The Natural History of the Sperm Whale…, to which is Added, a Sketch of a South-Sea Whaling Voyage.

Beale, Thomas. London: John van Voorst, 1839.
  • Whalemen's Reading
 Preview 

Part I is a scientific and fairly analytic description of the sperm whale, from physiology to diet to reproductive systems. Part II on the voyage begins in October 1830, observing no land between England and Cape Horn, where the Fuegians despite the gloomy terrain and wretched conditions “seem to possess a considerable share of that inestimable blessing—happiness” (p. 200). It is both charming and frightening in its description of certain adventures, and very good at describing the extremes of ennui and excitement.

William Henry Seward.

Van Deusen, Glyndon. New York: Oxford University Press, 1967.
  • Arctic Reading: Canada
 Preview 

p. 531: He [Seward] had that insatiable expansionist Robert J. Walker draw up a report in 1867 on the resources and geopolitical importance of Greenland and Iceland. [Walker wanted to purchase them for resources but also to encourage annexation of Canada by the US. Seward had it printed.]

The Lure of the Whaling Journal.

Johnson, Barbara. Manuscripts 23 (1971) 158-77.
  • Whalemen's Reading
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p. 162, Feb. 24, 1859: I am teaching Cooper Orthoepy and definitions for which he has generously offered me the large sum of one dollar.

Mariner’s Sketches, Originally Published in the Manufacturers and Farmers Journal, Providence.

Ames, Nathaniel. Revised, Corrected and Enlarged by the author. Providence: Cory, Marshall and Hammond, 1830.
  • Arctic Reading: United States
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The author Nathaniel Ames was the son of the statesman, Fisher Ames (1758-1808), of Dedham, Massachusetts, and was a congressman from 1789 to 1797. Nathaniel was named for his grandfather, Nathaniel Ames, famous for the Ames Almanacs, which were the inspiration to Benjamin Franklin's "Poor Richard's Almanac".

The North Georgia Gazette, and Winter Chronicle.

London: John Murray, 1821. [Reprint edition of paper circulated aboard Hecla on Parry’s Northwest Passage expedition, 1819-20.].
  • 1819-20 British Voyage of Discovery to the Arctic Regions (Edward Parry aboard Hecla and Griper).
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

Monday, the 1st of November, 1819, will ever be memorable in the history of literature. On that day appeared, composed, edited, but not printed, within the arctic circle, within fifteen degree of the North Pole of the earth, the first number of the “North Georgian Gazette, or Winter Chronicle;”—a work, take it all in all, without a fellow.

Account of the Russian Discoveries between Asia and America.

Coxe, William. Second ed. London: J. Nichols for T. Cadell, 1780.
  • Arctic Reading: Russia
 Preview 

p. 30: at some distance from thence lies a great island called Sabya, of which the inhabitants are denominated Rogii: these inhabitants, as the Russians understood or thought they understood him, made crosses, had books and fire-arms, and navigated in baidars or leathern canoes.

Of Whales and Men.

Robertson, R. B. (New York: Knopf, 1954).
  • Maritime Reading
 Preview 

A delightful account of a ship’s doctor on an 8-month cruise of a whaling factory ship, with something of a psychological emphasis on the men he was with.

Pacific and Indian Oceans; or the South Sea Surveying and Exploring Expedition.

Reynolds, Jeremiah N. New York: Harper, 1841.
  • 1838-42 U.S. Exploring Expedition (Wilkes).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

This volume includes a couple of Reynold’s works commenting on the preparation for the ExEx, from which he was eventually excluded. The volume includes reprints of two works previously published by the author: Address on the subject of a surveying and exploring expedition to the Pacific Ocean and South seas -- New York, 1836, and, Exploring expedition. Correspondance between J. N. Reynolds and the Hon. Mahlon Dickerson, under the respective signatures of "Citizen" and "Friend to the navy", touching the South sea surveying and exploring expedition -- [New York, 1838?] He never went to the Antarctic but his comments in preparation have peculiar interest.

Lt. Aemilius Simpson’s Survey from York Factory to Fort Vancouver, 1826.

Simpson, Aemilius. Edited by William Barr and Larry Green. Journal of the Hakluyt Society(August 2014) 106 p., illus.
  • 1826 British Overland Survey from Hudson Bay to Fort Vancouver.
  • Hudson's Bay Company.
  • Arctic Reading: Canada
 Preview 

Transcript of Simpson’s “Journal of a Voyage across the Continent of North America in 1826.”Although the journal gives no instances of specific reading there are references to Fraanklin’s Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea(London, 1823) sufficient to infer that he had a copy with him on the journey.

The Private Life of Polar Exploration.

Scott, James Maurice. Edinburgh: Blackwood, 1982.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

p. 65, re Scott’s Northern Party: Levick used to read aloud in the evening, first a chapter a night of David Copperfield, then the Life of Stevenson, then Simon the Jester [William Locke novel]. That was their library, and thus rationed lasted them about half way through the winter…. On Sunday nights they sang with a religious bias.

Nantucket Whalemen in the Deep-Sea Fishery: The Changing Anatomy of an Early American Labor Force,

Vickers, Daniel. Journal of American History 72 (Sept. 1985) 277-96.
  • Maritime Reading
    Whalemen's Reading
 Preview 

On the whaling journey of the brig Polley to West Africa in 1774, and in particular one of its crew, Samuel Atkins, who wrote some poetry about the journey: Steadily the nerves of unlucky whalemen were worn down by loneliness, boredom, and the knowledge that the vessel would have to remain at sea until a reasonable haul of oil had been taken in (p. 278).

An Account of a Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage by Hudson’s Streights, to the Western and Southern Ocean of America. Performed in the Year 1746 and 1747, in the Ship California, Capt. Francis Smith , Commander. By the Clerk of the California.

Swaine, Theodore. Two volumes. London: Jolliffe, Corbett, and Clarke, 1748.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

The little found in these volumes concerning reading and writing has to do with the documents of the expedition itself, as well as the account of earlier voyages.