The Wager: a tale of shipwreck, mutiny and murder

We get to give 5 stars, but if I could give 6 or 7 or 8, I would. Absolutely sensational.This is the story of the Wager from the 1740's. A ship that was part of a British fleet rounding Cape Horn to plunder Spanish galleons only to shipwreck. Some survivors, after considerable ordeal, arrive in Brazil in a decrepit state and return to England only to claim their Captain was dead and they were sole survivors. Then 6 months later, an even more decrepit crew wash up in Chile, including the Captain of the Wager, and return to the UK. Accusations of murder, treachery and treason fly, so who's telling the truth. What action will the notoriously strict British Admiralty take?It's sort of non-fiction, with the blanks filled in by fiction. Most of the narrative is taken from actual ships ledgers and personal journals of those on the Wager.There are almost 50 pages of references and bibliography in a book of just over 300 pages. That in itself tells you the extraordinary research Grann undertook, equivalent to a significant academic science paper.I've recommended this book to many people as it was recommended to me. A superb book, you'll re-read many sections and chapters just to absorb the tale. Brilliant.I've read one or two of the "not so positive" reviews on amazon incidentally. They seem to be by fellow historians to Grann, saying that history shouldn't be judged by modern standards, etc. I'd ignore all these, this is a superb read, start to finish, and gives tremendous insight into the hardships of the time.

I'd heard a lot about this book so was excited to read it. I found it a well-told historical tale that felt longer than it was, sign of a sometimes laboured style. It's deeply researched and tells a gruelling tale of shipwreck, mutiny and conflicting narratives but it sometimes feels like hard work and some of its conclusions are a stretch.I'd recommend reading it but don't expect it to live up to its glowing reviews. I found it good but not great.

I don’t read non-fiction very much - but I turned the pages as though I were reading a gripping novel. Even more than William Golding’s nautical trilogy (Close Quarters is the first if you’ve missed them), this gives a sharp feel for what life on an eighteenth century warship was actually like. Captures the period and gives a strong sense of how people actually behaved and interacted. I found no faults with it. If you like Aubrey/Maturin and Hornblower and that sort of thing, you’ll love this.

I was listening to an abridged version of this book on BBC Radio 4 recently and then I stopped listening because I realised it would be better to read the book – and I’m glad I did.This is a book about a squadron of Royal Navy ships that were despatched to South America to harass Spanish shipping during the oft-forgotten War of Jenkins’s Ear in 1740 (when I was doing A Level History I was taught that it wasn’t his ear but one of the family jewels that was sliced off by a Spanish swordsman). Their commander, Commodore George Anson, has secret orders to sail round Cape Horn and across the Pacific Ocean to the Philippines to intercept and capture a Spanish galleon laden with tonnes of silver and gold extracted from Spain’s colonies in the region.The expedition is a fiasco. The squadron sets off from Portsmouth months later than planned. Many of the crewmen have been pressganged and are untrained. They have only got as far as Madeira when they learn that the Spanish already know about their secret mission and are hunting the Atlantic for them. By the time they get down to Cape Horn the squadron is in a mess due to storms, typhus, scurvy, and damage to the ships. A couple of ships disappear, hundreds of sailors die from disease or drowning or are incapacitated due to sickness. The Wager is the least seaworthy ship and is wrecked on a tiny island off the coast of Chile that later became known as Wager Island. What follows is a kind of Lord of the Flies for adults. I won’t spoil it by saying what happens. Obviously there are survivors – as the back cover announces – and that’s how we know what happened. Or rather, we have several conflicting accounts of what happened. I will say that the back cover blurb doesn’t tell the whole story. A third group of survivors eventually reach home some years later. Also the mission is not a complete disaster as some people emerge from the sea fog with untold riches.I haven’t read any of David Grann’s other books but I gather from the acknowledgements, the note on the sources, the end notes and the select bibliography that he is one of those journalists whose work is capable of verging on history. That means he engaged in extensive research of primary and secondary sources as well as picking the brains of several historians. He even spent three weeks on Wager Island to understand what the castaways went through. There are some jarring notes. Despite the extensive help from editors and historians, the author is not entirely familiar with naval terminology and – specifically – with terminology used on this side of the Atlantic. He often refers to an institution that doesn’t exist – the British Navy – rather than the Royal Navy. That grates, even for a staunch republican like me. Direct quotations from the survivors are converted into American spelling, which also grates, but it would be wrong of me to whinge too much. It’s a well-written book and a lot more than just a dramatic account of a ship wreck. The castaways are not just seamen, they are naval personnel and thus subject to the harsh discipline of the rope – used for flogging and hanging. They are also products of our class hierarchy and all the snobbery and nonsense that that involves. How some of them survived the ordeal is – pardon the cliché – nothing short of a miracle.I’ve seen some complaints about wokery from some reviewers. They seem to assume that 300 years ago there was a consensus about imperialism and slavery such that any right-thinking person at the time couldn’t possibly have conceived of any alternative. That is far from being the case. There were plenty of people questioning what Britain and other European nations were doing sailing the seven seas. Ironically, a lot of that questioning was coming from Tories, like the great Samuel Johnson, who was hardly woke by any standards. It was the Whigs – now the Liberal Democrats in Britain – who were the party of trade and empire, while Johnson and other conservatives with a small “c” were deeply uncomfortable about slavery and our treatment of indigenous peoples.The author gives a practical example of the self-damaging consequences of colonial attitudes. The castaways are shivering and starving to death on Wager Island. A bunch of locals arrive from nowhere. Over the centuries they have developed the skills needed to survive in this hostile environment. They show the castaways how to catch fish and paddle around the stormy seas in flimsy canoes that don’t break up and sink like the British ships and boats. In return some of the castaways try to harass the womenfolk and the locals paddle off. As a result dozens of men die who could possibly have survived if they had cooperated better with the locals. At a later date, several men are rescued by locals and taken hundreds of miles to safety. The author therefore makes a valid point when he complains that the survivors refer to these lifesavers as “savages”. There’s a lot of irony there, given the behaviour of some of the castaways.I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys action and adventure, naval history, British history or to anyone who wants to know more about how human beings behave and survive in extreme circumstances.

There’s so much to commend this book. The amount of research the author must have done is staggering. I was, for the most part, completely drawn into the world of 18th century sea-faring, mutiny, and survival against the odds. It’s full of richly drawn characters and incredible action. I’ve had to deduct a star for the author’s insistence of putting in his 21st century US liberal judgments. These moments were distracting and took me out of the story. Leave the reader to make their own mind up about the morals of the characters and European imperialism.This aside, it’s a gripping read and one I highly recommend.

Incredible historic story - puts life today into perspective

WOW! Quite a story. This is an enjoyable and easy read. Lots of twists and turns.Incredible to imagine that people survived such dire circumstances.Gann is a masterful writer.

Ótimo livro, daqueles que você não consegue desgrudar.

Nothing not to like! Fast-moving for an historical story, well written, and hard to put down. Didn't give any print errors and the page weights are thick, work a great cover and art included.

Lo compre para mi papá de navidad. Le encanto el libro, es muy buen regalo. Y viene todo bien en relación a las páginas y sin daños.

I am not a history buff, nor am I usually interested in anything about the Navy, but this book pulled me in right away! It was incredibly interesting, exciting, and well researched. I read the book in just a few days. I couldn't put it down... I had to find out what happened next!I got to know the characters and felt like I was along for their extraordinary tough and scary experience! This is a Must Read!