PBA Galleries

[5]-208 pp. including the title leaf. Text in two columns. 22.7x14.4 cm (9x5¾"), period quarter straight-grain morocco & marbled boards, spine lettered in gilt, later endpapers. 

Rare and somewhat lurid (though undoubtedly largely fictional) unveiling of the lawless side of San Francisco during the heady days of the gold rush. Streeter notes that "The 'Joaquin' who is the hero of this tale has the same type of adventures as the Joaquin Murieta of Ridge which was published a year later. This Mysteries and Miseries of San Francisco may well mark the beginning of the 'Joaquin' legend. No other copy seems to be recorded." The work was first published in New York by Garrett & Company, with a copyright notice dated 1853, of which seven copies are listed in OCLC. This Dick & Fitzgerald edition, of which only two copies are listed in OCLC, has the same Garrett, 1853, copyright notice, but as the Huntington Library listing notes, "Partnership of Dick & Fitzgerald formed in 1858. Hence, book not issued in 1853." The other D & F listing, at the California State Library, has "No title page. Pages 7-10,15 mutilated."