DIARY OF A SURVIVOR
SALE, Lady Florentia. A Journal of the Disasters in Affghanistan, 1841-2. London: John Murray. 1843.
8vo. Original cloth, spine lettered in gilt, gilt-stamped elephant on front cover; pp. xvi, 451, 12 (publisher's catalogue); folding plan, one single-page lithographed plan, printed advertisement slip for another book on the Afghan War tipped in before title, binding expertly restored, folding plan with repaired tear along one fold, otherwise internally very good, old Sotheran's label inside front cover and a cut out catalogue description of this book tipped in at rear; contemporary ownership inscription of William Manwell at head of title.
First edition, scarce. Lady Sale was married to General Robert Henry Sale and based in Kabul when the Afghan rising of 1841 occurred. The British forces retreated in January 1842 and Sale joined the 16000 troops and civilians who formed its ranks. The hostile climate and continual Afghan attacks resulted in the death of many on the march and Sale herself was taken captive. During her captivity she learned that a single survivor from the retreat had managed to reach the safety of Jalalabad. In the diary that she kept during this period Sale records these events and their attendant sufferings, thus providing a close-up and harrowing account of the debacles experienced at this time by the British forces in Afghanistan.
"On the retreat of the British force from Kabul in January 1842, and the massacre which ensued, Lady Sale had shared the horrors of those cold snowy days and nights. She did what she could to alleviate the sufferings of the women and children and the wounded. Her clothes were riddled with bullets, and she was twice wounded and had a bullet in her wrist. With her daughter, Mrs. Sturt, she soothed the last moments of her mortally wounded son-in-law, Lieutenant Sturt of the engineers, who died near Khurd Kabul on 9 Jan. 1842, and was the only officer who received Christian burial. At last, on 10 Jan., Akbar Khan had compassion on these unfortunate women and children, and carried them, with other prisoners and hostages, to a fort in the Khurd Kabul. Their baggage was all looted, and they had only the clothes they were wearing. Fortunately, before leaving Kabul, Lady Sale had taken out her diary to make an entry, and then, finding her baggage gone, put it in a bag which she tied to her waist. This graphic account, begun at Kabul in September 1841, was continued through her captivity, and published in 1843" (DNB).
Yakushi S14a.
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