Wallace Ohrt

A decent biography of a fairly important, but relatively unknown, American diplomat. The first half of the book's basic biographical stuff, except that this man married one of Thomas Jefferson's granddaughters, which tells you a bit about the circles he travelled in. He spent 11 years as the American consul in Havana. And then he travelled to Mexico City with Winfield Scott's invading army, and negotiated a treaty which:
* Removed Mexico's claim on Texas, which let that nation become a state.
* Brought much of the western North American continent under US jurisdiction.
* Bought California from Mexico.

The Mexican effort takes up nearly half of the book, and is at least as much political history as biography--President Polk, Secretary Buchanan, General Taylor, and General Scott all had political concerns and ambitions, as did some lesser players. This part's fascinating. The author's account seems reasonably fair to all of the principals.

Glad I read it. I knew just enough about Trist to expect the story to be interesting; it was.… (meer)