Graham Pollard

Who was Graham Pollard?

Henry Graham Pollard was a British bookseller and bibliographer.

Pollard was the son of the historian Albert Pollard and was born in Putney, London on 7 March 1903. After studying at Shrewsbury School, Pollard studied history for one year at University College, London before winning a scholarship to Jesus College, Oxford in 1921, obtaining a third-class degree in history in 1924. In that year he married Kay Beauchamp, pioneering Communist and women's rights campaigner..

Even whilst he was a student, he was well known as a book collector, and bought part of a booksellers' business in London. He became managing director in 1927, with the company producing many noted catalogues in the 1920s and 1930s, some of which were to become standard works of reference. Pollard's knowledge of his subject was displayed in his contributions to The Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature and in his lectures and articles. With John Carter, he wrote An Enquiry into the Nature of Certain Nineteenth Century Pamphlets, exposing the prominent book collector Thomas J. Wise as a fraud.