THE SINKING OF THE OCEAN MONARCH: AN EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT BY A BRAZILIAN NAVAL OFFICER. Large 8vo [21.3 x 13.6 cm]. (9), 10-54 pp, [1 integral blank], plus lithographed frontispiece guarded by a blank leaf. Bound in original printed wrappers. Author's six-line signed presentation inscription to D. Maria Domingues on the verso of the frontispiece. Sadly a very fragile survival, with upper margins thinned and crumbling (though with no loss of text or lithographed image). Upper half of dedication leaf torn out – without any apparent loss to text on recto or verso. First few leaves loose. Extremely rare (unrecorded in OCLC or PORBASE) sole edition of this detailed Brazilian-printed account of the shipwreck of the Ocean Monarch, filled with Irish immigrants bound for Boston. The present example is a modest but complete survival of this important eyewitness account. On August 24, 1848, the Ocean Monarch, a large packet ship on the Boston-Liverpool run, caught fire soon after leaving Liverpool and went down six miles off the coast of Wales, with 178 passengers and crew; 223 others were saved by nearby ships. It was one of the most dramatic and horrific naval catastrophes of its time, and received widespread media attention. Araujo Junior was aboard the Brazilian steam-frigate Affonso, which anchored to windward of the burning Monarch. The crew attached a line and rescued 160 passengers, at considerable risk to themselves. They were commended for their actions by the Princess de Joinville, who was also aboard the Affonso, and who recorded the action in a drawing [dezenho] after which the lithograph was produced. This dramatic scene, signed by the Rio de Janeiro lithographers A. L. Guimares and ‘Heaton e Rensburg’, depicts dozens of life-boats being deployed from the flaming, sinking ship, while the Brazilian steam-frigate Affonso attempts a rescue mission. Many of the Ocean Monarch’s passengers had fled to the front of the ship; the image shows the moment when the bowsprit cracked, hurling them into the sea. The lithograph is captioned, "Incendio total do Monarcha do Oceano, a imitao de hum dezenho de S.A.R. o Principe de Joinville." At the time, Araujo Junior (d. 1884) was a first lieutenant in the Armada Nacional e Imperial. He rose to the rank of capito-tenente and was a knight of the Ordem de S. Bento de Aviz and Commendador of the Ordem Portugueza da Conceio de Villa Viosa. This is his only published work. * Sacramento Blake IV, 182; Catalogo dos livros do Gabinete Portuguez de Leitura no Rio de Janeiro, p. 393; not in PORBASE, OCLC, COPAC, or KvK.