Written and drawn by Norman Wilkinson, R.I., who served with the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve through the Gallipoli campaign and recorded what he witnessed in watercolour on the spot. All thirty Full-Page Plates in Colour, are present and are reproductions from Water-Colour Drawings made on the spot.
Bound in the publisher's original navy-blue cloth, the front board carrying a striking gilt-and-blind illustration of a British warship firing on a Turkish minelayer off an Aegean island.
Provenance: the front pastedown carries a printed ownership label, "Lieut. D. C. Ford, R.N." The name and rank correspond to Sir Denys Chester Ford (1890–1967), who rose to Vice-Admiral and was a naval engineer by training. In 1915 he would have held a Lieutenant's rank, consistent with the label.
Internally complete with the full complement of colour plates under tissue guards, including a vivid plate of a battleship's guns firing in support of the landings and black-and-white text illustrations throughout. The text itself, sampled at "Chapter VI: Submarines," discusses the loss of HMS Aboukir, Hogue, and Cressy and the early use of submarines in the campaign; pages are clean and bright with only light, even age-toning typical of the period.
Condition: a solid, well-presented copy. The gilt to the boards remains bright and fully legible, with light surface scuffing and faint marking to the cloth, and some fraying and minor loss to the cloth at the head of the spine. Corners lightly bumped. The leaf bearing the ownership label shows consistent with age, with the rest of the text block unaffected. No other inscriptions, stamps, or repairs noted.
A genuinely scarce title, sought after specifically for its subject, a firsthand artist's record of Gallipoli, and bolstered here by an authentic naval ownership provenance.
