Another local book or large booklet discovered, The Caverns of Derbyshire: being an extract from Irlande at Cavernes Anglaises. A 1914 English translation of the Derbyshire sections of a 1897 book by the pioneering cave and underground-river explorer E. A. Martel (1859-1938). It is not on Archive.org and appears to be effectively unknown, outside specialist libraries of caving history.

A more recent translation of a part of it was “A description of Peak Cavern, Derbyshire, by Edouard-Alfred Martel: a translation”, in Cave and Karst Science 45 (3), pages 113-117.

I see that there’s now a 2013 DVD documentary on Martel in German and French, being a 1995 documentary rescued from the archives. Those in the local Peak District archives might like to note that… “In addition, a limited edition of the English version is currently available” for 19 Euros. Though I don’t know how heavily it focuses on the Ireland and Derbyshire exploring. He also made a lot of other fabulous discoveries in France, Spain, Germany and Russia.