The Mystery Chest


Extremely Rare.
Author: Admiral E.R.G.R. Evans
Illustrations Edward C. Caswell
Dated: [1931]
Publisher: Farrar & Rinehart
Edition: 1st
Size: 8vo
Binding Hardcover
Type: Juvenile
Provenance: Hill House
Notes & Literature Admiral Edward Ratcliffe Garth Russell Evans, 1st Baron Mountevans, KCB, DSO, SGM (28 October 1880 – 20 August 1957) was a Royal Navy officer and Antarctic explorer.[1]
Evans was seconded from the Navy to the Discovery expedition to Antarctica in 1901–1904, when he served on the crew of the relief ship, and afterwards began planning his own Antarctic expedition. However, he suspended this plan when offered the post of second-in-command on Robert Falcon Scott's ill-fated Terra Nova expedition to the South Pole in 1910–1913, as captain of the expedition ship Terra Nova. He accompanied Scott to within 150 miles of the Pole, but was sent back in command of the last supporting party. On the return he became seriously ill with scurvy and only narrowly survived.
After the expedition he toured the country giving lectures, and returned to his naval duties as a commander in the summer of 1914. He spent the First World War as a destroyer captain, becoming famous as "Evans of the Broke" after the battle of Dover Strait in 1917. He commanded a cruiser at Hong Kong in 1921–1922, where he was awarded a medal for his role in rescuing passengers from the wrecked-vessel Hong Moh, and then spent several years commanding the Home Fisheries Protection Squadron before being given command of the modern battlecruiser HMS Repulse. He later commanded the Australian Squadron and the Africa Station before becoming Commander-in-Chief, The Nore, one of the Navy's senior Home Commands; during this time, unusually for a serving officer, he was also Rector of the University of Aberdeen. Writer of Children's Adventure Books.
Condition Report Very Good Plus to Fine