50. BROWN, John Henry. Indian Wars and Pioneers
of Texas. Austin: L. E. Daniell, [1896]. 762 pp., 124
plates (including portraits). Large 4to, original full dark
brown morocco with gilt lettering on spine and upper cover
(neatly rebacked with dark brown cloth, original spine
preserved). Some shelf wear, upper joint split (but
strong), interior very fine.
First
edition, first issue, with the sharper images of the
plates (the engraved portraits were not included in the
trade edition issued at the same time). Howes B857.
Basic Texas Books 23: "This is Brown’s most
important book and one of the best works on Texas Indian
fighters and...pioneers...The large volume contains
hundreds of biographical sketches of early Texans of the
nineteenth-century, with an immense amount of material that
appears nowhere else. Most valuable of all are the accounts
of the numerous fights and skirmishes between early Texans
and Indians. Only in the works of J. W. Wilbarger and A. J.
Sowell does one find a comparable amount of historical data
on this facet of Texas history. Brown was himself a
participant in some of the bloodiest battles." Rader 514.
Pingenot: Brown come to Texas in the days of the
Republic and was an eye-witness to many of the events that
he describes. The first 128 pages are devoted to a history
of the Indian wars with the remainder of the book being
biographies of over 500 Texas pioneers and their
families.
($600-1,200)
