From the international bestselling author of KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON and THE LOST CITY OF Z, a mesmerising story of shipwreck, mutiny and murder, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth.
On 28th January 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the coast of Brazil. Inside were thirty emaciated men, barely alive, and they had an extraordinary tale to tell. They were survivors of His Majesty’s ship The Wager, a British vessel that had left England in 1740 on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain. While chasing a Spanish treasure-filled galleon, The Wager was wrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia. The crew, marooned for months and facing starvation, built the flimsy craft and sailed for more than a hundred days, traversing 2,500 miles of storm-wracked seas. They were greeted as heroes.
Then, six months later, another, even more decrepit, craft landed on the coast of Chile. This boat contained just three castaways and they had a very different story to tell. The thirty sailors who landed in Brazil were not heroes – they were mutineers. The first group responded with counter-charges of their own, of a tyrannical and murderous captain and his henchmen. While stranded on the island the crew had fallen into anarchy, with warring factions fighting for dominion over the barren wilderness. As accusations of treachery and murder flew, the Admiralty convened a court martial to determine who was telling the truth. The stakes were life-and-death-for whomever the court found guilty could hang.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 352
Imprint: SIMON & SCHUSTER UK
Publication date: 11/05/2023
The Wager
by David Grann
Review by Harriet
At the height of imperial naval exploits in the 18th century, ‘The Wager’ sets off for Cape Horn as part of a fleet of British warships, on a murky mission to exert dominance over Spain and seize their ill-gotten treasure. What follows is a relentless onslaught of bad weather, scurvy, starvation, violence and mutiny. Grann is a master at capturing the tension between the men’s desire to survive and make it home alive, and their adherence to a rigid Naval hierarchy and colonial class system, which even in such foreign circumstances so very far from home, govern their every move. His meticulous research and clear-eyed empathy bring into razor-sharp focus, the monumental and tragic disregard of lives and resources in the name of empire building. This is a cracking good read – even for those with no previous interest in maritime history. Also, how on earth did they keep their precious record books dry?!
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