[Rarebooks] fa: MEMOIRS OF JAMES HARDY VAUX Swindler and Thief 1830 - AUSTRALIA

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auctions ending Sunday, October 29. Images and more details can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la. 

http://tinyurl.com/y8tfnnwd

Thanks again,
Ardwight Chamberlain
Ann Arbor, MI, USA

Memoirs of James Hardy Vaux, A Swindler and Thief, Now Transported to New South Wales for the Second Time, and for Life. Written by Himself. Second Edition. London: Whittaker, Treacher, and Arnot, 1830. Early/period polished buckram, leather spine label lettered in gilt; 12mo (15.5 cm); [4], xxiv, 288 pp.; bound with the publisher's adverts, extra title-page.

Comprising volume XIII of Autobiography. A Collection of the Most Instructive and Amusing Lives Ever Published, Written by the Parties Themselves, but a complete work in itself. Modest rubbing to the binding, bumps to the corners; mild toning and spotting to the edges of the text block, slightly over-opened at the midpoint, a few small spots and touches of soiling, but generally clean and sound, firmly bound. The first edition of Vaux's memoirs, published in 1819, is diabolically scarce.

Noted for being the first full-length autobiography written in Australia, the Memoirs of James Hardy Vaux is also a lively and fascinating read in itself. Vaux (1782-1827?) was a thief, pickpocket, con man, forger, deserter, rogue and charmer who has the distinction of being the only convict known to have been transported to New South Wales three times. His real fame, however, rests on his Memoirs, one of the great literary depictions of low-life, providing a vivid portrait of Georgian London's criminal underworld and the British penal system from one who was familiar with both.