THE FIRST COLONIZATION OF AUSTRALIA

"As a detailed and officially sanctioned account of the new colony, the first edition of Stockdale's Phillip is a key work and essential to any serious collection of Australian books."

[PHILLIP, ARTHUR.] THE VOYAGE OF GOVERNOR PHILLIP TO BOTANY BAY; with an Account of the Establishment of the Colonies of Port Jackson & Norfolk Island . . . embellished with fifty five Copper Plates . . . . London: Printed for John Stockdale, 1789. 4to. Contemporary tree calf, spine gilt in six compartments. [iv] (List of the Plates), 6 (Dedication, Anecdotes of Governor Phillip), [ii] (Errata), viii (Advertisement), [viii] (List of Subscribers), x (Contents), 298, lxxiv (Appendix), [ii] (Advertisements) pages. Engraved vignette on title after Josiah Wedgwood, frontispiece portrait and fifty-three engraved plates and charts, including the earliest plan of the settlement of Sydney, Australia. Expertly rebacked, preserving original spine, slight wear to extremities, some offsetting from plates, several marginal paper flaws not affecting text or images. A very good or better copy.

FIRST EDITION of "the first authentic and official account of the expedition to New South Wales and of the foundation of the settlement" (Ferguson). Arthur Phillip (1738-1814), then a little-known career officer in the Royal Navy, was chosen in 1786 to command the ships transporting the first English convicts for settlement in Australia. "The 'first fleet,' as it was so long called in Australia, consisted of the frigate Sirius . . . , the tender Supply, three store-ships, and six transports with the convicts and their guard of marines. On 13 May 1787 it set sail, Phillip hoisting his flag on the Sirius" (DNB). Proceeding slowly by way of Tenerife, Rio de Janeiro and the Cape of Good Hope, Phillip and the First Fleet reached Botany Bay on January 18, 1788.

"Little was known about Australia when . . . Phillip landed at Botany Bay . . . to begin the convict colony of New South Wales. . . . Botany Bay had been chosen as the site of the first settlement because it was one of the few stretches of coastline examined in detail and described favorably by Joseph Banks and James Cook in 1770. Arriving at the height of summer 18 years later, Phillip realized that their assessment had been grossly optimistic, for Botany Bay's sandiness and swampiness made it totally unsuitable. He was forced to sail north, enter Port Jackson, which had been bypassed by Cook, and establish his tiny penal outpost on the more fertile shores of Sydney Cove" (Delpar, The Discoverers). There, "[o]n 26 Jan[uary] 1788 he founded the city, which he christened Sydney, after Thomas Townshend, viscount Sydney, the secretary of state" (DNB). As the first governor of New South Wales, Phillip proved to be a surprisingly able administrator during an early period of great hardship and deprivation. "Phillip's energy and self-reliance, his humanity and firmness, made a lasting impression on New South Wales. He permanently inspired the colony, despite the unpromising materials out of which it was formed, with habitual respect for law and deference to constituted authority" (Id., quoting Rusden).

Jonathan Wantrup, in Australian Rare Books 1788-1900, offers the most thorough bibliographic treatment of The Voyage of Governor Phillip and the other accounts of Phillip's expedition. Of the six "First Fleet books" on the initial colonization of Australia, only Watkin Tench's Narrative of the Expedition to Botany Bay appeared before Stockdale's publication. "Although Tench's Narrative preceded it by many months, the importance of Stockdale's Phillip must not be underestimated. It offers a full record of events both on land and on sea in the first months of the settlement, detailing the early expeditions of Phillip and the other officers into the interior around Botany Bay and Port Jackson, the earliest coastal voyages of discovery and important discoveries in the surrounding seas. . . . As a detailed and officially sanctioned account of the new colony, the first edition of Stockdale's Phillip is a key work and essential to any serious collection of Australian books. Phillip is a scarce book and growing scarcer every year" (Wantrup). This copy of The Voyage of Governor Phillip, in a beautiful contemporary binding, has Wantrup's second state of the title but the earlier state of the "Wulpine" plate facing page 150. "Many editions appeared of this classic work on Australia, but none is as sumptuous as this first, a very well printed and illustrated edition" (Borba de Moraes). Borba de Moraes II, p. 665. Cox II, p. 314. Ferguson 47. Kroepelien 1249. Wantrup 5, pp. 59-62. BT000069.

$6000

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