The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 73, July 1969 - April, 1970 Page: 577
605 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Book Notes
others began a program of restoration and today Mission San Fernando is
almost completely restored.
This otherwise fine work is marred by the publisher's error in giving it
two titles. The title on the cover is San Fernando Mission, while the title
page shows Mission San Fernando.
Texas A.&M. University GARLAND E. BAYLISS
Texas Camel Tales. By Chris Emmett. (Austin: Steck-Vaughn Company,
1969. Pp. xx+234. Illustrations, notes, index. $7.95.)
Chris Emmett, whose later biography of Shanghai Pierce won the $1,000ooo
Roberts award, first became known for his interesting Texas Camel Tales,
published in San Antonio in 1932. Long an out-of-print collector's item,
this book is now out in an attractive new format, with added illustrations
and the omission of extraneous material. It relates many anecdotes of
Jefferson Davis' experiment with camel transportation, which began with
the landing of the first shipload of camels in Texas in 1856.
The book recalls the colorful era in which camels commonly were seen
in San Antonio streets and in which the wives of cavalry officers at Camp
Verde sometimes rode camels to church services at Camp Ives, four miles
away. The volume tells of test trips in which camels out-performed mules,
and it records the crumbling of the experiment with the neglect of the
camels by Confederate forces which captured them. The building of west-
ern railroads, of course, kept the camel herd from being revived; but its
story, told engagingly by Emmett, makes a fascinating chapter in Texas
history.
Dallas, Texas WAYNE GARD
A Texan in Search of a Fight. By John C. West. (Waco: Texian Press, 1969.
Introduction by Harold B. Simpson. Pp. 189. $6.50)
First published in 1901, this book consists of a combination of letters,
diary entries, and assorted documents woven together into a single account
of a soldier at war, 1863-1864. The brief introduction to this edition sum-
marizes well the preface and explanatory statement contained in the orig-
inal but adds little new information.
John C. West, a resident of early Waco, provides an account which,
though interesting to read from first to last, is best as he relates his par-
ticipation in the Gettysburg and Chickamauga campaigns. Otherwise the
books is simply a brief look at the camp life of a Confederate soldier and
an intriguing view of the war-torn South as he travelled to and from the
front.
The value of this reprint would have been much greater had someone
provided an index and annotations.577
East Texas State University
FRANK H. SMYRL
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 73, July 1969 - April, 1970, periodical, 1970; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth117147/m1/623/?rotate=180: accessed May 7, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.