Rare and First Edition Books from Buckingham Books

Dealer in Rare and First-Edition Books:  Western Americana; Mystery, Detective, and Espionage Fiction

The Texan Ranger Or Real Life In The Backwoods FLACK, CAPTAIN [PERCY BOLINGBROKE SAINT JOHN]

The Texan Ranger Or Real Life In The Backwoods

FLACK, CAPTAIN [PERCY BOLINGBROKE SAINT JOHN]

Other works by FLACK, CAPTAIN

Publication: Darton & Co, 1866, London

First edition. Publisher's original red, pictorial gilt cloth, titles and pictorial decorations stamped in gilt on the front cover and spine, 319 pp., preface, all edges gilt (aeg), illustrated with six plates, including frontispiece. The pseudonymous Captain Flack is believed to have been the British writer, Percy Bolingbroke St. John. A number of tales of life in the Southwest appeared from his pen in the 1860s, stories which are fictional but seem to be closely based on personal experience. In the preface, the author claims to have lived on southern plantations and to be experienced in the "cultivation of Sugar, Cotton, and Tobacco." Most of the later chapters are devoted to hunting tales. Jeff Dykes, who pursued the "Captain Flack" story for decades, listed a number of Flack titles in his "Ranger’s Al!" catalogue, including this one. He says there, and told William Reese and me subsequently, that the copy he listed in 1968 was the only copy he ever saw for sale; it is now at Texas A&M University. Howes only lists one Captain Flack title, but notes this work and several others. Expertly recased by a master conservator with new endpapers, cloth has a small old stain to the upper portion of the front cover along with a few small spots on the lower front cover, and spine lightly faded, else a very good, tight and internally clean copy housed in a tan slipcase.

Inventory Number: 46612Sold -- Contact us