[THE WHALESHIP ?ESSEX"]. MONTGOMERY, James (1771-1854). Journal of Voyages and Travels by the Rev. Daniel Tyerman and George Bennet, Esq. Deputed from the London Missionary Society, to Visit Their Various Stations in the South Sea Islands, China, India, &c. Between the Years 1821 and 1829. Boston: Crocker and Brewster and New York: Jonathan Leavitt, 1832. 8vos. Illustrated with 6 plates, including 2 frontispiece portraits. 3 volumes. Bound in contemporary blue cloth boards, all volumes rebacked with modern blue cloth and modern red gilt morocco lettering labels (boards rubbed, soiled, text toned, untrimmed, foxed, soiled, a few marginal tears, hinges repaired, p. v-vi in volume 2 a bit loose). Good. FIRST AMERICAN EDITION, ?From the First London Edition Revised by An American Editor". All volumes with half-titles from the Library of Religious Knowledge. THIS BOOK HAS THE FIRST AMERICAN APPEARANCE OF CAPTAIN POLLARD'S PERSONAL ACCOUNT OF THE WHALESHIP ?ESSEX," DESCRIBING THE DESTRUCTION OF THAT SHIP BY A WHALE AND THE CREW'S SURVIVAL (volume 2, pp. 170-172). This set also describes many encounters by the missionaries with native peoples, including cannibals. The first mate, Owen Chase, wrote the first account of the sinking of the ?Essex" in 1821, which became a source book for Herman Melville's Moby-Dick.