Presentation copy

DUNANT, Jean Henry.

Un Souvenir de Solferino.

Geneva: Imprimerie Jules-Guillaume Fick, 1862.

1st Edition. Hardcover. Near Fine. Item #002714

4to (262 x 165 mm). [4] [1] 2-115 [1] pp., including half-title and double-page chromolithograph map drawn by B. Müller from the author's instructions; lithographed by Pilet & Cougnard, Geneva. Contemporary half-calf over marbled boards, spine lettered and ruled in gilt (light wear to extremities, upper hinge cracked but firm), marbled endpapers. Internally only little age-toned, occasional very minor spotting, otherwise crisp and clean. Provenance: Van Tuijll(?)*, Red Cross, s-Gravenhage. A very fine, untouched copy. ----

PMM 350; Norman 670; Garrison-M 2166; Grolier/Norman 73; Waller 2639; Heirs of Hippocrates, 1945; En Français dans le Texte 284. - FIRST EDITION. "On 24 June 1859 the Battle of Solferino - one of the bloodiest of the nineteenth century - was fought between the Austrians and the French-Piedmontese alliance. Dunant, a Swiss philanthropist, witnessed the battle and its dreadful aftermath, in which the nearly 40,000 casualties were left to die with no medical treatment except what he and the local inhabitants could provide them. Upon returning to Geneva Dunant published Un souvenir de Solferino, an account of the horrors he had seen coupled with an appeal for "some international principle, with the sanction of an inviolable convention, which. . . might constitute a basis for the relief of the wounded in the various countries of Europe." The wide interest generated by Dunant's book led in 1863 to the formation of a committee which later became the International Red Cross, and in 1864 to the establishment of the Geneva Convention. Dunant shared with Frédéric Passy the first Noble Peace Prize in 1901" (Norman 670). "The first edition of Un Souvenir de Solferino consisted of sixteen hundred copies printed in November 1862 for private distribution. Only four hundred of these were actually distributed; these copies, constituting the original issue, have a title page stating 'Ne se vend pas' above the imprint. A month later, in December 1862, Dunant had another thousand copies bound with a title page indicating 'deuxième édition'. The third edition, in which Dunant suggested the extension of Red Cross services to victims of natural disasters, appeared in 1863. An English translation was published by the American Red Cross in 1939." (Haskell Norman, One Hundred Books Famous in Medicine 73, p. 269).
*According to a Dutch inscription on the half-title, this copy was given by the author to "(?) van Tuijll" who added his address "Parkstraat 213". It was later donated to the "Jeugd Roode Kruis Afd. 's-Gravenhage"

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