By Honor and Right: How One Man Boldly Defined the Destiny of a Nation - Hardcover

Jackson, John C.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1616142197 ISBN 13: 9781616142193

Publisher: Prometheus, 2010

Synopsis

The story of Captain John McClallen has long been neglected as a mere footnote to the history of the American West. But as this probing piece of historical detective work makes clear, McClallen played a crucial, if largely unrecognized, role in American western history. This is the first full study of an enigmatic figure who undertook to represent the interests of the United States when there was no one else to do it and paid a tragic price for his initiative. The author compellingly argues that McClallen deserves to be recognized as a national hero. Jackson reconstructs the life and astonishing audacity of the first United States officer to follow the Lewis and Clark Expedition. With the original intent of opening up the Santa Fe Trail, McClallen was twice deflected from this task by circumstances beyond his control. Instead the mysterious traveler entered the Pacific Northwest, discovered a practicable route across the continent, and for a brief but crucial moment blocked British expansion of trade to the upper Columbia River. As the author demonstrates with careful analysis and painstaking documentation, if McClallen had not taken the bold (and unauthorized) step of unilaterally declaring the United States right to the Pacific Northwest, British interests might have brought a stronger claim to the Columbia River and Pacific Slope south of the forty-ninth parallel. For devotees of American Western history as well as mystery lovers, this book will prove to be engrossing reading.

About this title

About the Author:

John C. Jackson (Olympia, WA) is the author of five books on the history of the Pacific Northwest, including The Piikani Balckfeet: A Culture Under Siege and Jemmy Jock Bird: Marginal Man on the Blackfoot Frontier. He is the coauthor with Thomas Danisi of Meriwether Lewis.

Review:

"Military history and biography fans, and any extent Federalists, will pull this book off the bookstore shelves and delight in it. You will meet Meriwether Lewis, James Wilkinson, Zebulon Pike -- and Jackson's principal subject, Capt. John McClallan, and the story of his ill-fated, but startling, trip up the Missouri River in 1807." --Walter Nugent is author most recently of Habits of Empire: A History of American Expansion

"The Pacific Northwest of the United States today is not a part of Canada due to the timely presence there of Captain John McClallen who, having been deflected from trade with Spanish Santa Fe, played an important role in combating British interests in the Columbia River Basin. John C. Jackson's revealing biography of this man is a model of historical detective work." --W. Raymond Wood, professor emeritus, University of Missouri, Columbia

"When it comes to the early history of the Rocky Mountain fur trade, few writers are as familiar with available primary documentation as John Jackson. In-depth research from several previous books and assorted articles about that era gives him unique insight into the political, economic, and social climes of the years before and after Lewis and Clark's epic exploration of the west. Using that knowledge, Jackson is not afraid to boldly speculate on the maneuvering of a man about whom so little is known. The resulting story is an absorbing examination of John McClallen's contributions to a young America's expansion beyond the Continental Divide." --Jim Hardee, editor, The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal

About this edition

• Publisher: Prometheus
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1616142197
• ISBN 13: 9781616142193
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 347