A Voyage to the South Sea, undertaken by Command of His Majesty, for the Purpose of conveying the Bread-fruit Tree to the West Indies, in His Majesty's Ship the 'Bounty', commanded by Lieutenant William Bligh. Including an Account of the Mutiny on board the said Ship, and the Subsequent Voyage of Part of the Crew, in the Ship's Boat, from Tofoa, one of the Friendly Islands, to Timor, a Dutch Settlement in the East Indies. The whole illustrated with Charts, &c. Published by permission of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty
London, Printed for George Nicol, 1792.
Quarto, [x], 264 pages plus a stipple-engraved portrait frontispiece, 3 plates (2 folding) and 4 charts (3 folding).
Early tree calf, later rebacked, retaining the gilt-tooled backstrip; edges sprinkled red; covers lightly scuffed and slightly worn at the corners; frontispiece somewhat soiled and spotted, and later mounted on archival paper; plates, charts and adjacent leaves generally offset and foxed, with several a little creased and weakening about the folds; scattered light foxing; overall, a very good copy.
The revised, official account of the voyage of the 'Bounty', including the mutiny and Bligh's subsequent voyage in the ship's launch with eighteen loyal crewmen. 'In their small boat Bligh and his companions made a remarkable journey of more than three and a half thousand miles from Tofoa to Timor in six weeks over largely uncharted waters. What is not so well known is that in the course of this hazardous journey Bligh took the opportunity to chart and name parts of the unknown north-east coast of New Holland as he passed along it - an extraordinary feat of seamanship ... [An] interesting addition to any library of Australian books, not only for the direct Australian interest of Bligh's coastal discoveries while navigating in the open boat, but also because of Bligh's later dramatic association with New South Wales as governor' (Wantrup). Bligh had first published his account two years previously, in 'A Narrative of the Mutiny on board His Majesty's Ship "Bounty"' (London, George Nicol, 1790). 'Since Bligh had left on his second voyage to the South Seas in the "Providence" at the end of 1791, the official account was edited, at Bligh's request, by the historian James Burney under the direction of Sir Joseph Banks' (Wantrup) Ferguson 125; Wantrup 62a.
Item #114071
Price (AUD):
$10,000.00