Ashley Library

The Ashley Library is recognized as one of the most important collections of 19th-century English literary manuscripts.{{sfn|Burnett|Wise|1999}} The collection spans the period from Coleridge to Conrad, with the emphasis on poetical manuscripts and the correspondence of writers, critics, collectors, and bibliographers. The collection is strong in manuscripts of the Younger Romantics and of the Pre-Raphaelites, together with Swinburne. Wise's lack of scholarship and his practice of dispersing related manuscripts throughout the collection, made it a particularly difficult library to catalog .{{sfn|Burnett|Wise|1999}}

The original collection consisted of 7,000 volumes with the bookcases used to hold them. When the British Museum library cataloged the collection it was discovered that 200 volumes were missing, it is thought that these were sold by Wise in the 1920s.{{sfn|Maggs|Wise|1965}}

Part of the collection was pre-restoration drama which Wise had been collecting since 1900. These works were compared with the British Museum's former collection at which point it was discovered that over 200 book leaves were missing and 89 of these matching leaves were found in the Wise volumes. {{efn-ua|"...a total of 206 leaves were stolen from the Museum's early quartos. Eighty-nine of these have been identified in Ashley copies and sixty in Wrenn copies; up to fifteen more may be added to this total from three suspect Wrenn copies... my personal opinion is that the plays are probably the only class where thefts were widespread."{{sfn|Foxon|1959|page=1}}}} Henry Wrenn had built up a drama collection (housed in the University of Texas){{cite web|url=http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/collections/books/holdings/wrenn/ |title=Harry Ransom Center, John Henry Wrenn Library |publisher=University of Texas at Austin |access-date=2011-01-26}} and Wise had helped with supplying these volumes, when the Texas authorities sent relevant volumes for comparison, 60 of these books were also found to have been completed with thefts from the British Museum library.

Though allegations were published against Wise of theft and forgery in 1934, it was not until 1959 that a detailed scientific investigation was published by the Bibliographic Society. The conclusion supported the theory that Wise must have known that some of the books leaves added to his collection were stolen and that it was probable that he would have taken the leaves himself.{{efn-ua|"In general, it seems likely that Wise would not have risked sharing his guilty knowledge with an emissary but would have made the thefts himself; the rest of this study is written on that assumption."{{sfn|Foxon|1959|page=3}}}}

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• {{citation |last=Burnett |first=T A J |year=1999 |title=The British Library catalogue of the Ashley manuscripts |last2=Wise |first2=Thomas James |location=London |publisher=British Library |isbn=978-0-7123-4572-9 }}, {{BLCAT|sys=006760053}}
• {{citation| title=Thomas J. Wise and the pre-Restoration drama: a study in theft and sophistication |volume=19 |journal=Transactions: Supplement |publisher=Bibliographical Society (Great Britain) |first1=David Fairweather |last1=Foxon |author-link=David Foxon |year=1959 |oclc=1470724 }}
• {{citation | last=Jackson | first=Holbrook |year=2001 | title=The anatomy of bibliomania |edition=reprint |location=Urbana, Illinois |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=978-0-252-07043-3 |page=450 |orig-year=1930 }}
• {{cite book|title=The Delinquent Bibliophile: Thomas James Wise and the foundation of the Ashley Library|year=1965 |first1=Frank Benjamin |last1=Maggs |first2=Thomas James |last2=Wise |publisher=Radlett Literary Society |oclc=24596991 }}, {{BLCAT|2718.cc.62}}

• {{cite book |last1=Ratchford |first1=F. E., Ed. |title=Letters of Thomas J. Wise to John Henry Wrenn |orig-year=1939 |publisher=W. G. Partington, Forging Ahead |edition=reprint |year=1973}}{{cite web |title=Wise, Thomas James |url=http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/people/wise-thomas-james.html#ixzz3RSYpDdrW |work=The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia |edition=6th |year=2012 |publisher=Columbia University Press, Infoplease |access-date=11 February 2015}}
• {{cite book |first1=Thomas J. |last1=Wise |title=Centenary Studies |year=1959}}

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Category:British Library collections