Item #13038 Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn together with Scenes in El Dorado, in the Years 1849 -’50. Samuel C. Upham.
Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn together with Scenes in El Dorado, in the Years 1849 -’50

Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn together with Scenes in El Dorado, in the Years 1849 -’50

Philadelphia: By the Author, 1878. Very Good. First Edition. Philadelphia: Franklin Printing House. [9.25x6.25in]; xxii [23] 24-594 pp., 45 illustrations and frontispieces of Upham and John Sutter; Maroon pebbled cloth boards beveled with black ruled edges gilt lettering and illustration of grizzly bear on front and spine, dark brown endpapers, red dyed text block cut edges; Some shelf wear to edges and corners bumped, minor rubbing to front and back covers, spine faded and small tears to top and bottom with 3/8 closed tear top front hinge, front inside hinge cracked, the first leaves and several leaves, starting at page 213 loose, bookplate of Eva Scott Fenyes de Csokaly and John Patrick Ford [Kurutz 647, Cowan II p. 652, Hill 1751, Howell 50 888, Zamorano 80 76A]. Item #13038

Samuel C. Upham [1819-1885] was a businessman in Philadelphia when heard the siren call of the Gold Rush. He sailed to California around Cape Horn and arrived in San Francisco in August 1849. After a three month mining adventure on the Calaveras river, he wound up in Sacramento to start the Sacramento Transcript newspaper, one of the State’s first papers. As one of the few pioneer journalist, he witnessed and wrote about the events of 1850 and at the end of the year returned to Philadelphia. During the Civil War, he was involved in a number of money making schemes; most notable was counterfeiting of confederacy notes. This book is about his adventures and early history of Sacramento and California journalism. Upham comments on his adventures, stating “All of which I saw, and part of which I was.”

The oldest bookplate is of Eva Scott Fenyes de Csokaly [1849-1930], that created many watercolors and oils of the west and is best known in the early 1900’s for her paintings of the California and Southwest missions.

Price: $375.00

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