A true story of shipwreck, mutiny, murder, scurvy, battles, terrible storms, and more. As with David Grann’s other books Killers of the Flower Moon and The Lost City of Z, he has put in a lot of research and built up an action-packed, page-turning narrative.
HMS Wager was a man-of-war ship ordered to chase Spanish treasure. This was during the ‘War of Jenkins’ Ear’ in the 1740s. The Wager was part of a squadron which became separated. The wonder is that anyone at all survived to make it back to England and tell their side of the story. Grann tells us about the characters, using archival evidence to breathe life into them and get us interested in the human stories. One of them was 16-year-old John Byron, who was to become a Vice-Admiral and the grandfather of the poet Byron.
The book describes some truly awful experiences and is not for the faint-hearted. What I really liked about the writing was that all the maritime terms and historical contexts were explained effectively without getting in the way of the story. You can start off, as I did, knowing barely anything about ships, the Royal Navy and the 18th century, and by the end of the book you’ve acquired a lot of knowledge while enjoying reading this grim yet gripping account.
Published by Simon & Schuster, 2023.