THE ANTI-CONSPIRATOR, or, INFIDELITY UNMASKED; Being a Development of the Principles of FREE MASONRY; to which is Added, STRICTURES ON SLAVERY... Edited and Published by Dyer Burgess.

Contains the first twenty-four issues of this strongly anti-Masonic publication, which strives to show that Masonry and Slavery go hand in hand. The issues are bound together, numbered consecutively and have an index at the front. The issues are: Vol. I No. 1 - Vol. I No. 24 (June 1831 to April 1832).

CINCINNATI: Dyer Burgess, 1831-1832. First Edition

Twenty-four issues, 16 pages each, 384 total pages (numbered consecutively). Bound together in card covers with leather spine, 6x9 inches, 384 pages plus title page and 2 page index.

Copy of Kenneth D. Arn, M.D., b.1921 d.1976, with his bookplate on the inside front cover. Kenneth D. Arn was a noted Dayton, Ohio physician, and a 33rd Degree Mason.

Only FAIR (but complete) condition, the covers are well worn, with scrapes, rubs, tearing to the corners, peeling to the leather spine, some biopredation, etc, but holding on with its sewn binding; internally, the front and rear inner hinges are split, the blank prelims and endpapers are lacking, the front pastedown has light waterstaining, there are relevant pencil notes on the front pastedown, the blank verso of the title page, and the rear pastedown; the first and last twenty or so pages have corner creases; the inner pages are all toned and foxed but the text is legible throughout. A worn but complete copy of this rare and important abolitionist and anti-masonic journal / book.

RARE. Here is how Louisiana State University described its copy:

"Perhaps the rarest journal in the library's collection is The Anti-Conspirator, or Infidelity Unmasked (1831-32), published in Cincinnati by Dyer Burgess, a Presbyterian minister and abolitionist who connected slavery with what he saw as a Masonic conspiracy to destroy democracy."

About Reverend Dyer Burgess (from History of Adams County, published in 1900, and elsewhere on the Internet)

******The Rev. Burgess was very much opposed to secret societies. On June 5, 1831, he began the publication of a semi-monthly periodical at Cincinnati, Ohio, entitled: Infidelity Unmasked. There were twenty-four numbers of it; the last number appeared April 22, 1832. Mr. Burgess was the editor. The periodical was made up of extracts from other periodicals of like character, articles written by like minded individuals, and transcriptions of lectures and addresses against Masonry and slavery. The burden of the periodical is against Masonry, calling it anti-democratic and linking it to slavery, with some articles specifically against slavery.******