[i-iii] iv-xi [1, blank], [13] 14-112 pp. (8vo) 25x16 cm (9¾x6¼"), modern brown cloth. Title page repaired, remargined in gutter, and mounted on a stub; a2-3 probably from another copy. First Edition.
A rare and exciting but possibly apocryphal account of an American captive during the Mexican War, who even worked in Valparaiso as a printer on an ancient Ramage press for a publisher who bought his freedom from his drunken guards, who were threatening to execute him.
Donnavan made the most of his adventures and his book, which went through at least a dozen editions almost instantly and was translated into German, by producing a huge, 21,000-square-foot panorama of Mexico and the war, which he toured on the East Coast after its opening in Cincinnati. (For a description of the panorama, see Magali M. Carrera, Traveling from Spain to Mexico, Duke University Press, 2011, pp. 103-104.) Donnavan predicts that the U.S. will win the war and eventually occupy Mexico, an event that he believes will only help the country grow. If this text is manufactured, it is certainly based somehow on detailed knowledge of the country. Maria and Charles Sanders (1824-1891) were prominent citizens of Glenville, New York.