| CLASSIC DIVE BOOKS
Classic Shipwrecks Please note: The books are listed for interest only, and not offered for sale. See also MARITIME
ARCHAEOLOGY.
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HOMEPAGE |
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This section is difficult to categorise, but generally refers to a few "old" books on "old" shipwrecks. |
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RELIC
OF THE MARY ROSE
Published originally in 1841 but this edition was re-published in 1995 for the 175th anniversary of Siebe Gorman & Co Ltd. The cover is made of wood and leatherette and has a gold Siebe Gorman crest. There are only sixteen pages in the book, all pages being edged in gold leaf. It measures 4 inches (10 cms) by 3 inches (7.5 cms). Each copy made was given a unique number of a limited edition. Covers the story of the Mary Rose that sunk at Spithead in July 1545. [ps] |
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RELIC
OF THE ROYAL GEORGE
First published in 1842 but this edition was re-published in 1995 for the 175th anniversary of Siebe Gorman & Co Ltd. The cover is made of wood and leatherette and has a gold Siebe Gorman crest. The 136 pages are edged in gold leaf. There is a 3 page fold out print depicting the actual sinking of the ship in 1782. It measures 4.5 inches (11.2 cms) by 3 inches (7.5 cms). Each copy made was given a unique number of a limited edition. Covers the story of the Royal George that sunk at Spithead in August 1782 and how she was removed by the famous Colonel Paisley of the British Royal Engineers. [ps] This from collector Doug Stimson: I have had for some decades now a copy of this book “A Narrative of the Loss of the Royal George including a statement of her sinking written by her then flag-lieutenant Admiral C.P.H. Durham, G.C.B. Late Commander –in-Chief, at Porstmouth”. It is the second edition printed and published by S Horsey, Sen. 43 Queen Street in 1844 and is bound in the wood of the wreck. It is in good condition except there is a fragment of wood missing from the front cover. See Royal George website for photographs of the original book. |
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GREAT
SHIPWRECKS AND CASTAWAYS.
Authentic Accounts of Adventurs at Sea. Charles Neider. Harper and Brothers Publishers, New York, 1952. Library of Cingress 51-11943. Hardcover, dust jacket, 238 pages, sources list, no index, no prints. From the fly: Here's a collection of sea-going adventure stories unlike anything you've ever read. From the Arctic to the Cape of Good Hope, from the days of wooden galleons to modem times, these are eye-witness accounts of peril on the ocean, on desert islands and in savage coun- tries. Every word of them is true, set down by the men and women who, by luck, courage and ingenuity, somehow managed to survive their harrowing experiences long enough to leave the record. The original Robinson Crusoe tells in his own words the story from which Defoe took his famous classic. So does Miss Ann Saunders, a prim young lady who never expected to be shipwrecked, still less to drink the blood of her own fiance. And Peter Carder, the resourceful Englishman,who escaped drowning only to fall among wild animals, drunken cannibals and slave traders. Here also is the journal of Robert Falcon Scott, who made one of history's grimmest and most heroic marches across the wastes of the South Pole. Another testament, found beside its author's skeleton, is a tragic confession of suffering by a man' abandoned by his shipmates to die in torment. Each of these stories is a drama of man's battle against the sea and nature, stamped with the times and personalities of the people who wrote them. To obtain the authentic material for this volume, Charles Neider has searched through innumerable documents, for the most part completely new to modern readers. The stories he found, says Stanley Rogers, "produce in the reader a sense of having himself experienced the very adventures, sufferings and heroism so powerfully described in the survivors own records. This is certainly a book that one should own." |
| PLAIN BLUE COVER
DUST JACKET? |
SURVIVORS'
TALES OF FAMOUS SHIPWRECKS
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THE
EMERALD WHALER
William J. Laubenstein. First published by Andre Deutsch Ltd, no date. Readers Book Club in association with The Companioin Book Club, London, 1962. Hardcover, dustjacket, 240 pages, a few mono prints, bibliography, no index. Tells the story of the three-masted whaler Catalpa, which set out from New Bedford, USA, for Western Australia in 1875 with the objective of rescuing fellow Irishmen imprisoned at Fremantle for their part in the Irish rebellion ten years earlier. The rescue of six Fenians was succesful. [ps] |
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THE
TALE OF A SHIPWRECK
James Norman Hall Published by Houghton Mifflin, 1934. Hardcover, dustjackt, 164 pages, illustrations. Account of the author's shipwreck on the way to Pitcairn Island from his home in Tahiti in 1933..The Author draws parallels between his shipwreck and that of the "Mutiny on the Bounty", which he co-wrote. |
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THE
WRECK OF THE WHALESHIP ESSEX.
A Narrative Account by Owen Chase, First Mate. Edited with prologue and epilogue, by Iola Haverstick and Betty Shepard. Modern English edition published 1968, Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc. Edition shown published by Constable Young Books Ltd, London. Owen Chase's account of the wreck of the Essex was irst published in new York City in 8121 under the title Narrative of the Most Extraordinary and Distressing Shipwreck of the Whale-Ship Essex. The modern edition is rerpinted through the courtesy of the Rare Book Division of the New York Public Library. A recent television documentary The True Story of Moby Dick was shown on Australian ABC television in October 2002, based on the wreck of the Essex. Superbly made, it gave the impression that this was the basis for Herman Melville's classic tale of th hunt for a huge whale that succeeds in sinking its adversary. Whatever, the documentary was excellent, and the book brilliant. |
| WRECKED
AMONG CANNIBALS IN THE FIJIS. A NARRATIVE OF SHIPWRECK & ADVENTURE
IN THE SOUTH SEAS.
William Endicott, Third Mate of the Ship Glide, with Notes by Lawrence Waters Jenkins. Published 1923 by the Marine Research Society, Salem, USA. Possibly 76 pages, frontis., 11 plates. |
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