(#166247) The southwest expedition of Jedediah S. Smith his personal account of the journey to California 1826-1827 edited with an introduction by George R. Brooks. JEDEDIAH STRONG SMITH.
The southwest expedition of Jedediah S. Smith his personal account of the journey to California 1826-1827 edited with an introduction by George R. Brooks.

The southwest expedition of Jedediah S. Smith his personal account of the journey to California 1826-1827 edited with an introduction by George R. Brooks. Glendale, California: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1977. 23.8x15.5 cm, pp. [1-2: blank] [3-8] 9-31 [32-34] 35-259, 3 maps (one folded), original red cloth, spine panel stamped in gold, top edge stained red, fore and bottom edges untrimmed. First edition. Issued as Clark's "Western Frontiersman Series," volume XVIII. In August Smith's party set out from the 1826 rendezvous on a "South West Expedition" in search of beaver. By the spring of 1827 they were in central California, having entered the Mexican territory via the Mojave Desert route. The party elected to return to the Great Salt Lake through the Sierra Nevada. In May 1827, after two unsuccessful attempts due to heavy snow, Smith's party crossed the Sierra crest near the present-day Ebbetts Pass, the first crossing of the Sierra Nevada by European men. See pages 167-171 for Smith's account of this historic crossing of the range. For an analysis of Smith's route see Francis P. Farquhar, History of the Sierra Nevada (1965), pages [23]-29. See Wagner-Camp, rev. Becker (1982), item 34 (note) regarding collaboration of Farquhar's choice of Smith's crossing of the Sierra Nevada by the Ebbets Pass route, resulting from the discovery of a transcript of part of Smith's journal published in 1977 as The Southwest Expedition of Jedediah S. Smith: His Personal Account of the Journey to California, 1826-1827, edited by George R. Brooks (Glendale: Arthur H. Clark, 1977). Lower corner tips bruised, a nearly fine copy. (#166247).

Price: $75.00

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