Book Review: In the Heart of the Sea (2015) by Nathaniel Philbrick

London: William Collins

ISBN: 9780008126834

302pp

Imagine it’s 1821 and you are on board the whaling ship Essex, out of Nantucket on the east coast of America. It’s a small, three masted wooden ship, only 87 feet long, with a crew of twenty men. Your voyage will take you to the Azore Islands in middle of the Atlantic Ocean, south to the Cape Verde Islands off the West African coast, then around the notorious rough seas of Cape Horn to the whaling grounds in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. You could be at sea for up to three years or until the ship’s hold is full of whale oil.

Now imagine your ship is rammed by a huge sperm whale and sinks in ten minutes. The entire crew of twenty men take to three, small, rowing boats – carrying all they can salvage. You’re thousands of miles from the South American mainland, have no chronometer, no sextant and only basic navigation aids. What would you do to survive in an open boat when food and water runs out? The men did the unspeakable – but recorded everything. Those in one boat survived for 89 days before they were rescued by a passing ship. The captain of that ship, Captain William Crozier, described what he saw in the rowing boat “the most deplorable and affecting picture of suffering and misery.” They had navigated over two thousand five hundred miles with astonishing accuracy. The second boat to survive was three hundred miles further south, and almost at their destination, when they were rescued after 94 days at sea. They were also in a sorry state.

In the Heart of the Sea, by Nathaniel Philbrick tells this epic, true story of how eight of the crew survived the ordeal. It’s a story of courage and ingenuity, desperation and cannibalism. The account is as chilling as it is forensic. The detail is such that a reader can visualise the appalling conditions they endured and the decisions they felt forced to make. However, the book is more than merely a grisly tale of survival. Philbrick places the events in an historical context – charting the rise and fall of the whaling industry. He explains the pressures on communities and families where the sailors spend a few months on land and then years at sea. The pressure on ship owners and captains to make each voyage profitable and to satisfy the demand for whale oil.

Philbrick’s book draws upon the written testimony of survivors, published accounts and books, official reports of the tragedy and other contemporary material. For each chapter the author provides the sources for his account, a selected bibliography as well as an index. He includes diagrams of the Essex, the route the ill-fated ship travelled prior to sinking and route of the arduous journey back towards South America. Philbrick supplements his story with 28 black and white photographs; portraits and wood cuts, paintings and crew lists as well of sketches of the Essex as she sank.

In the Heart of the Sea may not be as famous as Herman Melville’s book Moby Dick – but it deserves to be. Not all of the content is easy to read but you will marvel at the story.

Professor Fred Lockwood

About the author

Nathaniel Philbrick (born June 11, 1956) is an American author of history, winner of the US National Book Award, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

His other books include:

Sea of Glory: America’s Voyage of Discovery, The U.S. Exploring Expedition, 1838-1842 (2004).

Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community and War (2006).

Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold and the fate of the American Revolution (2016).