McCORMICK, Robert (1800-1890). Voyages of Discovery in the Arctic and Antarctic Seas, and Round the World; being the personal narratives of attempts to reach The North and South Poles; and of an Open-Boat Expedition up the Wellington Channel in Search of Sir John Franklin and Her Majesty's Ships Erebus and Terror, in Her Majesty's Boat Forlorn Hope. London: Sampson Low, Marston, et al, 1884.

2 volumes, royal 8vo (253 x 163 mm). 63 lithographed plates including frontispiece portraits and panoramas, 3 maps (2 color-printed, one folding). 16pp. advertisements at end of vol. II. (Some light spotting on preliminary leaves.) Publisher's gilt-lettered blue cloth (a few tiny chips to spine ends, corners with very slight wear). Provenance: C. E. Collins (bookplate).

FIRST EDITION of McCormick's first-hand account of the Ross expedition (1839-1843), in which he "he conveys the sense of awed wonder experienced by all aboard Ross' ships when the true enormity of the Antarctic continent revealed itself for the first time" (Taurus). He sailed with Captain Parry on his fourth voyage to the North Pole in 1827 aboard Hecla, and served under Ross from 1839-1843 on the Erebus and Terror expedition to the South Pole; he recounts both expeditions in the first volume. The second volume describes his voyage with Captain Sir Edward Belcher's 1852-54 on the last Admiralty search for Sir John Franklin and his ships Erebus and Terror (which had successfully carried Ross to the Antarctic ten years earlier). Arctic Bibliography 10582; Spence 747; Taurus 10.


Estimate $1,000-1,500

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