Lost Sea Serpent Book?
Posted by: Loren Coleman on August 2nd, 2010
Gloucester Sea Serpent
Does anyone know of this book? Have it in your collection?
Scientific American
Vol 4 no 42, 1849 July 7, page 330
Sea Serpent Book.
Mr. John Bartlett of Cambridge Mass., has in the course of publication a book on the Sea Serpent. this work will contain a story of the monster and all about his swallowing a man, and also about his visit to Nahant, Gloucester and other places, together with all that is known on the subject of sea serpent by all the Savants in the world. The work will be illustrated with cuts, in which his head will be visible a long ways above the water. The price is only 37 1/2 cents.
Thanks to J, Brænne for the item.
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Loren Coleman no longer writes for Cryptomundo. His archived posts remain here at Cryptomundo.
Would this not be the same “John Bartlett”, 1820 – 1905, who once owned the Harvard bookstore and who is most famous for Bartlett’s Quotations? If so, Harvard’s special collections might include his other books.
Hey Loren follow the link to an electronic version of the book. if you are looking for a hard copy, its on Amazon, I believe.
P.S. the book is called A Romance of a Sea Serpent
http://books.google.ca/books?
id=fJEZAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=a+romance+of+the+sea+serpent++sea+serpent&source=bl&ots=xG5oElam8L&sig=to93YrnYNv9KO_Pqd2_hoJPNu60&hl=en&ei=ytVWTOq7HoTCsAPMn-WyBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBgQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false
Whenever you are looking for American or Colonial printed material before 1876, the American Antiquarian Society in Worchester MA is your best bet. They have been around for nearly 125 years and have been trying to gather everything. I have a friend there and I sent her this posting, so perhaps they may have it.
As a retired librarian, I am rather embarrassed to say that as a profession we are very conventional about assigning subject headings to books, so probably the terms that cryptozoologists use are not the same as the Library of Congress Subject Headings. Computers and data bases have made it easier to add multiple access points, though, above and beyond the stodgy LCSH.
No mystery, it is the compilation of Eugene Batchelder entitled
“A romance of the sea serpent, or, The ichthyosaurus. Also, a collection of the ancient and modern authorities, with letters from distinguished merchants and men of science.”
published by Bartlett in 1849. Available at good national libraries worldwide.
I did a quick search of the New York Public Library site and found:
A romance of the sea serpent, or, The ichthyosaurus. [By Wave, pseud.] Also, a collection of the ancient and modern authorities, with letters from distinguished merchants and men of science.
So the book got published. It also adds:
Batchelder, Eugene, 1822-1878
Cambridge, [Mass.] J. Bartlett, 1849.
so I guess he published it under the Batchelder synonym.
Sorry, for synonym read pseudonym! Please edit , Loren.
The British Library has this too. Interestingly, they hold it as
( Wright American fiction ; v. 1, 1774-1850, no. 282)
which suggests it might be of limited usefulness as source material…