by Ben Huseman

Ben Huseman, cartographic archivist at the University of Texas Libraries Special Collections, introduces us to the history and anecdotes behind a fine new acquisition made by Special Collections: The Quadrupeds of North America (1849-1854) by John James Audubon and the Rev. John Bachmann.

The University of Texas at Arlington Libraries Special Collections recently acquired the first octavo edition of The Quadrupeds of North America, by John James Audubon and the Rev. John Bachmann, published in three volumes in New York by Victor Gifford Audubon between 1849 and 1854. Artist, naturalist, and author John James Audubon (1785-1851) is best known for The Birds of North America (1827-1838), a massive project to paint and describe North American birds that involved not only him but his sons and their families.  They also worked on a second, similar project to paint and describe the continent’s mammals which was at first titled The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America (1845-1851). The Quadrupeds contains much more material on Texas and the Southwest than does The Birds, which was completed before the United States’ acquisition of these areas.[1]

The Audubons based much of their information about Texas on three separate visits there.  In late April 1837, while still researching The Birds, the 52-year-old Audubon, already a celebrity, traveled to the Republic of Texas with his 25-year-old son John Woodhouse Audubon (1812-1862).  Texas Navy Secretary S.  Rhoads Fisher greeted them in Galveston and introduced them to President Sam Houston, who met them in his dog-trot cabin in Houston. The Audubons also toured the San Jacinto battlefield (just a year after the battle) and observed many previously known bird species.  Interestingly, also on this trip John W. reportedly made a sketch of Galveston, now lost, with a camera lucida, an optical device which projects an image that can be traced on paper.  That July John W. married Maria Rebecca Bachman, the daughter of the Rev. John Bachman (1790-1874), a Lutheran minister, amateur naturalist and close friend and collaborator of the elder Audubon. Victor Gifford Audubon (1809-1860), John W.’s older brother, also an artist and the family business manager, soon married another Bachman daughter. As the two families worked together on The Quadrupeds, John W. made two more research trips to Texas before and after the U.S.-Mexico War. In 1845-1846 John W. toured Texas, visiting among other places, Washington-on-the-Brazos, San Antonio, Castroville, and La Grange.  He observed mammals, gathered specimens, talked again with Sam Houston and met the celebrated Texas Ranger John Coffee “Jack” Hays and some of his fellow rangers. After the war, in 1849, John W. returned to Texas, this time to the mouth of the Rio Grande with a California-bound expedition.  An outbreak of cholera and outlaws forced the leader and half the men to give up, but John W. took command and led the remainder to California via northern Mexico.[2]

The Quadrupeds contains prints and descriptions for dozens of animals John W. Audubon personally observed in Texas and the Southwest or from which specimens were procured, including skunks, rabbits , bears, armadillos, rodents, squirrels, raccoons, opossums, wolves, deer, peccary, and a wide variety of predatory cats.[3]  John James Audubon and Rev. Bachman’s text for The Jaguar, for example, is full of interest, particularly since the animal may no longer be found in the wild here. As they did for the other animals, they began with a short description in Latin, followed in English by distinguishing characteristics, a list of synonyms or names applied to the species by earlier authorities, a general description, color, dimensions, habits, geographical distribution, and general remarks. The essay on “habits” at times included namedropping, anecdotal hearsay, and exciting tales that one might expect to hear around a campfire late at night:

“Col. HAYS and several other officers of the Rangers at the time J. W. AUDUBON was at San Antonio de Bexar in 1845, informed him that the Jaguar was most frequently found about the watering-places of the mustangs, or wild horses, and deer.  It has been seen to spring upon the former, and from time to time kills one; but it is much more in the habit of attacking colts about six months old which it masters with great ease. Col. HAYS had killed four Jaguars during his stay in Texas….”[4]

After recounting further anecdotes from other Rangers, Audubon and Bachman relate an incident “HAYS” told to John W. about the time he thought he was being stalked by a Waco Indian for some distance and when finally confronted, learned his pursuer was instead a jaguar, which he shot and killed. “The skin,” as he informed him, “was so beautiful, it was a pleasure to look at it.”[5] The Audubons and Bachman claimed:

 “These skins are very highly prized by the Mexicans, and also by the Rangers; they are used for holster coverings and as saddle cloths and form a superb addition to the caparison of a beautiful horse…. In a conversation with General HOUSTON at Washington city, he informed us that he had found the Jaguar east of the San Jacinto river, and abundantly on the head waters of some of the eastern tributaries of the Rio Grande, the Guadaloupe, &c. These animals, said the general, are sometimes found associated to the number of two or more together, when they easily destroy horses and other large quadrupeds. On the head waters of the San Marco, one night, the general’s people were aroused by the snorting of their horses, but on advancing into the space around could see nothing, owing to the great darkness. The horses having become quiet, the men returned to camp and lay down to rest as usual, but in the morning one of the horses was found to have been killed and eaten up entirely, except the skeleton. The horses on this occasion were hobbled and picketed; but the general thinks the Jaguar frequently catches and destroys wild ones, as well as cattle. The celebrated BOWIE caught a splendid mustang horse, on the rump of which were two extensive scars made by the claws of a Jaguar or cougar. Such instances, indeed, are not very rare.”[6]

