[NAVAL -- MANUSCRIPTS]. WREY, R. “Logs of HMS ‘Duke of Wellington’ Captain G. Hancock / ‘Inconstant’ Captain C. L. D. Waddilove. / ‘Doris’ Captain W. H. Edye…kept by R. Wrey [signed], Midshipman.” [1870-1876].

Approximately 500 pages bound in one volume, folio (ca 307 x 205mm). Written in cursive in brown ink on blue paper. With inserted plates in pen-and-ink (most on heavy paper), including 4 decorative title-pages (2 with watercolor), 18 maps or charts (some folding), 4 ship diagrams (one with watercolor), and one watercolor view of Carthagena. (Some leaves frayed or brittle at edges, possibly missing leaves, one folding map separated into pieces, some staining, usual dust-staining and signs of wear.) Bound in contemporary half calf (rubbed and worn, text block cracked with many quires or leaves becoming loose). Provenance: Juha Nurminen (bookplate).

Bound volume of logbooks kept by Midshipman R. Wrey serving briefly (July to August 1870) on HMS Wellington (then a training ship at Portsmouth Harbour); from 11 December 1871 on HMS Inconstant, sailing from Madeira to Rio, then to the Cape, Simon's Bay, Bombay, Mauritius, Simon's Bay, St Helena, Ascension Island, Fayal, returning to Portsmouth on 11 October 1872; the remaining sequence of logs recording service on HMS Doris between 16 October 1872 and 17 January 1876, cruising off the coast of Spain, from Funchal to Barbados, in the West Indies, from Halifax to Gibraltar and Gibraltar to Halifax, off the Cape de Gatte, in the Mediterranean, from Malta to Corfu, Navarino to Salamis, St Vincent to Monte Video via Stanley and back via the Falklands and the Cape, from Gibraltar to the Cape, and from there to India.

Selections from Antiquariat Botanicum, Dr. Eugene Vigil