About this Item
First edition - a narrative written by Sidney Reilly, edited and completed by his wife. With illustrations including photographs of significant documents, some of which are on folding pull-out pages. ***Very good in plum-coloured cloth-covered boards with block gilt titles to the spine. The boards are clean and unmarked, and the gilt is still beautifully bright, having been protected by the dustwrapper. Head and tail of spine slightly creased. No other bumps or creases. Corners sharp. Slight reading lean to the binding. Spine tight. Page block edges clean, with just some light foxing to the fore-edge, and with the top edge stained a plum colour by the publisher to match the boards. Internally near fine with no inscriptions. Light offsetting to the endpapers, but hardly any foxing. Pages clean. No creases or tears. ***In a good monochrome-illustrated dustwrapper, which has not been price-clipped, retaining the original publisher's dual price of 10s. 6d. on the front flap. Whilst the dustwrapper is largely complete, there is quite a large hole at the top of the spine which affects the titles. There is a small chip at the bottom edge of the front panel, and loss along the top edge of the back panel. Also, a previous owner has trimmed the ragged edges of the dustwrapper at some point. (please see scans). The flaps of the dustwrapper are intact and uncreased. ***224mm x 150mm. 288 pages including two appendices and an index at the back of the book. ***'Capt. Reilly's narrative of his Counter-Bolshevik work in Russia reveals for the first time the full story of the attempts to overthrow Bolshevism which were made in the first months of the Red Terror. Becoming "Comrade Relinsky" of the Tcheka, Capt. Reilly was able to discover the innermost secrets of the Bolshevik plans, and to build up his schemes for removing them from power and substituting a White Government. His story of plotting and counter-plotting, of attempts to capture Lenin and Trotsky, of his hundred and one disguises, of hair-breadth escape from Bolshevik agents, of how he was followed to London, and of the attempts made to lure him back to Russia which culminated in the kidnapping of Mrs. Reilly by the Tcheka agents, of forged letters sent by the Bolsheviks to Mrs. Reilly, and of agents provocateurs who endeavoured to trap him, make the book so fantastic that were it not for the documentary evidence of its authenticity it would seem incredible.' (Quote taken from the front flap of the dustwrapper) ***'Sidney George Reilly MC (c. 1873 - 5 Nov 1925), known as the "Ace of Spies", was a Russian-born adventurer and secret agent employed by Scotland Yard's Special Branch and later by the Foreign Section of the British Secret Service Bureau, the precursor to the modern British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6/SIS). He is alleged to have spied for at least four different great powers, and documentary evidence indicates that he was involved in espionage activities in 1890s London among Russian émigré circles, in Manchuria on the eve of the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05), and in an abortive 1918 coup d'état against Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik government in Moscow. Reilly disappeared in Soviet Russia in the mid-1920s, lured by the Cheka's Operation Trust. British diplomat and journalist R. H. Bruce Lockhart publicised his and Reilly's 1918 exploits to overthrow the Bolshevik regime in Lockhart's 1932 book Memoirs of a British Agent. This became an international best-seller and garnered global fame for Reilly. The world press made Reilly into a household name.' (Wiki) ***A first edition of this unusual work, complete in the original dustwrapper. An uncommon book in first edition, and very seldom found in the original dustwrapper. ***For all our books, postage is charged at cost, allowing for packaging: any shipping rates indicated on ABE are an average only: we will reduce the P & P charge where appropriate - please contact us for postal rates for heavier books and sets etc.
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