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The Lost Fleet
A Yankee Whaler's Struggle Against the Confederate Navy and Arctic Disaster

by Marc Songini



      At one time whale oil lit the lamps of the world, and the New England whalers harvested many thousands of the leviathans that provided that oil.  Marc Songini's lively book tells the story of one man and his family, but more than that, it provides a fascinating, in-depth account of the demise of the entire whaling industry.

Thomas William Williams and his tiny, courageous and pregnant wife, Eliza, boarded the Florida to begin a three year whale hunt on November 7, 1858. This exciting story follows Williams from 1840 through 1880.

Here is the story of the Stone Fleet: the whalers which were loaded with New England granite and then scuttled to block Confederate shipping out of Charleston, South Carolina, in an effort to stymie the Confederate Navy.  Here too is the story of the intrepid Confederate ship Alabama, whose main mission was to capture and destroy whaling ships; a job subsequently carried on by the Shenandoah. These two ships were responsible for burning and sinking a great many whaling ships, with the Shenandoah inadvertently continuing this mission past the end of the Civil War, to the point where she was considered a pirate vessel.  Most of the remainder of the whaling fleet self-destructed in the forbidding Arctic seas.

Songini's years of research produced a book that is factual enough to suit the strictest academic, and yet thrilling enough to read like a great novel. His excellence in writing captures the excitement of the hunt, the fear and heart pumping excitement of loss and victory at war, and the terror and great hardships spawned by Arctic disaster.

If you are fascinated by sea stories, and a history devotee, this book will give you hours of great reading.  It is thoroughly entertaining along with being educational. There is an extensive bibliography and index, and several pages of black and white photos add visual impact to the story.

The Book

St. Martin's Press
July 24, 2007
Hardcover
0-312-28648-1 / 978-0-312-28648-4
Nonfiction / History
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Excerpt
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The Reviewer

Beverly J. Rowe
Reviewed 2007
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© 2007 MyShelf.com