Description

This book covers the initial stages of the circumnavigation of the globe on the sloop Diana by the famed Russian explorer Vasilii Golovnin. Descended from an illustrious military family and educated at the Imperial Russian Naval College, Golovnin rose to become a vice admiral in the Russian navy and a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The Diana left the naval port of Kronstadt (near Saint Petersburg) in 1807 under Golovnin’s command and sailed southward in the Atlantic Ocean, intending to round the Cape of Good Hope ...