THE WORKS OF FRANCIS FRY ON PDF eBook

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THE WORKS OF FRANCIS FRY  1865-1887

5 works in 1, PDF on a thumb drive.

This valuable resource authored by the 19th Century bibliographer and prolific Bible collector Francis Fry includes:

1.) A Brief Memoir by his son Theodore, 1887, 2.) The Bible by Coverdale, 1535, remarks on the titles, the year of publication, &c., with facsimiles,’ London, 1867. 3.) A Bibliographical Description of the Editions of the New Testament, Tyndale’s Version in English, with numerous readings, comparisons of texts, and historical notices, the notes in full from the edition of November 1534, an account of two octavo editions of the New Testament of the Bishop’s version, without numbers to the verses, illustrated with 73 plates,’ London, 1878. , 4.) A Description of the Great Bible,1539, and the six editions of Cranmer’s Bible, 1540 and 1541, printed by Grafton and Whitchurch. , 5.)  The editions in large folio of the Authorised Version printed in 1611, 1613, 1617, 1634, 1640; illustrated with titles and with passages from the editions, the genealogies and the maps, copied in facsimile, also with an identification of every leaf of the first seven and of many leaves of the other editions, on fifty-one plates, together with an original leaf of each of the editions described,’ London, 1865, folio.

378 single and double digital pages including dozens of plates that are very useful showing the distinguishing points in each edition. A must have reference for the serious collector and Bible scholar. An antiquarian book collection of these works individually would run into the thousands.

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Francis Fry (1803–1886) was an English businessman and bibliographer.

Fry was born at Westbury-on-Trym, near Bristol, on 28 October 1803, the second son of Joseph Storrs Fry. He was educated at a large school at Fishponds, in the neighbourhood of Frenchay, kept by a Quaker named Joel Lean, and began business training at Croydon.

From the age of 20 to middle age he devoted himself to the rapidly increasing business of J. S. Fry & Sons, cocoa and chocolate manufacturers, at Bristol, in which he was later a partner. He took a part in the introduction of railways in the west of England, and was a member of the board of the Bristol and Gloucester Railway, which held its first sitting 11 July 1839, retaining his position during various amalgamations of the line until its union with the Midland Railway. He was also a director of the Bristol and Exeter Railway, the South Devon Railway, and other companies. He took a major share in managing the Bristol Waterworks (1846) until his death.

In 1839 he moved to Cotham, Bristol, and built a house close to the old Tower. With William Forster, father of William Edward Forster, and Robert Alsop, he visited Northern Italy in 1850, as a deputation from the Society of Friends to various crowned heads, asking for their support in the abolition of slavery. In 1852 he made proposals to the railway companies for a general parcel service throughout the United Kingdom.

He was a member of the committee of the Bristol Philosophical Society, as well as of the Bristol Museum and Library. He took an interest in other associations for social improvement. He died 12 November 1886, soon after the completion of his eighty-third year and was buried in the Friends’ graveyard at King’s Weston, near Bristol.

Books and china formed his chief study. His collection of specimens produced at the Bristol factory between 1768 and 1781 was particularly complete. Many examples were described by Hugh Owen. His collection of bibles and testaments numbered nearly thirteen hundred, chiefly English, especially editions of the versions of Tyndale, Coverdale, and Cranmer, but with a number of first editions in other languages.

He catalogued the library of the Monthly Meeting at Bristol in 1860. On a visit to Germany, a discovery made by Fry at Munich, about books printed at Worms by Peter Schöffer the younger, enabled him to decide that William Tyndale‘s first English New Testament came from Schöffer’s press. Two years later Fry produced his facsimile reprint, by means of tracing and lithography, of Tyndale’s New Testament (1525 or 1526), the first complete edition printed in English, from the only perfect copy known at the time, later in the Baptist College, Bristol.

In the same year he edited a facsimile reprint of the pamphlet known as The Souldiers Pocket Bible, distributed to Oliver Cromwell‘s army, and discovered by George Livermore of Boston, who had himself reprinted it the previous year. Several editions were circulated among the soldiers during the American Civil War. The altered and enlarged edition, The Christian Soldier’s Penny Bible (1693), was produced in facsimile and edited by Fry.

In 1863 he issued a couple of small rare pieces illustrative of Tyndale’s version, and in 1865 published his bibliographical treatise on the Great Bible of 1539, the six editions of Cranmer’s Bible of 1540 and 1541, and the five editions of the Authorised Version. Fry visited private and public libraries to collate different copies of these bibles. This work was followed by his account of Miles Coverdale‘s translation of the Scriptures, and his description of forty editions of Tyndale’s version, most of them having variants.