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I bought my first book on the Jacobites when I was about fifteen and a boarding school student at Groton School in Massachusetts. It was the Chevalier de Johnstone\u2019s History of the Rebellion in 1745<\/em>. A few years later, (1951) on my first trip to England and Scotland, I visited the battlefield at Culloden, scene of the decisive defeat of Charles Edward Stuart (\u201cNonie Prince Charlie\u201d). On that same trip, I bought a book from Blackwell\u2019s bookshop in Oxford, Sandford\u2019s large folio History of the Coronation of James II<\/em>. Eager to peruse it, I turned down the shop\u2019s offer to mail it to Cincinnati, consequently having to bicycle with it strapped over the rear wheel, as a friend and I continued our youth hosteling tour. It survived the trip.<\/p>\n While still an undergraduate at Princeton, I began to buy seriously\u2014or, as seriously as I could with the limited time and money at my disposal. Antiquarian books from England were cheap right after World War II, and I ordered regularly from the catalogues issued by English booksellers. Eighteenth century pamphlets could usually be had for between $1.50 and $3.00 each. My most extravagant purchase from that time cost a staggering $100. I thought long and hard before ordering it, but it was, after all, written by Henry Fielding\u2014a fine copy of his extremely rare History of the Rebellion<\/em>.<\/p>\n In 1954, compulsory military service took me to France. In the tar-paper barracks in Orleans, I continued my regular perusal of booksellers\u2019 catalogues (forwarded by my parents in Cincinnati), and even on the paycheck of a Private First Class ($99 a month) I was able to acquire eighteenth century books and pamphlets.<\/p>\n I joined the staff of the Virginia Historical Society in 1958. A starting salary of $3600.00 per annum allowed me to buy with, what seemed to him at the time, reckless abandon! Gradually, however, book prices rose, and decisions as to whether or not I could afford a particular item became more frequent. By the mid-1960s, I had new family obligations to consider, and with the cost of antiquarian books increasing relentlessly, I concluded that I could no longer make additions to the collection. As a result, the collection remains basically what it was in 1970.<\/p>\n -Virginius C. Hall<\/p>\n Cincinnati, 2016<\/p>\n