Walker's Expedition to Nicaragua; a History of the Central America War; and the Sonora and Kinney Expeditions, Including All the Recent Diplomatic Correspondence, Together with a New and Accurate Map of Central America, and a Memoir and Portrait of General William Walker.

New York, Stringer and Townsend, 1856.. FIRST EDITION. 12°, publisher's black cloth, blocked in blind, spine gilt (some wear). Wood-engraved seal of Nicaragua on title page. Some browning, scattered foxing; 2-cm. tear in margin of map, which is otherwise in fine condition. Overall in good to very good condition. Signatures in ink of J.T. Williams, dated 1858, on front pastedown, front free endpaper, and blank verso of frontispiece. Stamp of Kenneth Williams on blank verso of frontispiece. Frontispiece (wood-engraved portrait with added tint block), vi, [11]-316 pp., large folding hand-colored map. *** FIRST EDITION of this "highly partisan defense of the filibusters' regime" (DAB) in Nicaragua under William Walker. Save for Walker's own The War in Nicaragua (1860), Walker's Expedition is the best contemporary account of Walker's life and expedition to Nicaragua in 1855-56. Wells' account carries events up through Walker's election as president of Nicaragua and formal recognition of his government by the United States in June 1856. Walker remained in power for another 10 months. A German translation was published at Braunschweig, 1857.The fine map of Central America bears the imprint of J.H. Colton, New York, 1856, and includes insets of the Isthmus of Panama and "The Nicaragua Route."William Walker (Nashville, Tennessee 1824-1860, Honduras) trained as a lawyer and physician but is famous for filibustering expeditions in which he attempted to establish personal "colonies" where slavery would be established. In 1853 he attempted to set up shop in Baja California and Sonora, but was easily repulsed by the Mexican government. A few years later, he went head-to-head with Cornelius Vanderbilt for control of the lucrative traffic from the Caribbean to the Pacific via Nicaragua - the fastest route for steamships to carry those in the East to the California gold fields.Wells (1826-1876) was born in Boston and lived a life of adventure, first on the high seas and then, beginning in 1849, in California prospecting for gold. Seeking new worlds to exploit, Wells journeyed to Honduras in 1854. The "gold" he found there, though not metallic, was nonetheless remunerative: from 1855 to 1874 he served as sometime consul for Honduras. His Explorations and Adventures in Honduras was published in 1857. Wells spent the last twenty years of his life in San Francisco and New York, where he worked as a journalist and author when not furthering the economic interests of Honduras and Mexico.*** Howes W256: collating as our copy. Not in Sabin. On Wells, see Dictionary of American Biography X, 646.