A SHORT ACCOUNT OF THE LATE REVOLUTION IN GENEVA; AND OF THE CONDUCT OF FRANCE TOWARDS THAT REPUBLIC, FROM OCTOBER 1792, TO OCTOBER 1794. IN A SERIES OF LETTERS TO AN AMERICAN...TRANSLATED AND ENLARGED FROM TABLEAU DE LA RÉVOLUTION FRANÇOISE A GENÈVE.
Ivernois, Francis d':
London: Printed by T. Spilsbury and Son, 1795. vi,77pp. Printed self-wrappers, stitched. Early ink signature on titlepage. Very good. First of two editions. A fascinating account of the spread of the French Revolution to Geneva between 1792 and 1794, in three letters and a postscript written between August 1794 and January 1795. The author, François d'Ivernois, was a polymath political writer and liberal opponent of the Revolution, forced to flee Geneva in 1792. He settled in London, became naturalized as a British subject, wrote volumes of anti-French propaganda for Britain, and was knighted "Sir Francis" by the King. In the present letters, addressed to an unnamed American, d'Ivernois describes the events leading up to the Revolution in Geneva and complains of the Revolution's brutal excesses, "beginning with the...introduction of the right of Universal Suffrage, in 1792" (p.61). Later in 1795, d'Ivernois would correspond with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson in the hopes of transplanting Geneva's university, L'Académie de Calvin, to the U.S., a project that was never realized, despite enthusiastic support from American political leaders (THE SISTER REPUBLICS...). Jimmy Carter Library and Museum, THE SISTER REPUBLICS: SWITZERLAND AND THE UNITED STATES FROM 1776 TO THE PRESENT, http://www.jimmycarterlibrary.org/pastexhibits/sis_reps.pht ml. The Napoleon Series, "The Finances of France in 1799," http://www.napoleon- series.org/research/government/france/finance/c_finances179 9.html.
(Item ID: WRCAM35866) $250.00