James Edwards, who was so ardent a collector that he directed that his coffin should be made out of the shelves of his library, was born in 1757. He was the eldest son of William Edwards, an eminent bookseller of Halifax, Yorkshire, who was noted both for his success in collecting rare books, and his skill and taste in binding them. In 1784 James Edwards and, along with him, his younger brother John, were set up by their father as booksellers in Pall Mall, London, under the title of Edwards and Sons. John died soon afterwards, but the business was conducted with great ability and success by the elder brother, who, Dibdin says, 'travelled diligently and fearlessly abroad; now exploring the book-gloom of dusty monasteries, and at other times marching in the rear or front of Bonaparte's armies in Italy.'

Edwards was a bookbinder as well as a bookseller, and in 1785 he took out a patent for 'embellishing books bound in vellum by making drawings on the vellum which are not liable to be defaced but by destroying the vellum itself.' This was accomplished by rendering the vellum transparent, and then painting or impressing the design on the under surface. The British Museum possesses a Prayer Book bound by Edwards in this manner for Queen Charlotte, wife of King George III., which is a very skilful and artistic piece of work. Both he and his father were also celebrated for the pretty paintings with which they decorated the edges of the leaves of the books they bound. In 1788 Edwards, accompanied by his friend and fellow bookseller James Robson, went to Venice for the purpose of purchasing the Pinelli Library, which they brought to England, and sold by auction in the following year. Many other collections of note were sold by him during the twenty years he remained in business. Having amassed a considerable fortune, he determined to retire from trade, and in 1805 purchased the fine old manor-house at Harrow, which for some time was one of the residences of the Archbishops of Canterbury. A part of Dibdin's Bibliographical Decameron was written on the garden terrace of this mansion, Edwards being the 'Rinaldo' of that work. In consequence of ill-health he determined in 1815 to part with the remainder of his library (a portion of the books had been disposed of by Christie on his retirement in 1804), and it was sold by his successor in the Pall Mall business, Robert Harding Evans, who became so well known as a book auctioneer. The sale consisted of but eight hundred and thirty lots, but it realised the large sum of eight thousand four hundred and twenty-one pounds, seventeen shillings. Edwards died at Harrow on the 2nd of January 1816, and a monument was erected to his memory in the parish church.

Edwards's collection was not a large one, but it contained some exceedingly rare and choice manuscripts and printed books. Among the most precious of the former was the famous Bedford Book of Hours, which he acquired at the Duchess of Portland's sale in 1786 for two hundred and thirteen pounds, and which was purchased at his own sale by the Marquis of Blandford, afterwards Duke of Marlborough, for six hundred and eighty-seven pounds, fifteen shillings. It is now in the British Museum. Other fine manuscripts were a copy of the Gospels in Greek, written in the tenth century; Opera Horatii, executed for Ferdinand I. King of Naples, which realised respectively two hundred and ten and one hundred and twenty-five pounds; and Regole e Precetti della Pittura, written by Leonardo da Vinci, and illustrated with original drawings by Nicholas Poussin, which fetched one hundred and two pounds, eighteen shillings.

Among the printed books were the Latin Bible, on vellum, printed at Mentz, by Fust and Schoeffer, in 1462, which realised one hundred and seventy-five pounds; and the first edition of Livy, also on vellum, printed by Sweynheym and Pannartz at Rome about 1469. This copy, the only one known on vellum, belonged to Pope Alexander VI., and was bought by Sir M.M. Sykes for nine hundred and three pounds. It was afterwards acquired by the Right Hon. Thomas Grenville, and bequeathed by him to the British Museum. Luther's own copy of the first edition of his translation of the Bible after his final revision, printed at Wittemberg in 1541, with MS. notes by himself, Bugenhagen and Melanchthon, which is also now in the British Museum, sold for eighty-nine pounds, five shillings; and a splendid set of the Opere di Piranesi for three hundred and fifteen pounds. A fine and perfect block-book, the Biblia Pauperum, was also among the treasures of the library, and was purchased by the Duke of Devonshire for two hundred and ten pounds.