California in 1852: The Letters of Dame Shirley

San Francisco: The Grabhorn Press, 1933. 2 volumes. 142,143pp. Octavo [22.5 cm] 1/4 blue cloth over gray boards with the titles printed on the front boards and backstrips. About very good. Boards age-toned at extremities with the corners gently rubbed and bumped. Small lib. Ink stamp at the upper left of the front pastedowns and again on the head of the textblock. Introduction and notes by Carl I. Wheat. Important firsthand account of the gold fields with eight tinted plates. Dame Shirley, as she is known in California literature, sailed around Cape Horn to San Francisco with her husband, Dr. Fayette Clappe. After a short stay in San Francisco, Dr. Clappe went off for the diggings at Rich Bar. Shirley joined him in September, 1851, and began a series of twenty-three letters to her sister back home in Massachusetts. She wrote the last letter in November, 1852. Upon returning to San Francisco, Dame Shirley separated from her husband and eventually met Ferdinand C. Ewer, the editor of California's first magazine, The Pioneer. Recognizing the value of these beautifully crafted firsthand account of the mines, Ewer published one Shirley letter in each number of The Pioneer beginning in January 1854 and ending with the demise of the magazine in December 1855. The Shirley letters have received the highest possible praise. Kurutz 133b. Zamorano Eighty: 69.