[Pacific Content / Gardner Island] – Luke, Harry Charles / Sir Harry Luke / [Gerald Gallagher on Nikumaroro (Gardner Island) / Patrick Jay Hurley – United States Minister to New Zealand].

From a South Seas Diary: 1938-1942. [Personal Working copy Number One without Index / “Review copy” of Sir Harry Luke – with very many annotations, additions and corrections which led to the ultimate finished print (this working copy has no Index yet) / With Three (3) Letters loosely inserted of which one is regarding funds for a bronze plaque for Gerald Gallaghaer’s grave on Nikumaroro (Gardner Island) / With Two (2) manuscript notes loosely inserted / With one handmade and handpainted bookmark signed and gifted Christmas 1941 by Cottrell-Dormer, Cox of the Iririki Hospital (Cottrell-Dormer is also mentioned in the Preface) / With a tipped-in Typescript on page 233, regarding the unannounced visit to Suva by United States Minister to New Zealand, Patrick Jay Hurley, on his way to take office. This typescript was clearly written to be included in the book but, for obvious reasons of diplomatic tact, never made it into the final publication. The typescript includes manuscript annotations by Luke and is a fine character-study of Patrick Hurley and his tendency to greet people with “an ear-piercing Indian war whoop or yell [Choctaw war crie, by Luke wrongly remembered as Osage Indian] / Luke rememberes in the typescript the spring of 1942: “About this time I was asked by Washington to look out for and put up, among many American military and naval notabilities who used to pass through Suva….crossing and recrossing the Pacific….So whenever a Catalina was sighted as being about to alight in Suva Harbour, my A.D.C. would hurry down to meet her…..One afternoon in 1942, Mungo dashed off to meet such an aircraft and did not return empty. Into the drawing-room of Government House strode a tall….flamboyant figure…General Hurley soon gave me to understand that in his private opinion Oklahoma was the only State in the Union that really mattered, an opinion which in the circumstances seemed an entirely proper one for him to cherish”.

[This item is part of the Sir Harry Luke – Archive / Collection]. London, Nicholson & Watson, 1945. 19 cm x 12,5 cm. 252 pages with 185 photographs by the author. Original Softcover with original dustjacket in protective Mylar. Harry Luke’s (Lukach) personal copy. With annotations and markings by Harry Luke. Split hinge, almost detached. Otherwise in fair condition.

This stunning working copy is titled by Luke in his own hand as “Review copy” and full of corrections and additions.

Includes loosely inserted:

Manuscript notes No.1: 1 sheet with notes in pencil
Manuscript notes No.2: 1 sheet with notes on Pitcairn, Tonga, “Types of Islands / Constitutions etc.″


Letter 1: Manuscript Letter Signed (MLS / ALS) addressed to Harry Luke and Lady Rigley, Hong Kong, dated 8th February, 1965.
Letter 2: Manuscript Letter Signed (MLS / ALS) from one Peter Whithromb on matters regarding Tonga
Letter 3: Typed Letter signed (TLS), dated July 23rd, 1952, thanking Harry Luke for making it possible to provide Gerald Gallagher’s memorial on Nikumaroro (Garden Island).

Besides the many interesting chapters it is the letter about “British government employee, Gerald Bernard Gallagher, noted as the first officer-in-charge of the Phoenix Islands Settlement Scheme, the last colonial expansion of the British Empire”, which makes the publication interesting beyond Luke’s notes.

The passionate Gallagher, who had joined the colonial service in 1936, was in charge of “The Phoenix Islands Settlement Scheme [which] was begun in 1938 in the western Pacific Ocean and was the last attempt at human colonisation within the British Empire.
Conceived by Henry E. “Harry” Maude, lands commissioner of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony, and approved by His Excellency Sir Harry Luke, Governor of Fiji and High Commissioner of the Western Pacific. The goal of the project was to reduce overpopulation in the southern Gilbert Islands by developing three mostly uninhabited atolls in the Phoenix Islands archipelago:

Nikumaroro (Gardner) / Manra (Sydney) / Orona (Hull)

A secondary goal was to enhance the British presence in the western Pacific in response to growing American influence through the Guano Islands Act, especially on Canton (later Kanton), where a commercial seaplane base was being established.
The three atolls, Sydney, Hull, and Gardner, were renamed in Gilbertese as Manra Island, Orona Atoll, and Nikumaroro respectively. Colonisation efforts by Gilbertese settlers were almost immediately hampered by the onset of the Second World War, the islands’ isolation and the 1941 death on Nikumaroro of the project’s officer in charge, 29-year-old civil servant Gerald Gallagher.” (Wikipedia)

• Keywords: British Colonial Administration · British Colonial History · British Foreign Office · British Foreign Policy · British Western Pacific Material / Manuscript Annotations · British Western Pacific Material / Manuscript Letter Signed (MLS) · British Western Pacific Material / Manuscript Material (Notes etc.) · British Western Pacific Material / Sir Harry Luke Collection · British Western Pacific Material / Typed Letter Signed (TLS) · British Western Pacific Territories · From a South Seas Diary – Working Copy One · Harry Luke – Pacific (1938 – 1947) · Manuscript / Autograph – Rare · Manuscript Annotation(s) · Sir Harry Luke · Sir Harry Luke – Personal Archive of Books and Correspondence · Sir Harry Luke Collection · South Pacific Material – Sir Harry Luke Collection · South Sea Material – Sir Harry Luke Collection
• Language: English
• Inventory Number: 30153AB

EUR 275.000,-- 

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