PAUL REVERE'S ENGRAVING OF THE BOSTON MASSACRE.


REVERE, PAUL The Massachusetts Calendar, or an almanac for the Year of our Lord, 1772. Boston: Printed and Sold by Isaiah Thomas, et al, [1771]. 8vo (186 x 114 mm). Three woodcut engravings (of 4), including Revere's "The Boston Massacre Perpetrated on March 5, 1770," verso front cover. 12 leaves (of 16), lacking the final 4 leaves. Original self-wrappers, chipping, not affecting Revere image, ink notations to cover, some foxing.EXTREMELY RARE VERSION OF REVERE'S FAMOUS ENGRAVING, a new cut above the lines, "While Britons view this scene with conscious dread, and pay the last sad tribute to the dead; What though the shafts of justice faintly gleam, And ermin'd miscreants ridicule the scene; Ne'er let one breast the generous sigh disclaim, Or cease to bow at FREEDOM's hallow'd sane; Still with the thought let Fame's loud Clarion swell, And fate to distance time the MURDER tell." After the 1770 publication of "The Bloody Massacre in King-Street," numerous engravings began to appear based on Revere's (which was ironically based on an illustration by Henry Pelham). This is the only one attributed to Revere himself (published in two forms in 1771-1772, a broadside and this one), "drawn closely after the Revere print, on the reverse of the first leaf, and below he cut an eight-line patriotic verse. It was unquestionably engraved by Thomas's friend, Paul Revere, as it was characteristically his work, and of the Boston engravers he was the only one who excelled in engraving on wood" (Brigham, p 64).