I suspect Tallon thought he was fighting to maintain slavery; a little later Russell quotes a Mississippi planter who had spent much of his life fighting as an adventurer in the many Latin American wars of the time, and neglected his property in the process, as saying that of 110 slaves he had only five left, but he was "going to stand up for States' rights as long as I can draw a trigger- so snakes and abolitionists look out." Russell comments that "it must be a benefit to American society to get rid of a considerable number of the class of which he is a representative man." Not much Lost Cause romanticism there.

No, it was more the pathos of the appeal for the recording of his name- he may well have thought that he was dying- that interested me. Well, he succeeded, in as much as people who open the book today will know the bare fact that he existed, and for whatever reason supported States' rights.

Tallon- it's not an English name I don't think. Perhaps French?

And Greg- yes, I shouldn't post when drop taken. Russell. Mine is obviously one of the early editions, as the outcome of the war is certainly not known at the time- it finishes with the news of the death of Prince Albert (Queen Victoria's husband) in December 1861, and Russell's return to Europe the following March. It appears to have been owned by somebody who lived in Scarsdale House, Ripley, Derbyshire (UK) at some stage, and they must have been quite well off, because they had a telephone- Ripley 70- and their own letter press.