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Published by Washington, DC: GPO, 1868., 1868
Seller: OLD WORKING BOOKS & Bindery (Est. 1994), West Brookfield, MA, U.S.A.
Association Member: SNEAB
First Edition
Illustrated by 2 pull-out plates: Curves of Mean Daily (and Annual) Pressure and Temperature. First thus edition. Original salmon stitched wraps, paper printed spine label. 4to. pp. xlviii, [2], 472, [1] Errata sheet for 1861-66. Very Good/No jacket, as issued. Light soil and several shallow chips to paper cover, interally NF toning to some pages. Observations with Transit and Mural Circles, Prime Vertical and Equatorial, Mean declinations for 1870.0 of Stars Observed with the Mural Circle, Right Ascensions and Declinations of Stars, Asteroids, and Comets observed with the Equatorial, Adopted mean placed for 1870.0 of Comparison Stars used in observations with the Equatorial, Meteorological Observations, List of Publications present to the Library during the year.
Published by U.S. Naval Observatory, Government Printing Office,, Washington:, 1876
Seller: Zephyr Used & Rare Books, Vancouver, WA, U.S.A.
First Edition
Tall thick 4to. 696 pp. With two steel-engraved frontisps., 2 colour photolithographs, 6 maps, numerous woocut-engraved plates, and text woodcut engravings. Pictorial green publisher's cloth, gilt illustration on front cover, of a dogsled, gilt lettering on spine (minor wear & fraying head & foot of spine, wear and minor bumping to corners, rear hinge starting, ex-lib spine label, and markings on front pastedown), still VG- copy, from the Albert Pike Freemasonry library, Washington, D.C. First edition of this memoir of the first major American attempt to reach the North Pole, which resulted in tragedy, murder, and abandonment both of crew and ship as the expedition continued. Hall had taken two sledges North in September 1871 to best Sir William Parry's furthest north record, and upon his return October, 1871 fell violently ill, and died in November. Sidney Budington took command and again attempted to reach the Pole in June, 1872, and three lifeboats were crushed by the ice, and the S.S. Polaris turned south, ended up abandoning 19 members of the expedition and all of the Inuit in Oct., 1872, and finally ran it aground near Etah, Greenland. In 1873, the remainder of the crew finally salvaged enough timber to build boats and return home. It was discovered in 1968 after an autopsy of Captain Hall's body, he had been murdered by arsenic poison, possibly by Emil Bessels, the chief science officer of the expedition. See: Richard Parry, Trial by Ice: The True Story of Murder and Survival on the 1871 Polaris Expedition (2002); William Barr, Polaris: The Chief Scientist's Recollection of the American North Pole Expedition, 1871-73 (2016).
Published by Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1876
Seller: Long Brothers Fine & Rare Books, ABAA, Seattle, WA, U.S.A.
First Edition
Condition: Good+. First Edition. Stout 4to. Pp. 696. Edited under the direction of Hon. G. M. Robeson, Secretary of the Navy. Two engraved frontispieces, depicting the U.S.S. Polaris and Captain Hall. Two full-plate color lithographs of the Polaris and 38 wood engravings. Six maps. In the publisher's full green cloth with gilt-stamped vignette of a sledge party on the front board, gilt lettering on spine. Bookplate of J. Hop. Woods on front pastedown, and with an inscription by him on the on the page following the frontis. of Hall. Front hinge starting. Scattered foxing throughout, and with light general wear and rubbing to binding (please see photos), and heavier wear to lower edge and corner of front board. Dust soiling to top edge. In sum, a sturdy, presentable copy. Woods (1853-1921) was a West Virginia lawyer. According to his inscription, the book was presented to him, in 1878, by "Hon. B. F. Martin" (Benjamin Franklin Martin, (1828 - 1895), US Congressman from West Virginia, 1877 -- 1881.A thorough account of the expedition, which thereto had penetrated the farthest point north, involving sundry hardships afflicting polar exploration of the era (vessel crushed by ice; crew stranded on an ice floe), but with a bonus: the murder of Captain Charles Francis Hall. While his death, upon returning to the vessel after sledging northward, was inexplicable at the time (1871), recent research has revealed death by poison. ARCTIC BIB., 18382. Now housed in a removable, clear archival sleeve. . Hardcover in Original Publisher's Cloth.
Published by U.S. Senate. 1866. Washington., 1866
Seller: Barry Cassidy Rare Books, Sacramento, CA, U.S.A.
Book
Hardcover. Condition: Collectible-Very Good. Cloth. 13 maps. Complete. Water stain to back end papers. The report by Admiral Davis includes tables of miles saved by using the isthmus canal, tonnage that would pass through the canal, etc. Some maps are: General map of the American isthmus es sh owing the various lines proposed; Isthmus of Tehuantepec; Isthmus between Chagres and Panama; Isthmus of Darien; etc.