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Lot Essay
Very rare first edition of an extraordinary color-plate Gold Rush "might-have-been." "In 1849 John Woodhouse Audubon joined the gold rush, travelling to California across Texas and northern Mexico. On his return, he planned an ambitious plate book of forty plates in ten parts, illustrating scenes from his trip and in the mines. Despite the tremendous national interest in the gold rush, he was unable to generate enough subscriptions to justify the publication, and so packaged the ... letterpress text, with the plates of the projected first part, as a complete book" (Stamped with a National Character). Audubon account ledgers for 1852 confirm the sale of only two copies (Kurutz).
The four color plates are: "Fourth of July Camp," "Night Watch," "Cañon, Jesus Maria," (called by the author, "the most magnificent mountain-pass I have ever seen") and "Jesus Maria." This is one of only three copies to appear in the auction records for the past 100 years, according to RBH. Bennett, p.5; Graff 111; Howes A-390 ("dd" = superlatively rare, almost unobtainable); Kurutz 21; Stamped with a National Character 41; Streeter sale 3166-3167 (two tinted plates only); Wagner-Camp 208.
The four color plates are: "Fourth of July Camp," "Night Watch," "Cañon, Jesus Maria," (called by the author, "the most magnificent mountain-pass I have ever seen") and "Jesus Maria." This is one of only three copies to appear in the auction records for the past 100 years, according to RBH. Bennett, p.5; Graff 111; Howes A-390 ("dd" = superlatively rare, almost unobtainable); Kurutz 21; Stamped with a National Character 41; Streeter sale 3166-3167 (two tinted plates only); Wagner-Camp 208.