THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A SEAMAN

Richard Bentley. London. 1860/61. SECOND EDITION. 2 Volumes. 8vo. (9 x 6 inches). Illustrated with four charts (3 folding) in volume 2, complete. A bright and clean set in the publishers decorative original Navy Blue cloth bindings. Boards with elaborate blind-stamed designs. Spines decorated in blind and ruled & lettered in gilt. Light brown coated endpapers. Neat previous owners armorial bookplates, and another family member's name plate below, on each of the front paste-down endpapers. Some light spotting to the fore-edges and an off white mark to the spine of one volume otherwise a superior set in the uncommon publishers original cloth bindings. Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald (1775 1860) was a Member of the British Parliament and noted naval commander who fought in the Napoleonic Wars. In 1814 he was imprisoned on a false charge of committing fraud at the London Stock Exchange and expelled from the Navy and Parliament. In 1832 he was pardoned and reinstated in the Royal Navy with the rank of Rear Admiral of the Blue, later rising to the rank of Admiral of the Red, and the honorary title of Rear-Admiral of the United Kingdom. The adventure writer Captain Marryatt served under him and his character inspired both C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower and Patrick O'Brian's Jack Aubrey, as well as turning up in the historical novels of G. A Henty and Bernard Cornwell.