Castañares, Manuel

Estimate

5,000 - 7,000 USD

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Description

paper

Coleccion de Documentos Relativos al Departamento de Californias. Mexico: La Voz del Pueblo, 1845

8vo (9 3/8 x 5 1/2 in.; 238 x 140 mm); minor spotting on first few and last few leaves. Modern red half-morocco, gilt-stamped title on spine.

Literature

Graff 625; Sabin 11376; Howes C224; Howell, California, Catalogue 50, no. 39 (this copy)

Catalogue Note

An extraordinary rarity, the former representative of California in the Mexican National Congress pleads for his region.

Bancroft devoted nearly a chapter of the fifth volume of his History of California, to an account of this book which he regarded as one of the principal sources for the period 1844-1845. Castañares provides a detailed account of the region he represented, its needs, Indians, settlements, missions, and a "General Report" on its natural advantages. He argues that the retention of California in the Republic is of the greatest importance, and supports the preservation of the Pious Fund. He exhorts "California will be irremediably lost, and I tremble at the sad consequences ... A powerful foreign nation will pitch its camps there ... Then will sprout the seeds of today lying ignored in the soil; then her mines will be worked, her ports crowded, her fields cultivated ..." He also reports that in 1843 near Los Angeles, rich placers had been discovered yielding 2,000 ounces of gold.