One of the earlier compilations of American biography, printed two decades after the Revolutionary War by the noted printer Isaiah Thomas and his partner E.T. Andrews. "Boarding School, 1796" written in ink on the front pastedown of Vol. I; Vol. II with early book label of Robert B. Taylor, Norfolk, to front pastedown. Robert Barraud Taylor, a prominent Virginia attorney, politician, judge, and military officer who was born in Norfolk in 1774 and died there in 1834. During the War of 1812 he was appointed a Brigadier General in the Virginia militia and was in command of the troops in the Hampton Roads area, distinguishing himself in the Battle of Craney Island in June, 1813. In 1819 Taylor served with Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and others on the Board of Visitors at the University of Virginia. BAL 934 & 942; Evans 26637 & 33393; Howes B-322; Larned 394; Sabin 4429.