London, 1949, 1st edition. 287 pp, ills, maps. Explorations on the Tibetan-Burmese border, near the 19,269' highest peak. No DJ, Near Fine. Frank Kingdon-WardFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaFrancis Kingdon-Ward, born Francis Kingdon Ward (6 November 1885 in Manchester - 8 April 1958) was an English botanist, explorer, plant collector and author. He published most of his books as Frank Kingdon-Ward and this hyphenated form of his name stuck, becoming the surname of his wives and two daughters. BiographyHe went on around 25 expeditions over a period of nearly fifty years, exploring Tibet, North Western China, Burma (Myanmar) and Assam (now part of North Eastern India.) Among his collections were, the first viable seed of Meconopsis betonicifolia the Himalayan blue poppy, (first discovered by Pére Delavay), Primula florindae the giant cowslip (named after his first wife Florinda née Norman-Thompson) and Rhododendron wardii a yellow flowered species. He is also commemorated in Ward's Trogon Harpactes wardi.He served in the British army in both world wars although he saw almost no action, despite requesting postings to the front. He was discharged with the rank of Captain.He survived many accidents on his expeditions including being impaled on a bamboo spike, falling off a cliff (stopped by a tree growing from the cliff), lost for two days with no food, tent crushed by a tree in a storm, and he was close to the epicentre of an earthquake (registering 9.6 on the Richter scale) on 15 August 1950 during an expedition in Assam. He was married twice, firstly to Florinda Norman-Thompson on 11 April 1923 (divorced 1936) and secondly to Jean Macklin on 12 November 1947, to whom he remained married until his death.Even towards the end of his career he was still active, his greatest "swansong" plant was probably Lilium mackliniae found jointly with his second wife after whom it is named. At age 68 he climbed to over 11,000 feet in Burma and was still discovering new species of plants on his last expedition in 1956. He wrote 25 books, mostly accounts of his expeditions. Frank Kingdon-Ward died on 8 April 1958 aged 72.
