Reports of Explorations and Surveys, to Ascertain the most Practicable and Economical Route for a Railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. Made Under the Direction of the Secretary of War, in 1853-4, According to Acts of Congress of March 3, 1853, May 31, 1854, and August 5, 1954... Vols. I + II
Washington: Beverly Tucker, Printer, 1855. First printing. Hardcover. Large Octavo. Vol. 1: viii, 134, vii, 651; Vol. 2: [4] 128, 132, 45, iv, [1] 185 [1], 50, 28, 22pp., 13, 24 plates. Original brown pebbled cloth boards with blind-stamped decorative covers, gilt lettering, tooling and blind-stamped ruling on spine. Small blue paper slip glued to inside front cover reading "Anthony Colby Jr. From his Grandfather Anthony Colby Feb. 2, 1856." Anthony Colby was a politician and business man from New Hampshire who served as the 20th Governor of New Hampshire from 1846 to 1847.
The period covered in these two volumes does not include a foreign war but were defined by internal conflict fueled by the Kansas-Nebraska Act leading to the so-called Kansas Bleeding, a series of violent civl confrontations over slavery in the Kansas Territory and Western Missouri. The period also saw the Gadsden Purchase finalized. A treaty to purchase parts of today's New Mexico and Arizona from Mexico, after the Mexican-American War from 1846-48. Volume II is illustrated with thirteen full-page aquatints and twenty-three botanical b/w lithographs. Vol. II also contains a threefold geological map in color from the Red River to the Rio Grande as well as six-fold geological section for the same territory. Contains numerous charts and three woodcut illustrations in lithography.
Vol. I contains the Report of the Secretary of War; Examination of the Reports of the Several Routes Explored; Railway Memoranda; Letter of Major General Thomas S. Jesup, and the Report of Governor I. I. Stevens.
Vol. II contains the Report by Lieutenant E. G. Beckwith, Third Artillery, Upon the Rout Near the Thirty-Eighth and Thirty-Ninth Parallels, Explored by Captain J. W. Gunnison, Corps Topographical Engineers; Report of Lieutenant E. G. Beckwith, Third Artillery, Upon the Route Near the Forty-First Parallel; Report of a Reconnaissance from Puget Sound, Via South Pass, to the Mississippi River, by F. W. Lander, Civil Engineer; Report of Brevet Captain John Pope, Corps Topographical Engineers, Upon the Portion of the Route Near the Thirty-Second Parallel, Lying Between the Red River and the Rio Grande; Report of Lieutenant John G. Parke, Corps Topographical Engineers, Upon the Portion of the Route Near the Thirty-Second Parallel, Living Between the Rio Grande and Pimas Village, on the Gila; Extract from Report of a Military Reconnaissance Made by Lieutenant Colonel W. H. Emory, U.S. Army, of the Portion of the Route Near the Thirty-Second Parallel, Lying Between the Mouths of the San Pedro and Gila Rivers.
The complete set contains 12 volumes in 13. Light wear along edges, slightly more pronounced at head and tail of volume one and boards lightly rubbed. Two small scratches on front cover of volume one. Blocks very lightly age-toned. Two of the aquatints with partial damp staining in the sky areas of the motif, else minimal in motifs but visible in margins. B/w lithographs with more prolific damp-staining, several of them in motifs. Good to very good condition. Item #55337
Price: $450.00