[First Edition] Shackleton's Last Voyage : the Story of...

Hardcover. Sm 4to (9.5" x 7"), gilt blue cloth, pictorial front cover, pictorial endpapers by Garth Jones. Color frontis., 372 pp., numerous maps and b&w plates from photographs. CONDITION: Very good, light wear to extremities and top right corner of upper cover bumped, fore-edge foxed, occasional foxing to contents. First edition of this beautifully produced account of Ernest Shackleton's final Antarctic expedition, written by his second in command, who, after Shackleton's death on South Georgia Island, led the voyage as close as possible to the Antarctic coast before being forced back by unfavorable conditions. The Shackleton-Rowett expedition (so-named for its sponsor-and Shackleton's schoolfriend-John Quiller Rowett) set sail from England on September 24th, 1921, with the intention of surveying uncharted portions of the Antarctic coast. At Rio de Janeiro, Shackleton suffered an initial suspected heart attack, refused medical attention, and died of a second attack on January 4th, 1922, shortly after reaching South Georgia Island. Frank Wild took over command of the voyage, reaching as far south as 69° latitude-still far from the coast of Antarctica-before the state of the ice forced a retreat. Wild and his crew then returned to Elephant Island before ending the expedition, arriving at Plymouth Harbour just one year after their departure. This work, published in the year of the crew of the Quest's return, is drawn "From the Official Journal"-kept first by Shackleton and then, of course, by Wild-as well as the private diary of the crew doctor, A. H. Macklin, with occasional passages drawn from the diaries of other crew members. It tells in vivid detail the story of the voyage from its inception, with maps and charts in the text and over 100 photo-mechanical plates, including shots of Shackleton, the crew ("chipping off frozen spray from the gunwales," "taking observations for magnetic dip," etc.), and the people they encounter; landscapes; flora and fauna; and equipment, including, of course, the Quest herself, "pushing north through rapidly freezing ice," and so on. The volume includes some of the last photographs to be taken of Shackleton. REFERENCES: Howgego III S25; Taurus 112; Rosove 349.A1.

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