General Greely; The Story of a Great American

New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1936. First Edition. Very Good/Very Good. [8.25x5.5in]; xiv, 242 pp.. Ten photographic plates; Blue cloth covers with black lettering on spine and front, all edges trimmed; Red white and blue dust jacket with black lettering on front and spine, blue-tinted illustration of Arctic camp on front; Minor shelf wear to edges , bookseller price stamp on rear end paper; Some shelf wear to edges and corners with large chip on top front with text loss, chips to top and bottom of spine. General Adolphus Washington Greely (1844-1935) was a U.S. Army officer and Arctic Explorer. This definitive biography of this Civil War veteran and arctic explorer was completed just before Greely's death in 1935. The author General William Mitchell knew and worked with him from the time of his work with the U. S. Army Signal Corps to his death. In 1881, Greely was given command of the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition in the Arctic. He was to establish a chain of meteorological stations as part of the first International Polar Year. They were also to conduct astronomical and polar magnetic studies and search for the USS Jeannette that entered the Arctic from the Bering straight to find the "open polar sea" for a northwest passage. All in the expedition did not have Arctic experienced and after supply parties failed to reach the camp on Ellesmere Island after two years, the expedition was in dire shape. They abandoned the camp and traveled south. Ultimately only six of the 23 members survived.