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[RUFFIN, EDMUND.]. Anticipations of the Future, to Serve as Lessons for the Present Time.  In the Form of Extracts of Letters from an English Resident in the United States, to the London Times, from 1864 to 1870.  With an Appendix, on the Causes and Consequences of the Independence of the South. Richmond, Virginia: J.W. Randolph, 1860. 1st ed. 12mo. 9, [1], 416 pp., plus 14 pp. publisher's list. Orig. cloth. Library bookplate removed; lib. stamp on title. Slightly shaken. Some chipping to cloth. $850.00

 

Howes R 493:  "An ingenious effort, this, to awaken the South to the inevitability of sectional war and the advisability of immediate secession."  Ruffin predicts the election of Seward as President in 1864, followed by secession and a war lasting about a year, ending with the recognition of the South as a sovereign state.  The year after publication Ruffin fired the first shot on Fort Sumter, initiating the Civil War.  A well-known Southerner as agriculturalist, writer, publisher and politician, Ruffin committed suicide upon the collapse of the Confederacy.  Wright II, 2132a (one copy).  LCP/HSP Afro-Americana Catalogue, 9003.  Rare.