The American Cyclopædia (1879)/Mayer, Brantz

MAYER, Brantz, an American author, born in Baltimore, Sept. 27, 1809. His father was a merchant of German birth, engaged in trade with the East Indies and Mexico, and for many years consul general of Würtemberg in the United States. After graduating at St. Mary's college, Baltimore, he sailed for the East, visiting Java, Sumatra, and China, and returned in 1828. He practised law from 1832 till 1841, when he was appointed secretary of legation to Mexico, where he remained a year, and on his return edited for a short time the "Baltimore American" newspaper. In 1867 he was appointed a paymaster in the United States army, a post which he still held in 1874. Among his works are: “Mexico as it was and as it is” (1844; 3d ed., 1847); “History of the War between Mexico and the United States” (1848); “Mexico, Aztec, Spanish, and Republican” (1852); “Calvert and Penn, or the Growth of Civil and Religious Liberty in the United States” (1852); “Captain Canot, or Twenty Years in an African Slaver” (1854); “Observations on Mexican History and Archæology,” in “Smithsonian Contributions” (1857); “Mexican Antiquities” (1858); and “Baltimore as it was and as it is” (1871). He has also contributed to the Maryland historical society the “Journal of Charles Carroll of Carrollton during his Mission to Canada,” and “Tah-gah-jute, or Logan and Captain Michael Cresap.”