Description This unique mint copy of the First One-Volume English Edition in the extraordinarily rare dust jacket is inscribed and signed on the front free endpaper: “To R. Randolph Bruce from Winston S. Churchill. With all good wishes for 1930. Dec. 27, 1929.” Bruce’s bookplate is affixed to the front pastedown. ROBERT RANDOLPH BRUCE (1863-1942) was the 13th Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia, from 1926 to 1931. During Churchill’s extended 1929 North American tour, which began in Canada, the Churchill party was hosted by Lieutenant-Governor Bruce for three days at Government House in Victoria, B.C. Churchill fell in love with the natural majesty of the Canadian landscape and the “fortunes” it potentially offered. “Darling, I am greatly attracted to this country,” he wrote to to his wife Clementine. Still, the foreign scenery also moved him to morose thoughts about the political climate back home. “I have made up my mind that if Neville Chamberlain is made leader of the Conservative Party or anyone else of that kind, I clear out of politics & see if I cannot make you and the kittens a little more comfortable before I die.” The rare dust jacket, which is almost never seen, is here nearly pristine, with only tiny chips and miniscule separation at the jacket spine head, and a single chip to the front face. The book is pristine, without a flaw, including the normally fade-prone spine, which is here entirely unfaded. The book is preserved in a handsome burgundy cloth clamshell solander, with glit-lettered black leather spine label. Laid-in are materials relating to the book’s provenance, including a later presentation gift card from Bruce’s step-daughter-in-law.
