# Is "Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman" by William Tecumseh Sherman a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman by William Tecumseh Sherman (D. Appleton and Company, 1875) is identified by: First edition, New York: D.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- First edition, New York: D. Appleton and Company, published in May 1875 in two octavo volumes of 405 and 409pp (814pp in all), each with publisher's advertisements at the rear
- First-printing sets were bound in blue cloth with the title stamped in gilt on the front cover and spine
- Volume II includes a large folding map of Sherman's 1863-65 campaign marches, carried in a pocket attached to the inside rear board -- a fragile map, often torn or missing from surviving sets, that should be present and complete in a genuine first-edition set
- Publisher imprint reads D. Appleton and Company
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | William Tecumseh Sherman |
| Publisher | D. Appleton and Company |
| Year | 1875 |
| True first | — |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | First edition, New York: D. Appleton and Company, published in May 1875 in two octavo volumes of 405 and 409pp (814pp in all), each with… |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
First edition, New York: D. Appleton and Company, published in May 1875 in two octavo volumes of 405 and 409pp (814pp in all), each with publisher's advertisements at the rear. First-printing sets were bound in blue cloth with the title stamped in gilt on the front cover and spine. Volume II includes a large folding map of Sherman's 1863-65 campaign marches, carried in a pocket attached to the inside rear board -- a fragile map, often torn or missing from surviving sets, that should be present and complete in a genuine first-edition set.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Appleton issued a "Second Edition, revised and corrected" in 1886 that replaces the first two chapters with a new preface, adds a new opening chapter on Sherman's life before 1846 and a new closing chapter on his postwar career, appends letters and a "Personal Traits" sketch of Sherman by James G. Blaine, and makes roughly fifty changes to the original text; copies with this expanded content and the 1886 date are not the 1875 first edition.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman* by William Tecumseh Sherman a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/memoirs-of-general-w-t-sherman
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.