# Is "The Innocence of Father Brown" by G. K. Chesterton a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Innocence of Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton (Cassell and Company, 1911) is identified by: First edition: Cassell and Company, Ltd. The Cassell (London) 1911 printing is universally catalogued by the trade as the true first.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- First edition: Cassell and Company, Ltd
- (imprint naming London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne), 1911, octavo, in publisher's red cloth with the front panel stamped in gold and blind and the spine panel stamped in gold
- The first printing carries eight inserted plates by Sydney Seymour Lucas, including a frontispiece with tissue guard
- L.W. Currey records a first printing of 5,000 copies
- Copies should be collated for all eight plates, since the plates are the most frequently missing feature
- Publisher imprint reads Cassell and Company
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | G. K. Chesterton |
| Publisher | Cassell and Company |
| Year | 1911 |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | First edition: Cassell and Company, Ltd |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
First edition: Cassell and Company, Ltd. (imprint naming London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne), 1911, octavo, in publisher's red cloth with the front panel stamped in gold and blind and the spine panel stamped in gold. The first printing carries eight inserted plates by Sydney Seymour Lucas, including a frontispiece with tissue guard; L.W. Currey records a first printing of 5,000 copies. Copies should be collated for all eight plates, since the plates are the most frequently missing feature.

## Is this the true first?
The Cassell (London) 1911 printing is universally catalogued by the trade as the true first. John Lane Company (New York) issued the first American edition the same year, 1911; it is collected in its own right but is routinely miscatalogued as the true first — no source consulted dates the Lane printing ahead of Cassell.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Cassell issued further impressions of the first edition (a first-edition/second-impression state is recorded in the trade), so the impression statement should be checked. In the US, Macaulay Company reprints (c. 1918) followed the 1911 John Lane edition.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Innocence of Father Brown* by G. K. Chesterton a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-innocence-of-father-brown
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.