Of the Red Texan Wolf (by some reports, extinct today and not considered a separate subspecies), the Audubons and Bachman stated:

 “This variety is by no means the only one found in Texas, where Wolves, black, white and gray, are to be met with from time to time…. It is said that when visiting battle-fields in Mexico, the Wolves preferred the slain Texans or Americans, to the Mexicans, and only ate the bodies of the latter from necessity, as owing to the quantity of pepper used by the Mexicans in their food, their flesh is impregnated with that powerful stimulant. Not vouching for this story, however, the fact is well known that these animals follow the movements of armies, or at least are always at hand to prey upon the slain before their comrades can give them a soldier’s burial…. and if anything could increase the horrors displayed by the gory ensanguined field, where man has slain his fellows by thousands, it would be the presence of packs of these ravenous beasts disputing for the carcasses of the brave, the young, and the patriotic, who have fallen for their country’s honour!

No corpse of wounded straggler from his troops, or of unfortunate traveler, butchered by Camanches, is ever “neglected” by the prowling Wolf, and he quarrels in his fierce hunger in his turn over the victim of similar violent passions exhibited by man!”[7]

The Quadrupeds initially appeared in large format as did The Birds.  John W. used a camera lucida to reduce the images to octavo size for second printings at approximately 6-¾ x 10 in. each, first for The Birds and later The Quadrupeds.  Lithographer John T. Bowen of Philadelphia, who produced the chromolithographs for the octavo-size Birds and folio-size Quadrupeds, also printed the octavo-size Quadrupeds as chromolithographs. These are amazingly faithful to the larger prints, and in addition, the smaller quarto volumes offered practicality, affordability, and allowed greater distribution.[8] The Quadrupeds of North America make a fine addition to UTA’s Special Collections, particularly because of its pertinence to subjects for which the collections are already renowned, such as the U.S. War with Mexico, the Republic of Texas, and the borderlands of the American Southwest and Mexico.

Endnotes

[1] See Ben W. Huseman, “Audubon, John James,” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed August 23, 2020, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/audubon-john-james.; and Ben W. Huseman, “Audubon, John Woodhouse,” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed August 23, 2020, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/audubon-john-woodhouse. [2] As I learned back in the 1980s there was a large literature on the Audubons, and this has only increased since then. One of the best is Ron Tyler’s Audubon’s Great National Work: The Royal Octavo Edition of The Birds of America (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1993). The following are only some of the older works: Alice E. Ford, Audubon’s Animals: The Quadrupeds of North America (New York: Studio Publications, 1951). Alice Ford, John James Audubon (New York: Abbeville, 1988). Dictionary of American Biography (New York: Scribner, 1928–81). S. W. Geiser, “Naturalists of the Frontier: Audubon in Texas,” Southwest Review 16 (Fall 1930). Francis Hobart Herrick, Audubon the Naturalist: A History of His Life and Times (2 vols., New York: Appleton, 1917). John H. Jenkins, Audubon and Texas (Austin: Pemberton Press, 1965). Audubon, John James, John Bachman, and Victor Harrison Cahalane. The Imperial Collection of Audubon Animals; the Quadrupeds of North America. Maplewood, N.J: Hammond, inc., 1967. [3] There were several animals the Audubons called the “Texan” this or that since they were mostly common to Texas. John James Audubon and the Rev. John Bachman, The Quadrupeds of North America, (3 vols.; New-York: V. G. Audubon, 1849-1854), vol. 1, p. 157, notes that the Texan Hare or “Jackass Rabbit,” received the latter name “from the Texans and from our troops in the Mexican War.” Note also that in some printings of the octavo set, the contents of volume 1 were switched with volume 3. Volume and page numbers here refer to UTA’s set. [4] Audubon and Bachman, The Quadrupeds, vol. 1, pp. 4-5. [5] vol. 1, p. 5. [6] vol. 1, p. 6. [7] vol. 2, p. 241. [8] Tyler, Audubon’s Great National Work (1993), p. xiii, 37, 51, 54, 66, pl. 29 (illustrates a camera lucida).

Ben Huseman is the Cartographic Archivist at The University of Texas at Arlington Libraries Special Collections (since 2006) and has curated dozens of exhibits of rare maps, prints, books, paintings and drawings over a long curatorial career that includes, in addition to 14 years at UTA: 4 years at the DeGolyer Special Collections Library at SMU in Dallas, 2 years at Riddell Rare Maps and Prints in Dallas and 13 years at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art in Fort Worth. He has authored gallery guides, exhibit catalogs, articles, web content, and blog posts on subjects ranging from the U.S.-Mexico War to the topic of Maps & Religion. In addition to offering tours of Special Collections, he occasionally teaches a history/geography course titled “Images of the Southwest Borderlands” featuring original primary-source materials. He is currently planning an exhibit on the Franke Collection of African Maps for the twelfth Virginia Garrett Lectures on the History of Cartography to be held at UTA in the Fall of 2021.

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