An Address to the Committee of Association of the County of York, on the State of Public Affairs.

By... January 3, 1781. The Second Edition. Light browning and scattered foxing throughout, else very good in modern sage green combed cloth-backed plain paper covered boards. 46pp. Printed by A.Ward, and sold by J. Almon... G. Kearsly; and R. Faulder... London; R.Cruttwell, Bath; and by all the Booksellers in York,

Sabin 30685, giving precedence to this "Second" over the Stockdale, London edition of the same year.

Hartley was a close friend and correspondent of Benjamin Franklin, who he had met whilst he was studying at Lincoln's Inn. He was MP for Hull from 1774 to 1780 and 1782-4 and was noted as an outspoken, if not eloquent, opponent of the American War and of African slavery. Most likely it was due to his intimacy with Franklin and his consistent support of Rockingham that he was chosen as plenipotentiary to Paris, where in 1783 he and Franklin drew up and signed the definitive peace between Great Britain and the United States. Of his writings DNB remarks that they were mostly political "and set forth the arguments of the extreme liberals of his time", his personality appears to have been less than memorable, " Wraxall says that Hartley, "though destitute of any personal recommendation of manner, possessed some talent with unsullied probity, added to indefatigable perseverance and labour." He adds that his speeches were intolerably long and dull, and that "his rising always operated like a dinner-bell."

Stock Code: 88627