RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Official History (Naval and Military) of the Russo-Japanese War. First edition, one of only 250 possible complete sets, with the bookplate of Thomas Beaumont Hohler, Second Secretary at the British Embassy in Tokyo from 1902 to 1905. During the Russo-Japanese War, Hohler visited the front as an observer and enjoyed a strong relationship with the commander of the Japanese navy, Vice-Admiral Saito Makato. The last complete set to appear at auction sold at Sotheby's in 1982."As record of what actually happened, this is probably the best account of the Russo-Japanese War produced by any general staff in Europe. Reports of the British observers and the official accounts of Austria, Germany, the United States, Russia and Japan were all consulted; Russian authorities provided much useful information, and the proofs were 'very carefully revised' by Japanese military officers in Tokyo" (Higham).The volumes were compiled by a team led by Sir Ernest Swinton (1861-1951), the head of Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence and the future inventor of the tank, while Russian documents were translated by Archibald Wavell (1883-1950), later Viceroy of India. Swinton's group completed the series by 1914, but the outbreak of war delayed the printing of the third volume until 1920. Of Volume II, only 250 copies were printed, compared to 2,000 for Volume I and 1,500 for Volume III.Working under the leadership of Sir Claude Macdonald, Hohler (1871-1946) monitored the course of the

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