Mexican War - Capture of California

Duvall, Robert Carson. Cruise of the U.S. Frigate Savannah. Bearing the broad pennant of Commodore J.D. Sloat in the Pacific Ocean. Pacific Ocean between Lima, Peru and San Francisco, California, 24 March 1845 - 8 September 1847



Autograph manuscript logbook, folio (12 x 7 3/4 in.; 305 x 196 mm), 350 pages written, signed once by John Drake Sloat (27 June 1846) and several times by William Mervine; small newspaper clipping mounted on one page. Contemporary three-quarter reversed calf, tooled in gilt and blind, blank leather labels on spine, cream cloth slipcase with ancillary materials; extremities rubbed.

J. E. Cowles — Historical Society of Southern California — Doris Harris Autographs

Astonishing eyewitness account of the capture of Monterey and Los Angeles in Alta California.

Duvall (1819-1862), one of the first graduates of Annapolis, served under Sloat and Stockton during the Mexican War, later serving the Confederate Navy as commander of the gunboat Beaufort, on which he died. On the Savannah he was one of several midshipmen who kept logs.

Departing from Callao (port of Lima, Peru), the important historical section of the logbook begins with the arrival at Monterey (2 July 1846). Duvall provides accurate accounts of the battle of Dominguez Ranch, of the expedition from San Diego to rescue General Kearny after the battle of San Pasqual, and of the march of Stockton's and Kearny's forces from San Diego to Los Angeles in January 1847, which resulted in the capture of that city. Duvall participated in all these campaigns and offers vivid eyewitness testimony and details which are (according to H.R. Wagner) carefully concealed in most accounts of the time.

Extracts of the logbook have been published in the California Historical Society Quarterly (vol. 3, no. 2, July 1924, pp. 105-125) with an introduction by H.R. Wagner (a copy of which is provided in the ancillary materials with this lot which include various news clippings and a typed precis by Doris Harris).