The Story of the Guard: A Chronicle of the War
by Jessie Benton Fremont
Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1863. First Editon. 5 x 7 1/8
inches. 229 pp. Green blind-embossed cloth hardcover with gilt decoration and
lettering, red edge stain. Clean covers, solid binding, minor interior soiling.
Very Good, collectible copy.
Wife, activist and ardent support of her military officer,
explorer and politician husband John C. Fremont, writer Jessie Benton
Fremont writes in this book of her husband’s tenure and actions during the
Civil War.
John C. Fremont was one of the first two U.S. Senators from
California and a governor of the Territory of Arizona. As an Army officer, he
had also been assigned the task of exploring the West and scouting land for
future U.S. territorial expansion, and Jesse wrote and edited best-selling
stories of the adventures Fremont had while exploring the West with his scout,
Kit Carson. Fremont was also the first Republican candidate for U.S. President,
losing to James Buchanan.
Lincoln appointed Fremont Commander of the Department of the
West in 1861, but Fremont lost the position during the Civil War because he
issued his own edict of emancipation, freeing all the slaves in Missouri, which
came before Lincoln’s own Emancipation Proclamation. Jessie pleaded her
husband’s case to Lincoln, but to no avail.
(Source: Wikipedia)