[John James Audubon] The Winter's Wreath

[Various authors]. The Winter's Wreath, A Collection of Original Contributions in Prose and Verse. London: George B. Whittaker, (1829). Engraved decorative title page and 12 tissue-guarded plates. Green silk binding with gilt lettering to spine. All edges gilt. Measures approx. 4" x 6.5". Light rubbing, corners edgeworn, spine faded with some wear to tail, head lightly chipped. Some minor spots of foxing to text.

On pages 104-127, the first printing of John James Audubon's "Journey Up the Mississippi" is included.

In 1810, Audubon moved to Henderson, Kentucky to establish himself in the merchant business with his partner Jean Ferdinand Rozier. In December of that year, he went on a trading, hunting and naturalizing expedition up the Mississippi River with Rozier, not returning to Henderson until May 1811. Audubon here gives a detailed description of the country traversed, with much on the natural history and Natives Americans of the area whom he befriended and travelled among. Included is a memorable description of an Indian swan hunt on the Tennessee side of the river on Christmas Day 1810. Beyond its importance on the early life of Audubon preceding his work on the Birds of America, the essay is a remarkable picture of the early days in the upper Mississippi River region.

"Almost twenty years later, Audubon wrote an account of the trip, Journey up the Mississippi, which he published in 1828 for a Liverpool editor of a Victorian anthology called A Winter's Wreath. At the time time, Audubon was in England promoting himself and trying to bring Birds of America to press. Journey up the Mississippi is a fascinating document for many reasons, but I dwell on it here because it describes Audubon's first physical encounter with Louisiana. This is not the southern Louisiana that will revive Audubon's designs and desires in 1820, but it is Louisiana nonetheless. Audubon refers to it as 'Upper Louisiana,' using the old term to describe half of the vast French colony that originally stretched from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico and included the entire Mississippi River Valley" (Audubon on Louisiana, Forkner).

Although his Ornithological Biography (the text issued to accompany the plates of the double-elephant folio edition) includes many episodes recounting his naturalizing travels, these 1810 experiences were not included. The earliest account of this journey, and the only edition in Audubon’s lifetime, appeared in the present holiday annual, The Winter Wreath for 1829. Later abridged and more fanciful versions would be published within Buchanan’s Life and Adventures of John James Audubon (1868) as well as Maria Audubon’s Audubon’s Story of his Youth (1893).

The Liverpool annual, The Winter Wreath, was published from 1828-1831 and was merged with the “Friendship’s Offering” in 1833. The contributions came mainly from Liverpool non-conformist families, including the Rathbones. During the course of production of his Birds of America, Audubon spent considerable time in Liverpool as the Rathbones were among his financial backers; and among his Liverpool friends was John Chorley, the brother of the editor of this annual, likely accounting for how his narrative was published there.

As noted in 1942 by John Francis McDermott, "...it is such a detailed picture of the Mississippi country in 1810 that it is well worth reprinting from the rare volume in which it has been hidden for more than a century."