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The Lancashire Witches. A Romance of Pendle Forrest
[Wiliam] Harrison Ainsworth
William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882) was lawyer who tried publishing but gave it up to write 39 novels. This novel seems to have been first published in 1849 for private circulation only. Jenkins reissued several of his novels in the early 1920s, some 40 years after he died, perhaps because they were no longer in copyright. This title is not listed in Jisc, so there is no copy in any library in the U.K. or Ireland. Jisc list five other titles by Ainsworth that were published by Jenkins, one of which is dated 1923, a copy of Cardinal Pole.
I bought this copy of The Lancashire Witches on eBay with five other titles by Ainsworth, all published by Jenkins, all in dust jackets: Jack Shepherd, which is in Jisc, with a DJ designed by Gale; Guy Fawkes, in Jisc with a DJ designed by 'C.Morse' (Saloman van Abbé); The Star Chamber, not in Jisc, with a DJ designed by Gale; Ovingdean Grange, not in Jisc, with a DJ designed by Gale; and The Tower of London, not in Jisc with a DJ designed by Gale. As there is an inscription in my copy of The Lancashire Witches dated 1925 and some of the other titles have inscriptions dated 1924 (by Lucie Alyson Bishop), I have assumed that they were all printed in 1923, the same as Cardinal Pole, but I could be wrong.
First edition thus?
Bibliography code: JEN-23.2
Publisher: Herbert Jenkins
Series: none
Year: [1923?]
Format: no signatures of gatherings, but probably 16 mo
Pages: 312
Binding: green cloth with title in black at top, author at the botton, black lines around the edge; title, author and publisher on spine
Size: 178 x 112 mm
Dust jacket: signed Blam in white, lower centre, underneath the trees
Internal illustrations: none
Price: 2 shillings
Printing history: none given
Printed by: Garden City Press, Letchworth
Notes:
Dust jacket (click to enlarge)