The Log of H.M.S. Bounty 1787-1789.

BLIGH, William. Foreword by the Earl of Mountbatten of Burma.

Item Number: 142173

Guilford: Genesis Publications Limited, 1975.

First Zaehnsdorf edition of the Log of H.M.S. Bounty, one of only 50 copies signed by the Earl of Mountbatten of Burma. Folio, bound in full crushed levant morocco by Zaehnsdorf, gilt titles and tooling to the spine in six compartments within raised gilt bands, gilt central vignettes of the H.M.S. Bounty and signature of William Bligh within triple gilt ruling with fleuron cornerpieces to the front and rear panels, gilt turn-ins and wide stamp-signed gilt inner dentelles, silke moire endleaves and doublures, all edges gilt, illustrated, folding map at rear. One of 50 copies taken from a limited edition of five hundred copies specially bound by Zaehnsdorf and signed by Admiral Earl Mountbatten of Burma on the limitation page, this is number 199. In fine condition. Housed in the original felt-lined clamshell box. Rare and desirable.

HMS Bounty, also known as HM Armed Vessel Bounty, was a small merchant vessel that the Royal Navy purchased in 1787 for a botanical mission. The ship was sent to the South Pacific Ocean under the command of William Bligh to acquire breadfruit plants and transport them to the West Indies to be grown as food to feed the West Indies' large population of enslaved persons. That mission was never completed owing to a 1789 mutiny led by acting lieutenant Fletcher Christian, an incident now popularly known as the Mutiny on the Bounty. The mutineers later burned Bounty while she was moored at Pitcairn Island in the Southern Pacific Ocean in 1790. An American adventurer helped land several remains of Bounty in 1957.