Winner, 2020 Basil Stuart-Stubbs Prize. Sponsored by UBC Library and the Pacific BookWorld News Society, this prize recognizes the best scholarly book published by a Canadian author on a BC subject.
Winner, 2020 Basil Stuart-Stubbs Prize. Sponsored by UBC Library and the Pacific BookWorld News Society, this prize recognizes the best scholarly book published by a Canadian author on a BC subject.
Turmoil: The Life & Times of Philip Hankin
is the latest work by award-winning author Michael Layland. Hankin’s remarkable life brought abuse, hardship, and controversy, adventure, opportunity, and reward. It earned him a place in BC history as acting head of governments at a tumultuous time, and for recording parts of a 19th century Huu-ay-aht language. This list of common phrases and drawings lay misfiled in a British archive for more than a century until the author unearthed it during his research.
Hankin's life is a reminder that one
gifted and unusual person can make
a difference in history —Richard Mackie
INTRODUCING…
Meet Philip Hankin, a charming, enigmatic, Victorian-era British naval officer whose 32-year, multi-faceted career started at age 13. Hankin ▪▪ chased slave ships off the African coast ▪▪ mapped uncharted seas around Vancouver Island ▪▪ cooked a curry for the Queen of Hawai’i ▪▪ sought gold in Barkerville ▪▪ battled corruption as Victoria’s police chief ▪▪ acted as go-between for Indigenous groups and the Royal navy ▪▪ recorded—for the first time—an Indigenous coastal language ▪▪ was acting head of successive BC governments, as Vancouver Island joined the BC mainland, and later Canada, and ▪▪ finished as private secretary to a duke in England and then India at the height of the British raj. At age 45, he began a financially stable, but restless, 42-year retirement. Decades later, he wrote the memoir on which this book is based.
The author has used contemporary sources to fill gaps and resolve discrepancies in Hankin’s memoir. Despite extensive research, mysteries remain about his motives, activities, and relationships. Hankin’s final story may still be written, but what is known now makes for an engrossing read.
Of special note is an appendix with examples from a long-hidden word list of the Huu-ay-aht language used in Barkley Sound during the late 19th century. It was recorded by Philip Hankin in consultation with Indigenous guide Thomas Roberts, and lay misfiled for many decades in a British naval archives until discovered by the author while researching this book.
Turmoil: The Life & Times of Philip Hankin
by Michael Layland, 2025
published by Touchwood Editions
Paperback / Softback Trade Paperback (US)
420 pages, soft cover
ISBN: 9781771514712
CDN $35.00
Essential reading for anyone interested in colonial Vancouver Island and British Columbia. — Richard Mackie
I pity the child; his life,
like the night, will be
strange and wild.
— nurse at Hankin’s birth
VANCOUVER ISLAND EXPLORATION TRILOGY
In Nature’s Realm:
Early Naturalists Explore Vancouver Island (2019)
Never a dull moment in this beautiful and thoroughly enjoyable book — Caroline Woodward, BC Booklook, May 4, 2020
​
Masterful … consummately executed
research and investigation — Dr. Susan E. Parker, UBC University Librarian, May 3, 2020
A work of great range, breadth, and synthesis — Richard Mackie, Ormsby Review, Apr 2, 2020
A Perfect Eden:
Encounters by Early Explorers
of Vancouver Island (2016)
​
The greedy—fur traders, prospectors, timber speculators—rub elbows with the officious—surveyors, cartographers, planners, missionaries—as well as the mad and the magnificent on all sides — Stephen Hume, Vancouver Sun, Dec 21, 2016
​
Sheds new light on some of the long-familiar stories — Dave Obee, Publisher, Times Colonist, Dec 4, 2016
​
The choicest morsels from hundreds of logbooks and diaries…. illustrated with antique engravings and beautiful maps, complemented by a selection of modern paintings of historical scenes — Robert Amos, Times Colonist, Dec 4, 2016
The Land of Heart’s Delight: Early Maps and Charts of Vancouver Island (2013)
Filled with beautifully detailed colour and black-and-white reproductions, this coffee-table book is a must for fans of cartography and history — Mark Collin Reid, Editor-in Chief, Canada’s History (formerly The Beaver)
​
Readable, entertaining and informative … a reference work for many years to come — Dave Obee, Publisher Times Colonist, Nov 3, 2013
​
Meticulously researched and lavishly illustrated — Margaret Thompson, The Coastal Spectator, Jan 14, 2014
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
At Munro’s Books in Victoria for the 2019 launch of
In Nature’s Realm, the third book in author’s Vancouver Island exploration series.
“World traveller finds a treasure trove of print and digital maps” published in the Times Colonist, October 25, 2016, about the author’s passion for maps, and how his first two books came to be.
Born and educated in England, Michael Layland trained as an officer and mapmaker in the Royal Engineers of the British Army. As a civilian, he continued with mapping-related projects in South and Central America, Arabia, North and West Africa, and Antarctica.
​
Throughout his career he experienced first-hand the challenges, complexities, and hazards of working in undeveloped regions. These experiences fostered his empathy and great admiration for the early explorers of Canada’s west coast, in particular Vancouver Island, his home since 1992.
​
His extensive research of the cartographic and exploration history of the Island fuelled his first two books. In the third, In Nature’s Realm, he combined his love of exploration history with a deep, life-long interest in the natural world.
​
Michael Layland has served as president of the Friends of the BC Archives and the Victoria Historical Society. He is a member of the Victoria Natural Historical Society, the Victoria Historical Society, The Writers Union of Canada, Science Writers and Communicators of Canada, and the International Map Collectors’ Society. A past member of the Society for the History of Discoveries, he reviews books for British Columbia History magazine and the Ormsby Review. His articles on explorers and exploration history have appeared in international encyclopedias, including eight entries in the two-volume Oxford Companion to World Exploration.
​