Lawman, The Life And Times Of Harry Morse, 1835-1912

JOHN BOESSENECKER

Publication: University of Oklahoma Press, 1998, Norman

First edition. Cloth, titles stamped in gilt on the spine, xviii, 366 pp., frontispiece, preface, acknowledgments, prologue, illustrated, two maps, notes, bibliography, index. Harry Morse's career as a lawman spanned five decades. As Sheriff of Alameda County, California in 1864, he began a dangerous life fighting such notorious California outlaws as Narato Ponce, Juan Soto, Narciso Bojorques, and Tibuacio Vasquez. Morse captured the legendary stagecoach robber, Black Bart, and eventually became San Francisco's foremost private detective. Laid-in are two hand-written letters on the writer's personal engraved stationery. The writer is Mrs. Ethel De La Montanga Newell, Oakland, California, the grand daughter of Lawman Harry Morse. The letters are written during the summer of 1939 and both are addressed to author Joseph H. Jackson (1894-1955). He was the author of several books including "Tintypes In Gold" and "Bad Company" each of which dealt with outlaws and lawmen solving studies in robbery, stagecoach holdups, etc. in California. In one letter she refers to comments made in one of Jackson's radio broadcasts that he was planning to write a book on the history of the early days in California. She sends him a book that was "printed when Mr. Morse ran for sheriff and has many historical points that I thought might be of interest to you. Mr. Morse was my grandfather." In the second letter she says "I had already read your Tintypes In Gold and enjoyed it very much. Thank you for your very correct account of grandfather's experiences." An excellent biography. Fine, bright copy in dust jacket.

Inventory Number: 17187