Narrative of a Voyage to the Pacific and Beering’s Strait, to Co-operate with the Polar Expeditions: Performed in His Majesty’s Ship Blossom, Under the Command of Captain F. W. Beechey, R. N., In the Years 1825, 26, 27, 28.

London:: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, 1831., 1831. 2 volumes. 4to. xxi, [3], 392; vii, [1], [393]-742, [1] pp. Folding frontis. map, 2 maps (1 folding), 23 engraved plates. erratum slip. Original half calf, marbled boards, gilt spine, red and black gilt-spine labels; spines worn, corners showing, named clipped from title of volume 2 [repaired]. Very good. Captain Frederick William Beechey was an English explorer and geographer. IN 1825 he was appointed to command the HMS Bloosom, and directed to explore the Bering Strait. The voyage lasted 3 years, during which Beechey and his crew discovered numerous islands in the Pacific. They also spent significant time on the California coast, and the description of their time there provides significant insight into early San Francisco life, as well as the condition of life at the California missions. "Beechey’s book is one of the most valuable of modern voyages and relates extensive visits to Pitcairn Island, Easter Island, the Tuamotu Archipelago, the Society Islands, the Mangareva (Gambier) Islands, and Tahiti, Alaska, Hawaii, Macao, Okinawa, and the coast of California. Captain Beechey was ordered by the Admiralty to Bering Strait as a relief expedition to await the separate expeditions of Captains Franklin and Parry, who had sailed in 1824 to search for the Northwest Passage to the Pacific Ocean. He was to meet them at Kotzebue Sound in July of 1826. After visits to Tahiti and Hawaii, Beechey heard at Kamchatka that Parry had turned back, but he waited at Kotzebue Sound for Franklin, who never arrived, during the summers of both 1826 and 1827. . . . Beechey’s work provides an important account of Monterey and San Francisco before the American conquest and gives his impressions of the missionaries in San Francisco. Blossom Rock in San Francisco Bay is named for his ship. Beechey also describes the Eskimos of the north. At Pitcairn Island, Beechey met with John Adams, last survivor of the mutiny on the Bounty, who gave Beechey a lengthy account." - The Hill Collection of Pacific Voyages, p. 33. REFERENCES: Cowan, p.42; Ferguson, 1418; Forbes 772; Hill, p.19; Howes B309, "b"; Lada-Mocarski, Bibliography of books on Alaska published before 1868, 95; Reese, Best of the West 57; Rocq 5621; Sabin 4347; Smith 704; Streeter Sale 3517; Wickersham 6541. Zamorano 80, 4.