content to be served with our own products, instead of costly varieties from abroad,” he wrote (Discourse, 158). The 2016 essay “Reconstructing Mercantilism” by Jonathan Barth, published in The William and Mary Quarterly, outlines Pollexfen views on free trade and mercantilism.
Also printed in this volume is The Argument of a Learned Counsel, Upon an Action of the Case Brought by the East-India-Company Against Mr. Sands an Interloper, a work by John Pollexfen’s brother, Lord Chief Justice Henry Pollexfen. In it, the Justice discusses the case of a trader sued for violating the monopoly of the East India Company to argue against such monopolies (“The Pollexfen Brothers” by Amy Weng, Duke University).
This addition to the Thomas Jefferson Collection was purchased using funds from the Victor S. Clark Endowment.
Roscoe’s Address on Opening the Botanic Garden of Liverpool, by William Roscoe, (1802)
Two agricultural publications have returned to the Thomas Jefferson Collection. The first of these is Roscoe’s Address on Opening the Botanic Garden of Liverpool, by William Roscoe (1802).
William Roscoe was an Englishman with many occupations and interests. He was a banker, a lawyer, a poet and a botanist. Roscoe was one of the founders of the Botanic Garden of Liverpool, and he wrote this small booklet on the occasion of its opening in 1802. According to the notes in E. Millicent Sowerby’s Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson, the text of this address may have been sent to Jefferson by James Maury, the U.S. Consul in Liverpool. Sowerby notes that Jefferson received a letter from Maury stating that Roscoe “certainly is one of the most amiable of men in all the relations of society,” and “When last at his house he presented me this pamphlet, which I beg leave to present you in return for the one you have been so good as to send me” (Sowerby, 493).
The Experimental Husbandman and Gardener, by Georg Andreas Agricola, translated by Richard Bradley (1726)
The second agricultural title added to the Thomas Jefferson Collection, The Experimental Husbandman and Gardener, is a 1726 English translation of scientist Georg Andreas Agricola’s most important work, which was first published in German in 1716. Agricola was most known for his work on plant propagation and this book described many of his techniques for causing fruit-bearing plants to multiply. Richard Bradley, an English botanist, translated the work into the English language and contributed an appendix attesting to his own success in using Agricola’s methods.
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