Correspondence of Charles, First Marquis Cornwallis.: Edited with Notes by Charles Ross. Second Edition.

IMPORTANT PRIMARY SOURCE ON AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1798 IRISH REBELLION, etc.
second and best edition 3 vols. tall 8vo. xvi, 568, 32 (advts.); iv, 582; iv, 618pp., engraved portrait, 2 folding maps, folding genealogical table, original pebble-grain terracotta cloth, sides decoratively blocked in blind and with Cornwallis's crest blocked at the centres of the sides in gilt on the fronts and in blind on the rears, slight faded patch on one spine, an exceptional fine bright, unopened, copy.
From the fine library of Adare Manor, Co. Limerick, Ireland, with one volume signed by Lord Dunraven, F.R.S., and with his lightly penciled shelf number on each front end paper.

This second edition corrected some errors, added a small number of new letters (some supplied by the Knight of Kerry), and introduced fresh information into many of the biographical notes.
Cornwallis (1738-1805) was commander of the British forces who surrendered at Yorktown in Virginia in 1781 thus confirming the success of the American Revolution. He had a successful period (1786-93) as Governor-General of India and in 1797 he refused command of the army in Ireland unless some progress on the question of Catholic emancipation was guaranteed. In June 1798 he was appointed as both Lord Lieutenant and supreme army commander in Ireland, and in this role he successfully put down the Rebellion. He firmly opposed indiscipline and indiscriminate violence by the army and he sought to restrain the savagery of the yeomanry against the general population. Recognition of this, together with his support for meaningful Catholic emancipation, had great influence in gaining widespread support among catholics for the Act of Union, but alienated many loyalists. The Union was eventually passed on the understanding that Catholic Emancipation would swiftly follow, but when George III refused to allow the measure to proceed, Cornwallis, together with Pitt and Castlereagh the other principal architects of the policy, resigned.The correspondence printed in these volumes constitutes therefore an important primary source on the histories of America, India and Ireland. About one third of the work deals with his short, but critically important, entry into Irish affairs.